बग्स एंड डैफीज कार्निवाल ऑफ द एनिमल्स

Bugs and Daffy's Carnival of the Animals (1976) is a TV Musical Special with Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck and it was fun.

Positives for Bugs and Daffy's Carnival of the Animals (1976): It was fun to see Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck taking part in a musical for the most part. The music in this special was very good. The animation for these musical sequences looks phenomenal and this was in the early 70s. And finally, the special is a quick and easy watch at only 23 minutes.

Negatives for Bugs and Daffy's Carnival of the Animals (1976): There isn't a lot of Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck in the special and their appearance feel like cameos.

Overall, Bugs and Daffy's Carnival of the Animals (1976) is a fun TV Special for Looney Tunes fans and fan of musicals.

I saw this American TV special on British television, on a rainy afternoon in Bristol. In several other IMDb reviews, I've stated my displeasure for the work of animator Chuck Jones. Here, Jones actually subordinates his own ego for once, and I was pleasantly surprised that he produced a one-off show that gives kids (and other viewers) a taste of classical music.

I'm not sure if it was a good idea to bung Bugs and Daffy into this. Clearly, they were shanghaied into the project because their presence would bring in some viewers. Unfortunately, those viewers probably expected some Loony Toons comedy -- Bugs Bunny cutting loose in the 'Barber of Seville' -- and that's just not on offer here. This special isn't very funny, and in fact doesn't really try to be funny ... but the presence of those two Merrie Melodies madmen will mislead viewers into expecting Termite Terrace mayhem.

We begin in typical Warners cartoon fashion, with a shot of a symphonic hall. From within come the voices of Bugs and Daffy, arguing over the proper pronunciation for the name of Camille Saint-Saëns, composer of the music we're about to hear. As usual, it's Bugs who's right and Daffy who's wrong. Memo to Chuck Jones: c'mon, fella, would it have hurt just this once to let Daffy be the one who's right? Also, if Saint-Saëns's name is actually in the credits, I must have missed it. Since he died in 1921, I guess Chuck Jones didn't expect him to sue.

The music here is conducted by Michael Tilson Thomas, a comparatively youth-oriented conductor who seems to have spent his career (with varying degrees of success) in projects that gave him credit for hipness while also giving him credentials as a highbrow interpreter of classical music. The orchestrations impressed me more than Thomas's conducting. I enjoyed the musical pun in 'Fossils', with the xylophone evoking the image of a series of ribs on a spinal column.

I realise that any animation project will feature some re-use of animation cels, but Jones is more obvious here than he needs to be. We see the same animation cycle, of Daffy Duck hunched over a piano keyboard with a grim look on his face, several times.

The real attraction here, of course -- for anyone but the most die-hard Loony Toons addict -- is the suite of symphonic melodies in 'The Carnival of the Animals'. Each of these is performed as a sort of self-contained music video, each in a different style of animation ... and all of them radically different from Chuck Jones's usually foolery. For instance, 'The Lion' resembles a young child's drawings; very charming in its simplicity. At first, I was deeply impressed that Jones was willing and able to break free so fully from his usual animation style. Then I double-checked the credits of this special; it turns out that the animations for the symphonic sequences are by someone named Herb Klynn, who spent most of his animation career at UPA. His work here is excellent.

The bottom line here is: if you're willing to give the classical music pieces (and their accompanying visuals) a chance in their own right, and don't expect any Loony Toons shenanigans, you might enjoy this special very much, as I did. If you're planning to sit through this thing humming Wagnerian versions of "Kill the wabbit!" and wondering when Bugs and Daffy are going to cut loose with some real slapstick, you'll be disappointed. My rating: seven out of 10.

If you want to turn a neophyte off of both animation and classical music, show them this!

Camille Saint-Saëns' Carnival of the Animals is one of my favourite pieces of music of all time - such a great classic, and honestly a great choice with which to introduce one to classical music. I found the animated parts mostly quite boring and also poorly done. It's like a bad rip-off of the classic Looney Tunes of the golden age, with a poor attempt at aping the humour. The Fantasia ripoff of animated music visualization is done with crude children's drawings instead of the wonderful high art moving paintings of Disney's masterpiece. Of course budget is likely a main reason, as well as the overall cynical ethos of Warner Bros. As compared to the sincerity of Walt Disney. Some of them are interesting, and I suppose they likely did the best they could with their budget. Maybe I'm spoiled by the high art of the Disney studio, as there is charm and interest to some of the visualizations.

I thought the musical performance at least would be worthwhile listening to, and it's done alright in in many places, but fails in others. The conductor seems sincere, expressing enjoyment, engagement, and probably the most enjoyable to watch conduct this piece at least.

One of the worst parts is that it isn't performed in full, and hence it seems somewhat disjointed.

I like the effort put into Bugs Bunny's speeches in verse, though I found them not the easiest to grasp. I also just don't really like Daffy Duck and never have, so that certainly affects my appreciation of the film.

The ending of Bugs Bunny entering "That's All Folks" into "a computer" that looks like a pocket calculator strikes me as a bizarre attempt at humour that dates this film in a weird way. It's like if they made a similar film today and inserted a nonsensical reference to "AI" or "ChatGPT" that had nothing to do with anything in order to make him seem smart I guess.

Tl;dr: Some bits have some charm, but overall a very poor attempt to recreate the golden age classical music Looney Tunes in the dark ages. I still can't believe how poorly the piano playing was animated.

This was extraordinarily funny, visually pleasing, and creative. Yes, Mel Blanc DOES do the voice characterizations and is credited at the beginning. And the narration is nothing short of brilliant, because it was penned by the Emperor of Puns, Ogden Nash. I got to see a live performance of Carnival of the Animals when I was in elementary school and the narrator was the great Robert Klein. Watching the amusing animated short brought back great memories. I recommend a terrific book (may be necessary to go to one of the out-of-print booksellers), A GOLDEN TRASHERY OF OGDEN NASHERY. Anyhow, seek out a copy of this cute animated short on VHS. I'll bet it can be found on one of the compilation DVDs by now, too.

I have been a long-time fan of Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies cartoons, so I found this a disopointment. They basically show parts of the carnival of the animals symphony, with some "Fantasia" rip-off visuals. Bugs and Daffy's nararation was the highlight, but even that wasn't funny. Don't get me wrong, I love classical music, but this just wasn't satisfactory.They didn't even get Mel Blanc to do the voices!