La Ferme de demain

Tex Avery offers some of the comic details of what he imagines scientific advances will bring to the farm.

It's amusing enough in its scattergun, listicle manner of offering its audience the wonders of scientific agronomy and its "we cross a chicken with a centipede to get more drumsticks" way; it was Avery's regular habit to stick as many gags into a cartoon as he could manage, and this certainly does that. Contrariwise, the simplified character design, lack of detailed backgrounding and limited animation make apparent that his budgets were not stretching as far as they had ten years earlier.

Tex Avery plays with biotechnology brought to farming in this cartoon short. Almost all of it involves animals being crossed with other animals or objects to produce amusing effects. For example, a cow is crossed with a kangaroo so the farmer can just extract bottles of milk from its pouch, rather than waste time milking it. That concept veers into other areas, like the giraffe crossed with a racehorse so it can lower its long neck and win by a nose, but it's repeated again and again, and most of them were pretty corny. I can't say it was terribly funny, but maybe my enjoyment was clouded by the dark overtones, e.g. The rise of factory farming after the war. It's always interesting to see something from Avery though.

Many years ago there were jokes that went "What you crossed a this with a that." They were fun. That's what most of this Tex Avery cartoon was about. It was entertaining but seemed a little hackneyed. A strength is that there is enough of a pause to let on figure out what is coming. Avery adds a little sexiness to a couple of these things, but it is sort of lacking in any sort of story.

This cartoon is a fairly funny look at the "future" of farming-a future that most farmers are probably grateful hasn't come in a great many respects! Typical of Avery, sight gags galore are fired at the viewer non-stop, with more puns than normal and more lunacy than usual. Good Avery, though not great Avery, even for the series of shorts this fits in with. Worth watching.

Love animation, it was a big part of my life as a child, particularly Disney, Looney Tunes and Tom and Jerry, and still love it whether it's film, television or cartoons.

Also have much admiration for Tex Avery, an animation genius whose best cartoons are animated masterpieces and some of the best ever made by anybody. 'The Farm of Tomorrow' does not see Avery on top form and he did do much funnier and more imaginative cartoons, especially in his prime period of the 40s when he was at MGM. Of his '...of Tomorrow' cartoons (the others being 'House', 'TV' and 'Car'), 'The Farm of Tomorrow' for me is the weakest. As said many times, when Avery was not at his best he still fared much better than most other animation directors at their worst, some can only dream of having their best work on the same level as the masterpieces from Avery.

The other '...of Tomorrow' cartoons, especially my personal favourite 'House', were consistently funnier, more educational and more imaginative. 'The Farm of Tomorrow' certainly has the typical Avery lunacy, plenty of amusing sight gags and puns and some nice ideas, but not much is hilarious or standout-worthy.

Occasionally, limitations show in some of the backgrounds (in comparison to his cartoons from the 40s), but actually a vast majority of the animation is very good.

Some limited backgrounds and some unrefined drawing aside, the animation has a lot of colourful colours and expressive, inventive drawing and expressions. The music from the always never less than dependable Scott Bradley is lushly and cleverly orchestrated, with lively and energetic rhythms and fits very well indeed, a lot of the action is even enhanced by the music.

It is not a 1940s-1950s Avery cartoon without his trademark lunacy, sight gags and puns, and 'The Farm of Tomorrow' certainly all three and does them to amusing effect, though as said they didn't blow me away like those of many of his cartoons tend to. It's not heavy-handed and feels somewhat relevant, and the inventions are cool and suitably wacky in the way only Avery could do. It's very nicely paced and there are some interesting ideas that are ahead-of-their-time. Avery fares well with the directing and the voice acting is very good.

Concluding, a good cartoon but not a great one, which for Avery is slightly disappointing. 7/10 Bethany Cox