Folies ratoniles

Jerry and Tuffy flood the kitchen and use the freezer to turn the floor into a massive ice-rink. Tom discovers the pair of rodents sliding effortlessly around the room and tries to catch them, but isn't as steady on his feet—at least until he finds a pair of ice skates in a cupboard.

The problem with watching a lot of Tom and Jerry cartoons in quick succession is that the action can all become a bit 'samey'; the benefit of watching a lot of Tom and Jerry cartoons in a row is that when you get a particularly good one it really stands out from the crowd.

Mice Follies is a great example, the frozen setting making a welcome change from the usual housebound chaos and allowing for some superb gags. What also makes this one sparkle is the quality of the artwork and animation, with great attention to detail in the ice and the reflections of the characters as they skate along.

Jerry and some little baby mouse (with diapers) floods the kitchen at Tom's house by turning on all the faucets, making a pool and then freezing it with a couple of tubes from the refrigerator. They now have their ice-skating pond in which they can slide and skate and have a merry old time. They even rig up a spotlight and pretend they are in the ice follies.

Tom hears noise coming from the kitchen, goes to investigate and sees the situation. He goes after the mice but, of course, is sliding all over the place. That part isn't too funny but when Tom dons skates, there are some clever scenes.

Overall, a "fair" short - seen better, seen worse.

'Mice Follies' is an entertaining short with Tom, Jerry and a second mouse. Jerry floods the kitchen together with another mouse. After this they use the freezer to change the flooded kitchen into an ice skating rink. When Jerry and the other mouse want to do some ice dancing Tom finds out what they are doing and is causing them some trouble. He even finds some ice skates to catch both the mice.

This short is animated pretty well and never bored me. In fact, I found myself smiling constantly and there is one very big laugh. Tom on his ice skates knows how to pass a lot of furniture without hitting them, is very happy about that, but misses one little thing. This gag plays with perfect timing. The ending, although predictable, is quite good as well. Worth watching.

"Mice Follies" is probably one of the more original shorts in the Tom and Jerry series. In this film, Jerry and another mouse flood the kitchen with water, then freeze it to create a winter wonderland. This allows for some new twists on the old cat chases mouse theme. The gags still aren't on a par with say a Bugs Bunny short, but it's certainly a clever vehicle for the cat and mouse.

Jerry the Mouse and the little orphan Nibbles flood the kitchen to make a ghetto ice skating rink. Cue Tom and wacky ice cat and mouse hijinx.I don't know why, but this Tom and Jerry short didn't really do anything for me. It wasn't bad or anything like that, I just didn't laugh as much as I find myself doing while watching other Tom and Jerry cartoons. Sure some of the gags were kinda amusing and all. Maybe being a fairly new property owner myself I was thinking of how much the repair job would cost for something like that, coincidentally "the Amittyville Horror" affected me in pretty much the same way. Heh. This animated short can be found on disc 2 of Warner Brother's 2-DVD Spotlight Collection set.

My Grade: C+