The Shanty Where Santy Claus Lives

. . . are sure to scare the striped socks off the Wicked Witch of the East, after Ellie Beth demands to know "Who killed my sister?!" Music is thoroughly weaponized here as an instrument of mass destruction, accomplishing the seemingly impossible task of assaulting both the ear and eye with equal damage. It's not hard to fathom why the Brothers Warner swiftly exiled the producers of this SHANTY short to lesser film studios soon after this forgettable debacle was released. The conversation might have gone something like this: "Forget about singing Santa's, balloons and bagpipes; just have the underlings draw up some Porky the Pig, Bugs the Bunny, Daffy the Duck and Yosemite Sam cartoons!"

This Hugh Harmon-Rudy Ising Merrie Melodies cartoon short produced by Leon Schlesinger for Warner Bros. tells the story of a poor boy who gets invited by Santa to go with him to his shanty to watch all the toys come to life. That's basically the plot of the story with some unfortunate blackface stereotypes in some scenes. Still mostly enjoyable with some entertaining musical sequences like the title song and a Kate Smith doll singing, "Shine on Harvest Moon". It was during this period that the Merrie Melodies shorts' purpose was to showcase a song that was published by the Warner Bros. publisher in each short with the showcased song's title the name of the film. That's the case here. Recommended for anyone who are Warner cartoon completists.

The animation is adorable and nicely done for how early this cartoon is. And the songs are catchy and fun. But there's just nothing very original or remarkable about "Shanty Where Santy Claus Lives." The plot-line is incredibly straight-forward and obvious, and even the toys are fairly predictable and behave relatively normally. A much better cartoon featuring Depression-era pathetic orphans who get a surprise visit from Santa is the 1936 "Christmas Comes But Once a Year."

The Shanty Where Santy Claus Lives (1933)

*** (out of 4)

Good short from Merrie Melodies has an orphan stumbling through the snow on Christmas Eve when she eventually bumps into Santa Claus. The jolly fat man takes the child for a ride and they land at a house where all the toys are being made. With a good song and dance sequence, we see the toys come to life and perform for the child. THE SHANTY WHERE SANTY CLAUS LIVES runs just around 7-minutes and it's pretty delightful from start to finish. Even though the film is in B&W I think a lot of kids today would still enjoy it because the visuals are terrific, the song is nice and there's no question that there's just something unique about seeing Santa in B&W. That big red outfit is just so familiar that I always enjoy seeing these shorts where Santa is shown in B&W. Perhaps this is just a strange thing of mine but I think the vintage image that comes with B&W just really adds an extra layer to the Santa myth. I was also very impressed with the images and especially the winder wonderland and the stuff dealing with Santa flying through the air.

The Merrie Melodies universe could be bizarre for the children of our days. Not for parents, familiar with the sweet songs, characters and script. But the film has a rare, precious virtue - it represents the decent answer to the desire or dream of eeach child. The shanty of santa remains the magic place of childhood and the toys from animation are cool, too. So, a precious short film about a great, great revelation to a poor boy . And to us.