335. Aviation Vacation (1941)

Release Date: August 2nd, 1941

Series: Merrie Melodies

Director: Tex Avery

Story: Dave Monahan

Animation: Sid Sutherland 

Musical Direction: Carl Stalling

Starring: Robert C. Bruce (Narrator, Radio), Mel Blanc (Patrick, Natives, Moth, Ostrich), Bill Days (Singer)

(Albeit unrestored, you may view the cartoon here!)

A day has come that would have been deemed impossible by viewers—namely, modern viewers both blessed and cursed with the convenience of consuming these shorts in mass quantities—a few years prior: the final Tex Avery spot-gag cartoon…

Kind of.

This would be the final Avery travelogue to have his name on the credits… as well as the final short to credit him at all. As mentioned in our dissection of The Heckling Hare, All This and Rabbit Stew and The Bug Parade were completed by Avery at the studio before his departure. The same applies to Aviation Vacation. However, given that he was out of the studio at the time of this short’s release, his credits would be excised by the foreseeable future.

Some of it is “warranted”, in the loosest definition of the term. Perhaps Leon Schlesinger worried there would be confusion among audiences if they were to see two directors credited in the shorts that Avery started but Clampett finished. Not that it justifies the decision, as involvement warrants compensation, but the line of thinking is there. Or, at the very least, more comprehensible than what warrants excising Avery’s name from shorts he did complete himself.

That could likely be chalked up to pettiness on behalf of Schlesinger. Perhaps to make his point that if Avery wasn’t involved with the studio anymore, fine—here’s a way to kickstart that divorce. 

Of course, this is all speculation; if there’s one lesson to adopt from this entire venture, it’s that credits on the Warner shorts can be incredibly fickle. Perhaps there was some grand reasoning as to why Avery’s name aren’t on this forthcoming shorts. Perhaps not. Given that we aren’t Leon Schlesinger, there’s no exact way to know. The gesture nevertheless cements the permanence of Avery’s departure.

And, if there’s anything that Aviation Vacation proves, it’s that his decision to leave was wise, a necessity for him to get his mojo and artistic fulfillment back. Vacation is not exactly the work of an artist who is fulfilled. Instead, it serves as a retreading of prior material: of spot gag shorts, yes, but aerial themed spot gag shorts, first enacted by Ceiling Hero. As is routine for many of these shorts, Robert C. Bruce serves as our guide through the skyways and the exotic destinations therein as gags old and new await the viewer.

Trite as the shorts have come to be, Avery attests that there are still surprises to be had—such manifests through the opening titles. Obtrusive brown bordering isn’t poor design sense nor awkward film cropping, but a purposefully duplicitous backdrop revealed as the camera pans right, serving as a poster against a brick wall. 

Casting Bruce as the announcer over an intercom serves as an additionally inspired choice. Especially given the sound design, echoed and warped to encourage authenticity and indicate that his voice is indeed emanating from a speaker. As a result, the audience feels as though they are not only being directly addressed, but as though they are given an inside look at private affairs. How lucky are we, the theatergoers, to have this opportunity in observing these planes preparing at the hangar. 

“Track fast”, adds the announcer slash narrator at the tail end of his airplane jargon. Avery’s direction obeys—the swarm of passengers erupting out of the foreground is indeed fast. It’s a gag that is twice as fast as it would have been two years prior, and would be shortened to be twice as fast again two years later. Meticulous coloring on the passengers—interjecting blues and yellows and reds and greens amongst the swarm of grays and black—condenses the crowd by making it feel more busy. More colors mean more areas of focus, which means more visual noise. Thus, the illusion of a heartier crowd. Ditto with the staunch refusal of any negative space within the crowd where possible.

Audiences will now note the decidedly filter free delivery of Bruce’s vocals as he announces “And we’re off!”, thus initiating an official segue into the meat and potatoes of the cartoon. 

Meat and potatoes being a plane flapping its wings like a bird. This is somewhat definitive of the gag sense in the short as a whole: amusing on a polite front, animated and executed well, but underwhelming even for its time. This is no Ceiling Hero with its exploding rocket airplanes or prolonged climaxes. 

Avery gets his “sunny California” joke in: to his credit, the clouds surrounding the brief sliver of sun (arranged for the convenience of some camera trickery) producing snow instead of rain does come as a surprise and genuine subversion. Perhaps that in itself contributes to an even stronger punchline—rain in California is rare, but snow even more so. Likewise, it seems that the left half of the screen is divided into rain as well (just more difficult to see.)

Given the inherently fragmented structure of spot gag shorts, any and all consistency or coherency is worth clinging to when possible. Thus, Avery remains loyal to the precipitation by synchronizing the movements of the plane to Stalling’s flowing orchestrations of “April Showers”. 

This in itself comes as a bit of a surprise. Avery’s cartoons could certainly present musical qualities, and many of the actions are timed to the orchestrations, but he was seldom a director to go out of his way and deliberately score an action to a wholly musical fragment. The music direction in his cartoons have a reputation for being some of the least melodic and most attuned to the action, comparatively divorced of popular tunes and more reliant on stings, tones, and other arrangements that are unique to the action on screen. Timing of the gag isn’t as sharp as something in a Friz Freleng cartoon (granted, what is?) but for a director who rarely dabbled in such explicit affairs, the gag meets its needs comfortably.

Nevertheless, moving onward to sunnier skies—previous comparisons to Ceiling Hero are not entirely unfounded, as Avery reuses(!) establishing animation for a synonymously structured gag. 

Such explains the break in flow. Viewers will note that the plane, once headed left, is now headed right—that’s fine and dandy, time has clearly elapsed, perhaps it’s a different plane. Specifics or not, this maneuver breaks the 180° rule, in which objects on screen are inverted in an adjacent scene and subconsciously muddle the directing. Even if the viewer is smart enough to piece together that this is still the same plane (and they are), the most menial, mental delay occurs as the audience subconsciously reroutes their thinking to accompany the change. Thus, the coherency and flow of the sequence is cut, if only for a moment. It seems so menial, and it is. Yet these little maneuvers, even on a most subconscious level, are important in ensuring the audience can follow and digest the action as smoothly as necessary. No need to cause confusion if that isn’t the intent.

Nevertheless, an aerial shot of the plane’s shadow reflected against the ground takes priority over lapses in screen direction. In the former cartoon, the plane dodged various cars on the road, as well as reversing and taking a different turn as it followed the rules of the road. Here, the plane abides by the train tracks (unique to this cartoon)…

…to a degree that it even goes in tunnels, tucking its wings in and losing the shadow entirely. Retreaded as the idea may be (and comparatively less elaborate than the former), it’s admittedly one of the short’s brightest moments. It’s simple yet clear and embraces its humbleness—likewise, Avery plays out the gag to still give it an identity and legs beyond a disposable visual. Carl Stalling’s musical accompaniment comes to a halt as the plane traverses through the tunnel, forming an endearingly arbitrary tension that accompanies the lack of object permanence. Will we ever see the plane again? How is this possible? Is it actually going through the tunnel? 

Fret not, the narrator would say if he were talking right now. Maybe.

Or, he’d shift focus to Mt. Rushmore. 

This in itself is indicative of one of the short’s overarching problems. While yes, it’s true the short adopts an angle of an aerial tour, taking in the sights worldwide, it feels as though that theming should be made more obvious. Aviation gags and explorations of various landmarks seem stacked against each other instead of themes that coexist—it doesn’t feel framed as though we’re just passing by or taking a breather. Instead, it feels like a shoehorned afterthought. Here’s some plane gags… by the way, you kids ever heard of Mt. Rushmore?

Perhaps such a notion arrives from a prejudice against the dedication to the monument. Showcasing Rushmore isn’t problematic in itself. Dragging it out for a total of 45 seconds, however, is. 

Obviously, it was still a relatively new commodity at the time of the short’s release. So much so that the monument hadn’t even officially wrapped up construction when the cartoon was released. Avery’s decision to linger on and embrace its grandiosity is not entirely unfounded, and that isn’t where the complaint stems from. 

Rather, it reads as a deliberate maneuver to eat up time. Pauses are bloated and spelled out, prompting any momentum in the cartoon to come to a crashing halt. It almost feel as though the air has been sucked out by the time the punchline comes in that it isn’t much of a punchline at all, but a weak topper.

Granted, that stems from the gag being dated even at the cartoon’s release. A more elaborate reprise of a similar gag in Holiday Highlights, the topper spoofs the results of the 1940 election: candidate Wendell Wilkie adjacent from the comparatively more jolly façade of FDR, reveling in yet another win. If anything, Wilkie has the benefit of being immortalized in Warner cartoons for his alliterative name—rife with comedic possibilities. A dotted line carved out of rock splitting the scene into two is clever,  but the overall impact is past its point of ripeness thanks to such a lugubrious buildup.

“Night finally overtakes us. Ahh… what a beautiful night…”

Bruce’s comments are supported by the recent MeTV restoration of the cartoon. Johnsen’s tight hand regarding his backgrounds always proves beneficial, whether it be the confidence and solidity of his brush strokes or his handling on color. Here, the latter serves as the primary takeaway—yellow lights pool against the cool blues of the plane submerged in the darkness, amalgamating to create a palpably cozy atmosphere.

An atmosphere that, likewise, enables Avery to slip in some subtle scatological humor. The moon shaped window at the tail end of the plane is subtle enough to elude censors, but get its intended rise out of the more attentive audiences and viewers nationwide. Much of the success of the gag stems from the sheer dissonance in tone—the gentle grace of the atmosphere and the juvenility of the gag.

Maintaining the night theming, Avery enlists in an old favorite. The moon juts out of the way at the last possible second, politely deluding the audience into bracing for a collision—such is the extent of the gag’s excitement. Similar to its cohorts within the cartoon, it’s serviceable. However, Tex Avery is better than a creative who just makes serviceable cartoons. A rigidity prevails in the execution that seems arbitrary. 

Dissolve to a morning scene where not one, but two planes cross paths…

…offering an opportunity for confused means of travel. Whether it be overlays of painted airplanes or actual paintings of humans seated on the train/plane hybrid, Avery certainly gets a lot of mileage out of Johnsen’s painterly talents. Treg Brown’s train sound effects do wonders in cementing the illusion, as does the “train” interior frame around the screen. Viewers are directly inserted into the action, subject to gawk back at the borderline ghastly faces staring at them—the metaphor is made all the more believable and immersive. 

A handful of empty seats prove to be an inspired touch of realism.

Dissolve to a reprise of an earlier gag: instead of the plane swaying to “April Showers”, Avery ups the ante with more exaggerated convulsions to “Over the Waves”. It boasts the sort of exaggeration the moon sequence was begging for (with the moon, at least), but suffers from awkward placement in the film. Such a short, fragmented segment, it both appears and disappears before the audience can hardly register what’s happened. It doesn’t feel as though it contributes to furthering the overall momentum of the sequence. A cute gag, but would likely work better if it didn’t feel as though it was haphazardly spliced between scenes.

“Our first stop is the Emerald Isle.” Enter the vacation portion of the film.

Introduction of a borderline comedic caricature of an Irish native—“Patrick”, as he is so condescendingly labeled by the narrator—offers further room for Bob McKimson to flex his animation muscles. His handiwork functions as a cousin to the animation seen in Old Glory, when he was still in Chuck Jones’ unit. What may appear disarming and uncanny is actually all original work. It’s easy to dismiss the design work as mere rotoscoping, surely that’s why it’s so meticulous and odd. That it isn’t is where the praise for the animation comes in.

Here, “Patrick” gives an emotional performance of “When Irish Eyes are Smiling,” delivered through the vocal talents of Bill Days. It comes as a bit trite to viewers of today, but the novelty of McKimson’s insurmountable talent remains.

Likewise, the eyes of the audience are more inclined to default to the hair quivering throughout the bottom of the screen.

This is one of those watershed moments seen so often in Avery’s Warner cartoons. The beginning of a gag that would later be reprised, reworked and reupholstered to greater success and notoriety at MGM. 11 years between this short and Magical Maestro grants Avery a generous amount of time and experience in learning how to best capitalize on the gag. What stretches on for nearly a minute here is shortened to a matter of mere seconds. Both gags have their respective moments of abrasiveness. Maestro’s timing and execution is swift, deft, bold, abrasive.

Here, it’s the singer who is the source of any boldness. As the audience wonders when the song will end, Mel Blanc’s booming voice suddenly interrupts the velvet tones of Days’ crooning:

“HEY! YOU UP THERE! GET THAT HAIR OUTTA HERE!”

Some poor projectionist obliges. Those of us thriving in the digital age are spoiled by this lack of a very persistent issue that dominated films for decades and decades. In fact, many a surviving print of a cartoon can be seen with the occasional hair or two caught along the sides. In a post hair-caught-in-film world, what was once a persistent annoyance serves as an aesthetic marker of sorts, a symbol of the circumstances that go into getting these cartoons out to the public. Audiences in 1941 would have reciprocated the gag with a resounding sense of vindication.

It should be noted that, upon the short’s release, theaters planning to showcase Magical Maestro had to be warned of the hair scene in advance—no need to fish around with the projector. Any resemblance to any hairs, living or dead, are purely coincidental. One wonders if projectionists had to receive that same note with this cartoon—Maestro’s hair is much more realistic in its thin, small size, whereas the thicker inking here reads as a bit more obtuse.

Nevertheless, it’s an inspired trial run of a gag that would become one of Avery’s most celebrated moments. Such subversive thinking and novelty is reciprocated with pointed warmth here—Aviation Vacation is a cartoon that benefits from any and all cartoon anarchy.

Moving forward. Keeping with the persistent musicality of the plane, the aircraft convulsing to the thundering rhythm of drums hints at a notion that is clinched through Bruce’s introduction of our next destination: darkest Africa. Thou hath been warned.

Rotoscoped animation dominates the opening of the segment; the bar is low when a lack of giant lips, big foreheads, or other rancid racially motivated exaggerations and stereotypes is seen as a positive. Fret not, as those soon await. For now, the solidity of the rotoscoped animation can be admired—there’s a sense of motivation in the rhythmic drumming movements that other instances of rotoscoping can often lack. Motions feel tight, controlled, more than a loose skin of fresh animation flopping around on someone else’s carcass. Granted, the print of the cartoon renders it difficult to discern the entire scope of the action, but it nevertheless reads coherently from where it stands presently.

“The primitive beat of the tom-toms to send messages from one tribe to another is still used by the natives,” orates our ever condescending narrator. 

Atmosphere of Johnsen’s handiwork remains relatively unmarred through muddy prints. A long pan traverses the interior of the jungle, stopping to gander at the beat reciprocated by another tribe in the distance—the natural frame formed through a clearing of brush and leaves is creative, secretive, organic. 

Camera still follows forth, hinting at a payoff that obeys the rule of comedic thirds…

…which is certainly met through the introduction of egregious caricatures more in vogue with Avery’s general cartooning style. This is an aspect that will be expounded upon in Avery’s next cartoon—the ever infamous All This and Rabbit Stew—but his desire to shock, subvert, and push boundaries can prompt an unfortunate tendency for racism to get caught in the crossfire. 

Actual mechanics of the animation are sharp. Loose movements of the native interpreting the drum beats to the king are elastic and energetic; even amidst the poor quality, Rod Scribner’s handiwork remains identifiable. It is, inarguably, a very well animated footnote, but is so overwhelmed by its own ignominiousness that it can really only be regarded with disgust today. Solid animation technique doesn’t absolve the gag of responsibility.

We still linger on the tribe, further patronization manifesting through Bruce’s language and description of the action. Here, viewers are subject to a glimpse of a hunter demonstrating his blowguns…

“Te’ble shot, Joe.”

This, too, is a take on a gag seen previously in Bob Clampett’s Africa Squeaks. Clampett’s gag is more grandiose, playful, framing the dartboard as a carnival game (complete with the incentive of a prize.) Here, Avery keeps it calm, cool and collected—underplayed reactions are still equipped in his utility belt of comedy.

A fade out and back in escorts us to less reprehensible matters… like ostriches. 

Ostriches are native to Africa, so the suddenness of their appearance is warranted. Still, the shift in tone is almost a bit too sudden—the background environments are entirely different through color and atmosphere. Going from the dense wilderness of the jungle to a much more open spread of land dotted with palm trees prompts a slight tonal whiplash without any formal warning. Even an introduction of “Ostriches can be found in the semiarid plains of Africa” or just “Elsewhere in Africa” would provide a buffer. Instead, their sudden inclusion reads more closely to a random non-sequitur than a logical flow of ideas. 

Bruce nevertheless orates on the phenomenon of ostriches burying their head in the sand. Three of them soon dominate the screen, playful squeaking sound effects giving a permanence to their secrecy—three all doing the same action indicates that this isn’t just a standard rule of threes gag.

Indeed, a straggler enters. Frenetic, befuddled head shakes seem innocuous enough…

“Hey, where is everybody?”

Buck teeth and a vacant, wall-eyed expression further the hollowness of his dopey voice. One wonders how more exaggerated and indicative of Avery’s design senses the ostrich would be had this gag been reused in later years. Dumb as the joke may be (in multiple senses), it’s harmless most of all.

“Interesting to behold is the evolution of a tropical butterfly.” This, too, almost seems to come out of nowhere. It follows the exploration of various native animals… but is a stretch to be included in a short about air travel. 

Relevancy is irrelevant. Animation of the cocoon hatching is delightfully disgusting, between its violent writhing and the resounding, wet spitting sound effects as a gorgeous butterfly is unearthed from the casing. Stalling’s orchestrations of “Apple Blossoms And Chapel Bells” are gentle, sweet, hushed, a rightful partner to Bruce’s equally docile narrations. Thus, the freneticism of the cocoon hatching and its arguably disgusting theatrics provide much of the comedy intended.

At least, as much comedy intended for a straightforward display of the butterflies hatching. Two of them erupt in perfect form, vibrant, meticulous inking doing their part to give Bruce’s claims of their beauty merit. Given how straight the scene has been played (coarseness of the hatching aside), the viewer is attuned to those ever enigmatic threes. Surely the third cocoon possesses an outlier. 

Indeed it does. Avery bites at any opportunity for the old “I’ve been sick” gag; Wacky Wildlife presents a more amusing and entertaining payoff through a stronger sense of exaggeration. The punchline here is serviceable, but reads as a means to an end more than a substantial joke. No doubt about it, the butterfly is positively pathetic… but seems to demand for more than just plain feebleness. 

Maybe that stems from the understanding that this is the finishing gag… sort of. A shot of the sunset (stunningly rendered by Johnsen) and talks of bidding reluctant farewells evoke a sense of finality that is rebutted through the minute or so remaining in the runtime. So, this isn’t the final gag, but it does feel as though there are more substantial means to end out on before segueing to the end.

Nevertheless, the waning sunset is one of Avery and Johnsen’s most gorgeous yet. High praise, seeing as Avery had a fondness for ending his travelogues on tropical sunsets. Added benefits of ripple glass on top of the painted waters simulate the movement of gentle waves; subtle enough to enliven the composition, but not to a degree of distraction. Additional ambience. 

More musically timed plane gags to bookend the short, this time to a swinging accompaniment of “Aloha Oe”. Animation of the plane reads more rigid and stilted than a deliberately coy maneuver, but the antithesis in tone is enough to communicate Avery’s intent.

“As we near New York on the return trip, we encounter a heavy fog which makes visibility poor and landing difficult.”

Once again, this last bit of suspense takes direct inspiration from the end of Land of the Midnight Fun, in which a cruise liner dissolved into the fog (also preceded through some picturesque island sunsets). Visual grandiosity with the fog effects aren’t as regarded as they were in Midnight, but that cartoon in itself boasted some particularly elaborate effects animation that remains a cut above. Tense music stings from Stalling and manufactured urgency in Bruce’s orations do much of the heavy lifting here. 

“Circle field before coming in… circle field before coming in…”

To Avery’s credit, depicting the plane with a convincing depth through the barest of details (a few yellow squares indicating slivers of light) is no easy feat. To do so in constant motion, said phantom object weaving in and out of perspective, is doubly impressive. 

Especially when such artistic meticulousness amounts to a deliberately befuddling and juvenile gag: the airliner manifesting itself as the time honored tradition of the carnival airplane ride. Midnight Fun’s ending gag is more satisfying humorously and directorially, but the lighthearted nature so innate to this gag proves difficult to refute. Especially with the proud, tinkling accompaniment of “The Merry Go Round Broke Down”.

Such marks two Avery cartoons in a row that end with a fade to black instead of iris out—the first one not exactly by choice.

It’s clear that Aviation Vacation is the product of a director who was becoming increasingly more checked out. To imply that it’s a bad cartoon would be disingenuous, as it certainly is not… but, like many of the mediocrities touted in the past handful of shorts, it falls into that trap of being not much of anything at all. Many of the gags seen here were either retreads of prior material that was utilized to a greater advantage previously, or would later be fashioned into a more refined delivery that renders its presence here obsolete. Tone and identity of the short is unconfident, discombobulated, confused, and there are multiple instances in the cartoon where long pauses dominate—more than likely an attempt to pad out the time and meet the quota. 

Again, the status of this film is worth reiterating: this cartoon was completed before The Heckling Hare debacle. It isn’t suddenly subpar because of studio meddling or anything having to do with Avery’s suspension. Instead, it stands exactly as it is: a representation of Avery feeling sheltered by the studio, trapped, unable to find the right outlet to be wholly self indulgent. Whether it was a result of feeling the aforementioned pressures of perfectionism, a case of tending more time to another cartoon in production, or another unspoken aspect, the outcome is clear: Avery’s heart was not in this one.

That isn’t to imply that there aren’t redeeming qualities. The hair in the projector gag is an unfettered stroke of genius; Magical Maestro did not exist in 1941. No Avery cartoon succeeding this one existed yet. As it stands on the exact surface level, the gag was unlike anything anyone had seen before. It’s original, it’s new, it’s novel. Clearly a defining moment for the cartoon. Likewise, Johnny Johnsen does much of the heavy lifting throughout this short, and it certainly plays dividends. Stalling’s musical tunes remain as catchy as ever, often instrumental in bestowing an identity to the actions and gags, and the animation is often solid. Barring the segment dedicated to Africa, there is nothing objectionable about this cartoon.

The problem is just that it really has no reason to exist. Previous Avery travelogues accomplish many of the same feats here to greater, more novel degrees of success. Most memorable moments of the short would be repurposed later on, or are custom for every one of Avery’s Warner shorts (great backgrounds and music, solid animation.) Avery’s exhaustion with the studio has begun to make itself clearer and clearer, and this short is no exception. Bigger and brighter opportunities thankfully await him… even if today is not that day.