Jack Frost

A young grizzly bear, undaunted by his mother's warnings of the coming winter, runs away from home only to be confronted by Old Man Winter himself.

This is an enjoyable animated short. I have a problem with the fact that it is "SOLD" in a DVD collection of "Christmas Animated Shorts". this is not a Christmas short. It takes place in Winter. There is no "Santa" or even a "Christmas Tree". However it is an enjoyable thing to watch.

This Animated Feature has some very impressive animation (For it's time).

It is available;e for free on many streaming sights.

This cartoon is from Ub Iwerks--the guy who did most of the animating in the early Disney Company cartoons, such as "Steamboat Willie". After a few years with Disney, Ub decided to go out on his own--and less than a decade later, he was back with Disney. Although he was very talented, and you can see some of it in "Jack Frost", you can also see why he failed. On the plus side, the cartoon's animation is very nice. Not as nice as the Silly Symphonies and Mickey cartoons coming from Disney, but still very nice. The cartoon also had color. While it wasn't the Technicolor that Disney was using (they had exclusive rights to it for several years), the Cinecolor looks very nice and has a wider color spectrum than many Cinecolor films--with some actual blues. BUT, despite looking good, the cartoon itself is insipid mush! It consists of lots of happy singing animals in the forest, Jack Frost and Old Man Winter singing and cavorting--and not a single trace of humor!! All in all, this is like torture to have to watch today, as the cartoons were amazingly dull (aside from Disney's) during this era. Cute characters and singing...YECCH!!!

For a start, I loved all the rich amber tones in the woodland backgrounds, and even more so later on with the the frozen scenery, all exceedingly beautiful to look at. Also the music was very nice and kept things moving at a good pace. The family of bears that is featured look a lot like the ones from the 1935 Iwerks short "The Three Bears." The momma bear sounds like a black women did the voicing. She may give Billy-Bear a spankin', but it probably hurts her more than it does him! For some strange reason a really crummy-looking picture that hangs above the little bear's bed made me laugh! I don't get the strange moment where there's an apparition hovering saw cutting a log above the sleeping bear parents... Maybe a visual pun on the saying "slept like a log"? The only thing I didn't like too much was the annoying little song the bear kid seemed to sing about every two minutes, I think it sounds a bit too childish and brings down the tone somewhat. I liked the slightly creepy character of the trickster sprite Jack Frost, who deems to teach young bratty-bear a lesson the hard way about respecting the cold. This short boasts several very impressive and spooky sight gags, like a hopping quartet of pumpkins whose collective "Whooo!" sound is genuinely eerie to listen to! And then there is my absolute favourite part of the whole short, an awesome scatting scarecrow whose wild movements and bluesy freewheeling sounds still sound extremely catchy and cool today! That scene felt to me very similar to the trio of Betty Boop Fleisher shorts to feature a dancing rotoscoped Cab Calloway! I loved the design and animation of the cackling wicked Old Man Winter who was quite scary as a monster once a vintage animation could only be. During the chase through the icy woods I love the snow-covered objects in the background that look very much like human figures frozen in agonised poses. Quite a dark and Gothic touch, I thought. I think Jack Frost was Old Man Winter, their faces and noses looked alike, and Jack's enigmatic wink to the audience at the "Finis" confirmed it for me. What a great little peril in winter wonderland animation this is, it's well worth anyone's time, and makes for an especially pleasant watch come Christmas time. Overall quite a charming rare old vintage show with an edge! X

Just watched this Ub Iwerks ComiColor cartoon on YouTube. It concerns a kid bear who defies his parents and decides to go out during Winter because of his big fur. The title character gently warns him but he keeps singing of how he'll survive because of his skin. Being from the '30s, this short shouldn't surprise when some inanimate objects come to life like some pumpkins or a scarecrow who in this case channels Cab Calloway! There are some touches of humor but this seems mostly to teach kids in the audience a lesson about staying inside when a snow storm comes. That's okay in this instance so on that note, I recommend Jack Frost.

. . . by leading seminarian End Times Instructors as an actual horseman of the Apocalypse. JACK FROST, aka the onset of Winter, is so fearsome that some quailing traditions substituted Famine for Frost so that the kids could sleep at night. However, on six of the Globe's seven continents more people freeze to death than expire from starvation in a given year. Furthermore, a consensus of pain experts rank a frigid demise a fate worse than buying the farm with an empty tummy. As their capillaries explode one by one, many victims turning into literal pop-sickles have been heard to bargain that they'd swear off food for a year for one mug of hot chocolate. JACK FROST does NOT give this scourge of glacial glazing his just desserts.