All's Fair at the Fair (1947) User Reviews

standard Popeye threesome

[SnoopyStyle · 7/10 · 24 July 2021]

Popeye and Olive Oyl arrive at the County Fair. Bluto is the star attraction doing a balloon jump. He takes a liking to Olive and starts undermining Popeye. One can never trust Olive Oyl. She always has that wandering eye. The animation style is not the nicest Popeye cartoon. Otherwise, this is a solid standard Popeye three-hander.

Not quite uplifting or deflating

[TheLittleSongbird · 6/10 · 31 August 2020]

The Famous Studios, more the earlier ones than the more variable later ones, Popeye cartoons were generally amusing enough and all the 40s efforts were well made (a bit more mixed for the 50s ones). To me though Fleischer's Popeye cartoons were funnier and fresher (even when the stories were formulaic the material was often very inventive) and they looked better, or at least looked better than the later Famous Studios output where time and budget limitations showed.

1947 was not a bad year for the series or even the studio. 'All's Fair at the Fair', not to be confused with the 1938 Fleischer Studios cartoon of the same time (a great cartoon) really isn't the series at its best and doesn't really represent what it is that makes the Popeye cartoons appealing. One of the weakest Popeye cartoons of 1947, the late-40s (the decade perhaps too) and towards the lower half of the series overall too. Does that mean that 'All's Fair at the Fair' is bad? No it isn't. It is also not particularly great either.

'All's Fair at the Fair's' animation is bright and colourful as usual for the late-40s efforts and there is some lovely background detail. Don't have any issue with the music either and never did throughout the series, which is typically merry and sumptuous, adding to and enhancing the action and even gestures and expressions. There are some amusing moments, though nothing here is hilarious or particularly inspired.

Popeye is an enjoyable titular character as always, will never get enough of his asides, while Bluto matches him, betters him even, in comic timing while being a suitably formidable foil. Their chemistry is nice though there is not an awful lot new to it. The voice acting is also fine, Jack Mercer being spot on.

However, 'All's Fair at the Fair' is very predictable, despite a different setting this was a bit repetitive, and never feels particularly inspired. It could have done with more energy and certainly more gags, what was there never really rises above amusing. The first half can be quite dull, taking too long and while things do pick up in the second half, the wildness isn't quite there.

Olive is very bland and has very little to do other than being a plot device.

Summarising, didn't leave me deflated but not quite uplifting enough. 6/10

It's a "Fair" Example of Popeye

[Hitchcoc · 7/10 · 31 July 2021]

This is the standard plot. The locations are pretty much what distinguishes on Popeye cartoon from the next. Bluto is a main attraction balloon man who sees Olive and goes bananas (as usual). He embarrasses Popeye a couple times and Olive goes off with him in his balloon but he is only after one thing. Fortunately, there is a spinach canning exhibit on the fairgrounds.

How can one hen lay an egg every . . .

[oscaralbert · 6/10 · 2 August 2021]

. . . minute, as documented in ALL'S FAIR AT THE FAIR? In the middle of this animated short, Olive and Popeye stumble across "Old Faithful" in the Poultry Barn. She is by herself, except for a massive mound of previously-laid eggs representing her work so far that day. (Think about it: An egg a minute adds up to 60 eggs every hour, 1400 daily or about 9,800 per week.) It seems fairly certain that a fair grounds would be overwhelmed by having 40,000 chicks running around after being open for a month. (Maybe this is why many fairs close up shop after just a week: Too many chicks spoil the pot!)

Popeye turns out to be a pretty lucky dude . . .

[pixrox1 · 7/10 · 30 March 2023]

. . . when he lands on a spinach-packing conveyor belt demonstration after falling hundreds of feet from a burning hot air balloon. As his charmed life continues to unfold, his gaping mouth is exactly positioned where the next empty can should be, resulting in him getting his episode's quota of the green stuff. Olive proves to be equally blessed, as the outer skin of the burning balloon is rigid enough to hold her paper weight until the moment the final patch is incinerated. B-l-u-t-o, on the other hand, gets bailed out twice during ALL'S FAIR AT THE FAIR. The first instance is of his own volition, when he hogs the only escape device available to flee the aerial fire. However, his second baling is involuntary--and that ain't hay!