59. Beau Bosko (1933)

Release date: July 1st, 1933

Series: Looney Tunes

Director: Hugh Harman and Friz Freleng

Starring: Johnny Murray (Bosko), Rudy Ising (Sergeant)

Two Boskos in a row! Bosko now finds himself as a soldier in the foreign legion, ready to capture the notorious scourge Ali Oop.

The sergeant in charge of the barracks blows the wake up reveille call. Predictably, no one wakes up as we have an array of amusing sight gags. Fed up with his lack of a response, the sarge storms into the barracks and shouts “HEY!” he’s greeted with a highly amusing, cheeky chorus of “Good Morning to You” by the soldiers. One particularly burly soldier sings “Good morning, dear sergeant, we’re glad to see you!” and makes a cutting motion across his neck. Love the charisma! 

A “SNAP OUT OF IT!” from the sergeant prompts all of the soldiers to dog pile on him and the mound of clothes he’s standing between. After the ruckus is over, there’s a gaping hole in the floor. The sergeant pokes his head out from the hole in a daze.

Ever the straggler, Bosko is still asleep. His soldier uniform takes a life of its own and tries to wake him up to no avail. The uniform opts to placing a horn to Bosko’s mouth, where he blares “Reveille” and wakes up. The uniform motions for him to make it snappy, and join the rest of the crew. Bosko snags his hat and chases after his clothes, diving into them last minute as he lines up at attention.

The gags are one after the other in this one! Bosko unzips the soldier’s backpack in front of him, where there’s a little faucet and mini bathtub inside—the essentials. Bosko turns the faucet and fills up the tub, splashing the water in his face and using the flap of the backpack to dry his face.

His routine is interrupted when a pompous man marches out to greet his soldiers. He calls Bosko at attention (“Attençion!” because he’s French), who marches up to greet him.

The general shoves a paper in Bosko’s hand and orders him to “Get this man!” Bosko opens the paper, where he gasps at a picture of “ALI OOP, THE DESERT SCOURGE”. I do like the pun names they give for the enemies in these shorts, such as Rice-Puddin’. Loyal soldier Bosko marches off and calls for the aid of a camel, and he slides on as they go to capture the scourge.

There’s a nice little gag of the camel approaching a tiny little puddle of water and drinking it up. A fish flops at the bottom of the now dry puddle, chattering unknown curses at the camel. Generously, the camel spits out a little bit of water, and the fish gives a thankful salute before diving into its own little oasis.

Bosko and his trusty steed approach a bustling village. There’s a snake charmer playing his pipe for the snake, who halts its dance to do a Jimmy Durante “HA CHA CHA CHA!” as you can expect, the villagers are caricatured and stereotyped.

Of course, Honey just so happens to be in that very village. She saunters over to Bosko, wearing a rather promiscuous see through harem outfit. That’s pre-code for ya! Bosko and Honey greet bashfully with a peck on the lips.

Because this is a Bosko cartoon, and bad things must always happen to him, he can’t rest for too long as Ali Oop and his men come charging towards them. Ali Oop throws a bunch of knives at the two, which stick into the side of a building. Bosko and Honey then (creatively) use the knives as a staircase, climbing to higher ground for safety. Bosko peers out of a window to see if they’re safe. A bullet that lands in his hat instead of his head gives him the definitive answer of no.

There’s an array of gags that are nicely paced and happen one after the other: a guy shooting bullets from his rifle, one of the bullets getting stuck and him pushing it through, Bosko finding a pistol and shooting it like a machine gun, the bullets knocking a jar onto the riflemen’s head and knocking him backwards with a domino effect of various pottery that hits ANOTHER guy, the interminable domino effect ensuing. It’s hard to describe—it all happens at once, and there’s so much going on, which makes it better.

Ali Oop is perched around a tree, shooting and the impact spinning him around the tree trunk. Bosko knocks a coconut above him with his bullet, which sends the coconut hurtling down onto Ali Oop’s head.

He falls onto a cart, and Bosko tosses a handful of spears that form a makeshift jail cell. Bosko and Honey make it out safely, Bosko calling for his camel. They hop on the camel, who ties his tail around the cart, and together they go back to the foreign legion with their capture. Iris out.

As always, the stereotypes were off putting (though Ali Oop is an amusing name), but this was a pretty good Bosko short. The gags were nonstop, one after the other, and the pacing was just right! It wasn’t one of those “Oh, a showcase of gags. Ha, that one’s funny... and then we have this one... and this one...”, which is how I felt watching Bosko the Sheep-Herder. I especially loved the beginning sequence where all of the soldiers sing “good morning to you” with such a disingenuous and sardonic tone. Bosko, like always, didn’t have much personality—his settings did. Music was good and animation was smooth. I’d maybe recommend it, just because the gags are interesting to watch, but as always express caution at the stereotypes.

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