Alice's Tin Pony

Alice's Tin Pony (1925)

*** (out of 4)

Fast and fun short from Walt Disney has Alice and her cat Julius running their own railroad station and they get a visit from Pete the bear who is a bandit and comes after the train. ALICE'S TIN PONY is another good entry in the series as we're given some really funny moments here and in fact, up to this point in the series, the best moment. This highlight happens when Pete has a drunk bear come up to him and trying to start trouble. I'm not going to spoil what happens but the animation is perfect and the joke is just downright hilarious. Other highlights includes Julius accidentally setting himself on fire and there's no question that the ending is great.

In the 1920s, Walt Disney was hired by Winkler Studios to continue making Alice comedies. Walt and his staff had made an Alice cartoon before....but the studio was failing and Winkler's offer meant money...something Walt had little of at this point. And, since Winkler had just lost its big money-maker, Felix the Cat, I am sure that's why Alice was paired with Julius...a character who sure looked a lot like Felix.

"Alice's Tin Pony" does what the previous Alice films did...combined a real life child (in this instance, Margie Gay) with cartoon footage. Most of these films are cute and sweet and hold up reasonably well today.

The story begins with Alice running her own railroad, with help from Julius as well as an anthropomorphic train. Their job is to transport the payroll....but some scummy rats (literally) decide to try to rob the train. Can Alice and the gang manage to elude them?

While I'd never consider this one of the best Alice films, it's clever and fun. A nice little cartoon and ample proof that Disney himself could animate quite well....though later, he just stuck to directing and producing the films as well as providing a voice for Mickey instead of actually animating any of his films.

Before Micky, even before we worked out what realities we wanted in animation, Disney made this. With his own hand.

The Alice supposed to be Alice from Wonderland. She is a live character superimposed on the cartoon, interacting with drawn objects.

The "tin pony" is a locomotive, and there are lots of sight gags having to do with plastic physics. Walt was responsible for several serious problems in the film world. But this really shows a lot of cleverness and promise.

I don't know my cartoon history, so I do not know how Felix the Cat features so prominently in this.

Ted's Evaluation -- 2 of 3: Has some interesting elements.