Ballot Box Bunny (1951) User Reviews

The Ultimate Smear Campaigners?

[ccthemovieman-1 · 8/10 · 22 February 2007]

Yosemite Sam is running for mayor. One of his campaign promises is "to rid this country of every last rabbit." Bugs chokes on his carrot when he hears this.

"Hey, this calls for strategy. I'll fight fire with fire," he proclaims. He decides to run against "Honest Sam."

Talk about smear campaigns! Mainly, what these two guys try to do is the blow the other guy up, with dynamite stuck in everything from watermelons to pianos. It's the usual fare, but that means some clever gags and Bugs usually outwitting the loud and obnoxious Sam.

In the ending, well, let's just saw a "dark horse" surprises both candidates.

"Nobody will vote for a flattened-out rabbit skin, I always say."

[utgard14 · 8/10 · 9 October 2015]

Hilarious Bugs Bunny short that takes a poke at politics. It's directed by Friz Freleng with a story by Warren Foster. Yosemite Sam is running for mayor on an anti-rabbit campaign. Bugs hears this and decides to enter the race to oppose Sam. One laugh after another with great lines and gags. Very nice animation with well-drawn characters and backgrounds. Wonderful Technicolor is always a plus. Excellent voice work from the incomparable Mel Blanc. He does some of his best Yosemite Sam work here. Energetic music from Carl Stalling. My favorite bits were the cee-gar bit and the Emma joke. Oh and that ending is classic. A great Bugs & Yosemite Sam cartoon that is sure to please most fans.

One of the better Yosemite Sam and Bugs Bunny cartoons.

[Mightyzebra · 8/10 · 29 June 2009]

Usually I am not a huge fan of the Looney Tunes cartoons where Bugs Bunny and Yosemite Sam are partnered together, as they almost always end up in a pretty mediocre string of slapstick jokes. Here, there were still slapstick jokes, but, for me, they seemed to be funnier and there seemed to be a secret personality let out from Yosemite Sam in this episode that I had not seen before (I do not want to give spoilers, but basically how he feels about partnership). Also, some of the slapstick gags included were ones that (according to reviewers on IMDb) have been repeated several times, I had not seen before, so I found them almost delightful to watch. (The piano one was one of them.) The theme of the episode was also quite entertaining. If there was one thing I did not like about this episode, it was that almost all of the jokes end up with dynamite going off or guns being fired. Pretty dull.

In this episode, we first see Yosemite Sam trying to place himself in the title of mayor, by convincing the townspeople to respect him. As he strings out a rather irrelevant list of things he will do for them, Sam tells the people he will eradicate every rabbit. Duh, Bugs Bunny is listening nearby - and of course -, he does his best to fight against Sam and become mayor. Cartoon capers commence...

I do not want you to go away thinking that I really like this episode, it is not one of my very favourites. It is one of my favourites which includes Bugs and Sam.

I recommend this to people who like all Yosemite Sam and Bugs Bunny jokes and for Looney Tunes fans in general. Enjoy "Ballot Box Bunny"! :-)

A good example of a cartoon where neither Bugs Bunny or Yosemite Sam win

[TheLittleSongbird · 10/10 · 24 June 2010]

No matter how predictable some of the story is, Ballot Box Bunny is enormously entertaining with a huge amount to like.

So what was it about Ballot Box Bunny that I loved? Well first of all, the pacing is just right, I was really delighted at how quickly the cartoon went and how many entertaining moments were squeezed in without feeling bloated. The animation is really good, with a real sense of colour, crispness and vibrancy, and the music is rousing enough. The dialogue is typical Looney Tunes wit, clever, sophisticated and irreverent, and the gags are fast paced and funny no matter how many times you see Yosemite Sam getting blown up. Bugs is great and witty, but Sam is the one who steals the show with the best lines I feel. I also love how neither character wins in the end, instead it is a "dark horse", and of course once again Mel Blanc does a stellar job with the vocal characterisations.

Overall, fast paced and very entertaining. 10/10 Bethany Cox.

Believe Me If All Those Endearing Young Charms

[Guitar-8 · 14 October 2003]

***SPOILERS*** ***SPOILERS*** This was a classic Warner Brothers gag that was used in three shorts.

Ballot Box Bunny is one of them (Show Biz Bugs & Rushing Roulette-Road Runner are the other two).

Yosemite Sam sets a trap on the piano so when Bugs Bunny hits that note, he would explode. The song would be "Believe Me If All Those Endearing Young Charms".

However, Bugs plays the tune incorrectly twice! That has Sam go to the piano, play the tune right & then gets exploded for hitting that note!

FUNNY GAG!

Mayor vs Mayor

[CuriosityKilledShawn · 10/10 · 12 June 2004]

Bugs and Yosemite Sam are at their best in this brilliant cartoon which sees them fighting each other over the Mayor elections in a country town. Sam has vowed to wipe out all rabbits from the town and naturally Bugs is upset.

The usual tricks and hijinks follow. But what makes them different this time is that instead of Bugs duping Sam into stupidity, Sam plays many nasty tricks on Bugs. But the bunny is so smart and so many steps ahead that he manages to reverse each and every trick back onto Sam. The comic timing is just perfect.

In the end none of them win. A mare becomes mayor. Trust me it makes sense.

A predictable but fast paced cartoon where there's always an explosion just around the corner!

[phantom_tollbooth · 6/10 · 18 August 2008]

Friz Freleng's 'Ballot Box Bunny' was one of my favourite cartoons as a child and watching it today it's easy to see why it appealed to my anarchic young mind. Barely a minute goes by without some kind of explosion, be it from a joke cigar, a cannon, a stick of dynamite or a booby trapped piano. The premise of Bugs Bunny and Yosemite Sam running against each other in the Mayoral elections is just an excuse for these various time-honoured routines. The most famous gag, used again and again in cartoons, is the piano with the booby trapped key which sets off some TNT. This old joke takes so long to tell that it always bores me nowadays unless it is timed impeccable. In 'Ballot Box Bunny' it is performed in a pretty uninteresting manner. There's a few other slip ups in timing throughout this cartoon, most noticeably the ludicrously late spit-take Bugs does at the beginning of the short. Despite relying on safe, predictable jokes for the most part, 'Ballot Box Bunny' is a fast paced cartoon which manages to avoid being dull despite the audience being one step ahead of every scene in Warren Foster's script. The plus side of this is that it makes the brilliant, slightly macabre ending all the more unexpected and funny.

Definitely recommended!

[JohnHowardReid · 9/10 · 16 March 2018]

STARS: "Bugs Bunny", "Yosemite Sam".

Director: I. FRELENG. Story: Warren Foster. Animation: Ken Champin, Virgil Ross, Arthur Davis, Manuel Perez. Lay-outs: Hawley Pratt. Backgrounds: Paul Julian. Voice characterizations: Mel Blanc. Music director: Carl W. Stalling. Color by Technicolor.

Copyright 13 January 1952 by The Vitaphone Corp. (In notice: 1950). A Warner Bros. "Looney Tunes" cartoon. U.S. release: 6 October 1951. 1 reel.

COMMENT: Running for mayor, Sam's the Man promises his constituents their fair share of fresh air and sunshine, and a rabbit - no, two rabbits - in every pot.

Naturally, Bugs is forced to campaign against Yosemite, doing his famous Teddy Roosevelt impersonation and providing a free picnic which Sam disrupts with a packet of Assorted Picnic Ants.

Further amusing confrontations follow before both our heroes are defeated by a dark horse.

Clever, fast-paced, ingratiatingly characterized, more than gently satiric.

In Warner Bros.' last-ditch attempt to stop . . .

[oscaralbert · 7/10 · 28 December 2015]

. . . John Wayne and Hedda Hopper from getting every past and present Democratic Party Member in California jailed (Dalton Trumbo) or assassinated-on-the-sly (John Garfield) by all of World War Two's laid off O.S.S. sneaks, its Looney Tunes Division sicked BALLOT BOX BUNNY on "Il Duce." Around 3:14 minutes (or about halfway) into this animated short, Bugs Bunny tricks Yosemite Sam into offering a cartoon caricature of John Wayne a complimentary campaign cigar (one that explodes, as substituted by Bugs!) which (prophetically) turns this voter into ashes (though, this being a cartoon, "Il Duce" revives quickly enough to punch out Sam). After Sam gets blown up twice more by his own smoking devices (again, a precursor of Mr. Wayne's Final Destination), Bugs offers Sam a revolver (a very rare gesture from this usually pacific hare), asking, "Anyone for Russian Roulette?" Since the Warner Brass guessed correctly that Mr. Wayne's pogrom would result in thousands more Hollywood deaths, injuries, broken families, and ruined lives (all of which happened, as documented in TRUMBO), it's not much of a stretch to imagine that Warner hoped BALLOT BOX BUNNY would result in either 10 more years of President Truman OR "Il Duce" having a "mortal gun-cleaning accident."

Ballot Box Bunny is another funny Friz Freling-directed Bugs Bunny cartoon

[tavm · 9/10 · 31 December 2007]

When Yosemite Sam runs for mayor, he vows to "rid the country of every last rabbit". Bugs, overhearing this in his hole, resolves to "fight fire with fire" and runs against him. Considering the explosions that happen here, that's an understatement! One such gag you usually find in these Friz Freling-directed shorts has Sam calling truce with Bugs and offering him a piano to play "Believe Me If All Those Endering Young Charms". The rabbit plays it wrong unknowingly and gets Sam to play it right with the thing literally blowing up in his face! Another touch I loved is when Sam uses some ants to steal some food from Bugs' picnic, a speeded up-version of the "William Tell Overture" (probably more familiar to boomers as "The Lone Ranger Theme") is playing. This short ends with a literal "dark horse" winning and the two leads playing Russian Roulette. I won't spoil it for you but if you're familiar with Bugs and Sam, you'll probably guess how it ends. Another highly recommended Warner Bros. cartoon short.

Wouldn't politics be better if it was more like this?

[lee_eisenberg · 10/10 · 23 October 2006]

Bugs Bunny and Yosemite Sam run against each other for mayor in a small town. Needless to say, they have all sorts of dirty tricks to play on each other; Karl Rove has got nothing on these guys. I wish to assert that politics would be better if it was more like what "Ballot Box Bunny" portrays. Sure, you may say, politics is already dirty enough - especially with George W. Bush getting us into the Iraq War and the recent revelations of Mark Foley's creepy activities. But seriously folks, wouldn't you prefer Bugs and Sam's actions to politicians running touchy-feely ads telling us how they'll lead us through prosperity and adversity? All in all, a classic cartoon. And don't forget to vote on November 7!

Sam and Bugs

[Michael_Elliott · 12 April 2009]

Ballot Box Bunny (1951)

*** (out of 4)

Another winning Looney Tunes episode this time finds Yosemite Sam running for Mayor when Bugs Bunny shows up and decides to run against him. With the two in a battle for the job you just know one of them are going to get blown up. The word explosion is the key here because there are many throughout the short and all of them get some very big laughs. We have an exploding cigar, piano, canon and all of them give some hysterical laughs. Sam's character is wonderful here and really steals the film, although there's no doubt he was one of Bug's greatest co-stars. What I also enjoyed was the look of Sam after being blown up countless times. Each time gave Sam a new look and I loved all of them.

A wonderful satire of American politics

[StSangue · 9/10 · 3 June 2001]

Even fifty years later this short holds up as a terrific commentary on life in America. Here's Yosimite Sam, running for mayor on a platform that promises to exterminate rabbits. "Two rabbits in every pot." Bugs hears this and needs to run against him to save his own skin.

Sound familiar?

anybody up for Russian roulette??

[movieman_kev · 23 November 2004]

Bugs Bunny chooses to run against Yosemite Sam for mayor, after Sam runs on a platform of exterminating all the rabbits and two rabbits in every pot. Of course Bugs doesn't wan't to share his pot with anyone. So he sets off to win the election. Like real politics dirty tricks abound. Most of them quite humorous. The funniest being the classic piano gag. But at the end it's all for naught as a dark horse candidate wins. This funny cartoon is on Disk 1 of the "Loony Tunes Golden Collection Volume 1" I'm happy that the Russian roulette gag is here at the end, as whenever the short is on Cartoon Network it's omitted.

My Grade: A

"Ooooh, I hate that rabbit!"

[slymusic · 7 April 2009]

"Ballot Box Bunny" is a terrific Bugs Bunny/Yosemite Sam cartoon directed by a man who has been described many times as BEING Yosemite Sam: Isadore "Friz" Freleng. This time around, Sam runs for mayor, promising the people that he shall rid the town of every last rabbit. Faced with this information, Bugs obviously must make every effort to stop him.

Highlights: Bugs is hilarious in his Teddy Roosevelt disguise. Bugs uses dynamite to persuade Sam that it is unwise to steal his picnic food. Bugs tricks Sam into opening his own booby-trapped door ("Emma!"). And lastly, there's the classic "All Those Endearing Young Charms" piano gag, which we see in several other Warner Bros. cartoons.

Catch "Ballot Box Bunny" on the Looney Tunes Golden Collection Volume 1 Disc 1. Whether you vote for Sam or for Bugs, you're sure to have a good time watching it!