Tortas e Flores

This is pure fantasy and mostly a little girl's animated short.

Little Audrey's listening to a cooking show ("The Friendly Chef") on the radio and the man is explaining how to make gingerbread cake. Little Audrey ready, and follows his direction. At a feverish pace, she puts all the ingredients in and the mixture in the oven.

The fantasy comes in when the oven signals the 30 minutes is up and out pops a talking gingerbread man! He's off to Cakeland, he says, so Audrey follows him out the window and into the clouds. As I said, this is pure fantasy.

During that time, Audrey is introduced to "Miss Angel Cake," who is going to marry the Gingerbread Man. There ceremony is interrupted by The Devil's Food Cake. At that point, the cartoon changes from a 3-year-old girls' story to a decent adult one with puns, good action and interesting sights.

The cartoon is fairly primitive looking. It isn't the best artwork or color, but not the worst, either. The last two minutes saved this from being a total waste of time, but it's still not recommended for adults. Little Audrey, from what I can gather, is really for small kids.

Not quite as good as 'Butterscotch and Soda' and 'Song of the Birds' before it, but to me 'Tarts and Flowers' is in the better half of the generally under-appreciated Little Audrey series.

The story is slight but has the right amount of confectionery sweetness without feeling too sugary or making one sick. This is the same for Little Audrey herself, an adorable and charming character that falls on the right side of sweet thankfully. While it doesn't immediately get to the action and the second half is somewhat better than the first, with a real urgency, wildly imaginative puns and mouth-watering visuals (plus the Devil Food Cake character, a great antagonist), 'Tarts and Flowers' was a cartoon I hardly found dull.

On top of that, the animation is rich and colourful, with very meticulous and beautifully drawn backgrounds and well-rendered character designs that don't look too stiff. Winston Sharples provides yet another outstanding music score, even in mediocre or worse cartoons Sharples' music was never among the flaws (if anything always one of the strengths or the best asset).

Love the lusciousness of the orchestration here and how characterful and whimsical the music was without going overboard in either, even better was how well it fitted in the cartoon and how it merged with the action. The main song is very infectious too.

Plenty of amusement here, as well as great visual imagination and a great deal of cuteness (one of the cuter cartoons with Little Audrey) without being overly so. Children and adults alike are likely to be having their mouths watering and craving for sweet foods, and any messaging is not handled in a heavy-handed way. The voice acting is good.

All in all, a confectionery delight and one of the best Little Audrey cartoons back when Famous Studios' cartoons were very well made and good to great, before suffering from tight deadlines and lower budgets in the mid-late-50s. 9/10 Bethany Cox