Popeye the Sailor Meets Ali Baba's Forty Thieves

The song of Abu Hassan and his 40 thieves is the axis of this charming short adaptation of classic story, great for the humor, fight scenes and for the admirable Wimpy serving in exemplary manner his interest. So, an admirable short film, remembering the emotions of childhood and giving a precious gift of adventures and songs and humor and wise use of cliches.

The second Popeye colour feature again takes a page from 'The Arabian Nights' as the spinach-eating sailor battles the legendary 'Forty Thieves' (oddly, Ali Baba is absent) who are led by egotistical tough guy Abu Hassan (essentially Bluto in foreign garb, voiced by Gus Wickie). After crashing his flying patrol boat in the desert, Popeye (voiced by Jack Mercer), his gangly girlfriend Olive Oyl (voiced by Mae Questel), and gourmand J. Wellington Wimpy (voiced by Lou Fleischer), end up in a Arabian town that gets thoroughly pillaged by Abu Hassan and his fast moving band of thieves. Finding his friends abducted, Popeye follows the brigands to their magical cave and before you can say "Open Sesame" is battling with two-score Arabesque villains to the rousing tunes of John Phillip Sousa. Needless to say that when things look the bleakest, out comes the can of spinach. The film is fun, albeit a bit dated, and culture-sensitive types will find a pleasing amount of Arab stereotyping over which to wax indignant. The animation is superb and Fleischer Studios Tabletop 3D background technique is on display, especially in the opening desert scenes and in the thieves' cave. The film is all you would expect from a Popeye feature, no more, but no less. In addition to the comic action sequences, there are lots of background jokes to watch for (I liked the 'Ali Cat Café'). The voice talent is great, especially Mercer's constantly muttering, semi-inarticulate sailor. Popeye is a one-of-a-kind character and, IMO, the Fleisher shorts and features made in the first half of the last century are 'his best work', so enjoy.

First of all, I've seen this cartoon twice and what a difference! The first look was on a generic DVD collection of cartoons and a was a cheap buy. This second look was on the "Popeye The Sailor Man 1933-1938 Volume One" DVD set" with a "restored" picture and it looks stunning. The colors are rich and bold, the contrast great and it almost like something made in recent years.

The story pits "Abu Hassan" (Bluto) against Popeye, the Coast Guard man (along with Olive Oyl and Wimpy). The radio announces Hassan and his 40 thieves have just committed some crime so Popeye takes off in his flying ultra-modern-looking boat. (The radio then changes shape, reaches out and snatches Wimpy's hamburger from his mouth!)

As cool as the plane-boat is, however, it conks out and crash lands in the desert. Our good guys look like Moses and Hebrews crossing the long desert. Only Popeye seems to be holding up and then figures out a clever way to get all three of them to a place where they can get food and water, and then go looking for the bandit. By now, he doesn't have much further to go. They are there in that Casablanca-like city

Rather than going into all the details in this special, 17-minute Technicolor cartoon, suffice to say it was not only interesting but very clever (especially Popeye's butchering of words) and a real hoot to see in that "restored" cut of it.

This cartoon features the normal Popeye humor and heroics, all packaged in one beautiful- looking animated short!

For those who hasn't see Popeye meets Ali Baba's Forty Thieves digitally remastered on DVD, you're in for a revelation! I'm so happy that Warner Bros. got rid of the dreadful A.A.P. opening and closing titles of all Fleischer Popeye cartoon movies and put back the original Paramount titles where it belongs.

I love the cartoon. Especially Abu Hassan (Bluto) and his boys singing that catchy tune back in 1937 which is still timeless to this day. Can't stop singing! It's now available either can buy or rent it as part of the Popeye collection (1933 - 1938) available exclusively from Warner Home Video.

1937 was a big year for the animation industry. So many milestones and shifts took place. Cartoons were becoming more and more sophisticated.

At the Fleischer studio, a second Popeye epic was released. This time Bluto plays the role of Ali Baba, but he identifies himself as Abu Hassan in his theme song. As with Sinbad, Popeye and Abu have a hilarious exchange of smack talk and showing off their wits and strength.

Sinbad is my favorite of the three Technicolor two-reel specials, but this is the superior one. The production value, pacing, and overall execution feels like a feature, and it should have been made as one. One can only wonder what animation history would have been like if the Fleischer studio made this as a feature to compete with Disney's Snow White as the first animated features.

It does feel like a missed opportunity, since Popeye was such a popular character at the time, and being a sailor, he lent himself to endless possibilities for epic adventure films.

While the use of Arab stereotypes may not sit well with contemporary audiences, this is a classic one cannot miss. One of Popeye's greatest films of all time.