This year, winter seems as if it may not end until, well, next winter. Many have been stuck in mountains of snow, experiencing sub-zero temperatures, and then, on top of that, a massive blizzard hit parts of the country this week.
We all wait patiently for the first glimmer of spring.
Until then, we hunker down inside. While doing that, why not spend time with classic cartoon characters, suffering through the same winter fate. In 2021, there was a first installment of winter-themed cartoons, and here, as winter drags on, are just three more.
Hockey Homicide (1945) – Disney
From its opening moments, with the title carved roughly into ice, this short announces itself and the satirical celebration of winter’s most popular sport (especially after this year’s Winter Olympics) that will follow.
As Hockey Homicide starts, it’s snowing outside a hockey arena, where a sign announces that it’s 60 degrees cooler inside. The two teams about to square off are the Loose Leafs and the Ant Eaters, with the names of the players the same as those of Disney artists, such as Icebox Bertino (animator Al Bertino) and Fearless Ferguson (animator Norm Ferguson), and a referee named Clean Game Kinney (after the short’s director Jack Kinney).
There’s a penalty even before the drop of the puck. When the face-off does happen, the players knock the referee into the clock hanging above the ice. They then knock the puck into the stands, where it takes the place of a player’s hamburger, and the player’s burger gets knocked onto the ice, substituting as the puck. The goalie then stops the shot by eating the “puck.”
The other goalie must then take a break from ice fishing to block multiple shots of the puck, which has been retrieved from the stands. There are plenty of eruptions of fights, both on the ice (which includes a player breaking through to the water below) and in the stands (which includes fans pummeling each other).
The buzzer sounds, ending the first period, and everyone stops in a freeze frame. As the players leave the ice, it’s littered with debris. The rest of the game starts, the referee nervously drops the puck and skates away into the stands to escape the impending doom.
The Ant Eaters finally score, and the goalie is so distraught that he starts crying, but his tears freeze into ice. At the next drop of the puck, the referee is in a suit of armor.
A player and puck are then shot into the net, but the goalie swats the player and the puck away, into the stands, parting the crowd like the Red Sea. Then, the referee and the puck get shot into the net, and when the goalie deflects them, all of the pucks that the referee is carrying fly up in the air and come raining down like snow.
This leads to a free-for-all, with all the players shooting pucks, including one who’s scooping them up with the snow shovel. The crowd in the stands then gets raucous, taking over the ice (in a long shot that looks like ants taking over an ant hill).
It’s a fast-paced, dizzying conclusion; the players wind up in the stands watching the fans fight it out on the ice below, as the narrator (Doodles Weaver) notes, “…that’s why hockey is called a spectator sport,” as the short concludes.
This is a sharp entry in the era of the Goofy shorts, where the character seemed to exist in a universe of “Goofies.” The writing, by Bill Berg and Dick Kinney (Jack’s brother), takes some pointed jabs at the sport, particularly in the running gag where Bertino and Ferguson come out of the penalty box multiple times during the game, only to begin fighting again, which sends them back into the penalty box.
Director Kinney and his team, which included Milt Kahl, John Sibley, Jack Boyd, and Hal King, handled the ongoing eruption of cartoon violence with smooth, free-flowing animation, including plenty of “bonks” to the head with hockey sticks.
With an ending that includes a flurry of action on and off the ice and intercuts scenes from everything from Victory Through Air Power, the Goofy short How to Play Baseball, and even Monstro from Pinocchio, Hockey Homicide is free-wheeling fun.
Snow Business (1953) – Warner Bros.
This Looney Tunes short, directed by I. Freleng, opens on a blizzard and Granny (Bea Benaderet) in her car. She is told that the road is closed, and she is concerned because her bird and cat are trapped at her cabin.
Meanwhile, up at the cabin, we see her bird and cat, Tweety and Sylvester (both Mel Blanc), nestled together, comfy by the fire, when a report comes over the radio that the blizzard has left the mountain snowbound and that all roads to the mountains may be closed for six weeks
“Six weeks?!,” Exclaims Sylvester. “I’ll starve!”
Unfortunately, what he finds is that the refrigerator, the pantry, and the closet are stocked with nothing but birdseed. So, Tweety, being as sweet as Tweety is, wants to help and starts thinking about what cats like to eat.
Sylvester starts thinking of liver, fish, and…when he comes to the third option, he stops and gets a devilish look in his eyes.
In the next scene, the cat is gathering a pot, wood, and a lit match over near the stove. He then builds a paper boat for Tweety, puts Tweety in it, and puts it in the pot filled with water. Poor Tweety is excited and begins singing, “Song of the Marines (We’re Shovin’ Right Off Again).”
As Sylvester starts seasoning the water in his “Tweety soup,” a mouse (Blanc), crazed with hunger, comes out of the mouse hole and is so starved that it starts gnawing at Sylvester’s tail. When Sylvester then runs to chase the mouse, it jumps down Tarzan-like and begins gnawing on the cat’s ear.
As Sylvester and the mouse battle it out it, Tweety escapes, and the mouse pushes Sylvester into the pot of boiling water.
Later, as a plan B, Sylvester pours cooking oil into a pan and offers Tweety the opportunity to go skating, placing the bird into the pan, where Tweety skitters around on the oil.
While flipping Tweety up and down in the pan, like a flapjack, the little bird escapes and as Sylvester goes to get him he puts his hand on the hot surface of the stove and then has to cool it off by opening a window and shoving it into the snow outside. The mouse then hits Sylvester on the head with a bowling ball and begins to pull the cat’s leg into his mouse hole, and begins cooking Sylvester’s leg on a rotisserie.
Production cel from “Snow Business”
As the short ends, Sylvester and Tweety are sitting at a table, both eating bird seed out of a bowl like cereal. Just as Tweety asks Sylvester how he likes it, the mouse bites the cat’s tail one more time. As Sylvester shouts, Tweety says, “Oh, come now, it can’t be that bad.”
With writing by Warren Foster and animation from Ken Champin, Arthur Davis, Virgil Ross, and others, Snow Business builds the gags well throughout the short, each one topping the other (Sylvester’s “hot hand” doesn’t just melt the snow around the cabin, but thaws the entire mountainside). It’s also fun to see the tables turned on Sylvester, with the mouse pursuing him.
It’s a solid Sylvester and Tweety outing, and relatable for anyone who has cabin fever this winter.
• “Snow Business” can be caught on MeTV Toons, or owned on blu-ray on “Looney Tunes Collector’s Vault: Volume 1”, on Disc 2.
The A-Tom-inable Snowman (1966) – MGM
From the “Chuck Jones-era” of Tom and Jerry cartoons at MGM comes this outing, featuring the famous duo’s pursuit against a winter setting. Tom chases Jerry on skis, and Jerry ducks into a medical cabin, hiding there with a sleeping Saint Bernard.
To get the dog to leave, Tom places his skis upside down in the snow to stage a trapped skier, and yells “Help!” which causes the Saint Bernard to come out.
As the Saint Bernard looks for the skier who isn’t there, Tom chases Jerry through the cabin. Tom falls off the nearby cliff and rolls into a snowball, crashing down to earth, as Jerry alerts the Saint Bernard.
As the Saint Bernard rescues Tom, the frozen cat crashes to the ground and shatters. The Saint Bernard pours the alcohol from the barrel around his neck, and an inebriated Tom awakes.
The intoxicated, hiccupping Tom thinks he sees multiple Jerrys and chases all of the mice, and falls through a hole.
The Saint Bernard rescues the now ice-encased Tom and brings him back with more alcohol, causing Tom to smash into a tree while skating. The Saint Bernard then brings Tom back to the cabin, where he puts the cat’s feet into warm water in front of a fire.
Just as Tom is about to grab Jerry, the Saint Bernard pours scalding water into the tub, causing Tom to grab Jerry, take off, like a rocket, through the roof, and soar into the air.
Tom and Jerry wind up on a tropical island, where Tom is roasting Jerry, who throws a coconut on Tom’s head, knocking the cat out. The Saint Bernard shows up, gives Tom more alcohol, which makes Tom hiccup and bounce his way into the sunset, as the short ends.
Jones produced this short, directed by Abe Levitow. They had partnered on many projects, and The A-Tom-inable Snowman has many of the hallmarks of their animated films together. These include nicely stylized backgrounds by Robert Inman, and perfectly timed gags (when Tom bursts through the roof and takes off, he comes back, grabs Jerry, and takes off again, allowing a funny gag to play out twice).
With the wintry backdrop, the cartoon also provides a nice change of pace for this legendary game of cat and mouse.
There are just three of the many “cool” cartoons for winter outings. Feel free to leave some of yours in the comments.
