The Mad Hatter

There isn't much to this cartoon, other than the fact that a large group of insane men, kept in cages, are given the task of creating women's hats. Masiie, the secretary, needs a new hat and becomes the focus of one of these mad men. It was a different time and place.

Animation is an art form, perhaps more popular than ever today thanks to the creativity of new styles like the Pixar approach, that thrives on the fantastic. With MAD HATTER this typical theatrical program filler is far too steeped in reality, especially considering that the audience went to movies to escape.

Sid Marcus, an animator whose career evolved into directing Pink Panther cartoons and later forgettable TV episodes, does a prosaic job limning the travails of Maisie, a well-named Ann Sothern type whose daily routine is just that, routine.

Featuring all human characters, normal situations merely exaggerated for effect, and in fact a mean-spirited presentation, this forgotten short emerges as anti-entertainment. Quite frankly, I would have appreciated a (precursor of course back in 1940) noir or even neo-Realist approach to animation if one was interested in a dreary cartoon. In fact, an animated spoof of the great Italian classics of the late '40s like SHOESHINE, BICYCLE THIEF or PATH OF HOPE would be quite amusing.

The nastiest (and most pointless) scene here comes early on when Maisie, late for work, slaps on her makeup and looks more like Emmett Kelly than a normal girl. It's a pure case of making fun of her -wanting the audience to laugh at her as a figure of ridicule. Starting from Betty Boop on through Jessica Rabbit, the fans want and deserve beauty and alluring female characters -Marcus missed the boat.

The precise irony is the lead virtue. Against fashion domain , against office routine, against feminism. Far to be a memorable short animation, its social critic works well , defining as modern portrait of consumerism. So, nice.

"The Mad Hatter" is a funny cartoon from Columbia Pictures, and I must admit I've seen few of Columbia's cartoons....so I cannot really compare it with the rest of them.

When the story began, I noticed two things...that the backgrounds were extremely well done and that the animations of the human characters was poor and a bit creepy--some of which why I didn't score this one higher. As for the story itself, it is very funny but also very politically incorrect and tacky. A lady goes in to buy a hat and the hat makers are all suck in cells as they are mentally ill...which would explain why the hats look so ridiculous. The same concept was used in an episode of "I Love Lucy"--where Fred and Ricky created outlandish outfits for their wives and passed them off as designer originals.

Overall, poorly animated yet funny...and worth seeing.