Toons Around The World: Blunders From Down Under

Mr. Blogmeister has been seeking - and for the most part not finding - examples of Down Under cartoon goodness to post on this blog. Best known of the animation producers Down Under was the Eric Porter Studio.

Porter's animation studio first debuted with Waste Not, Want Not, a 1939 educational cartoon promoting saving for a rainy day and starring the ravishing big spender Willie The Wombat. The Porter cartoons at times demonstrate that certain bent synthesis of primitive animation and startlingly off-the-wall ideas rampant (and much beloved) in the early talkie Aesop's Fables and Don & Waffles series by New York's Terrytoons and Van Beuren studios.

Curiously, Eric Porter's Color Classics share a series title (Color Classics) and main character name (Bimbo) with another New York cartoon studio of note, Fleischer's.



The anthropomorphized car in the following cartoon, Bimbo's Auto, may well have been inspired by a viewing by Porter and crew of Friz Freleng's 1937 Merrie Melodie cartoon, Streamlined Greta Green - or, for that matter, British Animated Productions' Bubble & Squeek series.



More lucrative for the studio: a series of ads for Aeroplane Pure Fruit Jellies, featuring the ever-plucky Bertie.



Since the technique in Bimbo's Auto is definitely less advanced than the following animated ad starring the iconic Bertie The Jet, the theatrical cartoon's frequently cited 1954 production date seems a tad suspect. Perhaps the Australian equivalents of The Motion Picture Herald and Harrison's Reports would yield the answers regarding when these cartoons were released theatrically. Even the excellent Animation In Australia piece from the Australian government website is primarily an overview.



Here's the most often seen Eric Porter Studio opus, Rabbit Stew. Said to have been produced in 1952, this looks like a cartoon made by an independent animation studio in America around 1937. We like it just the same!



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Blackhawk Films struck prints of Rabbit Stew and Bimbo's Auto for the home 16mm and 8mm market. Unfortunately, the third Porter Color Classics cartoon, Bimbo's Clock, was never completed.

Porter himself frequently shifted over to directing live-action movies and television programs between his studio's projects thoughout his career, but in 1972 returned to animation with the epic fantasy feature Marco Polo Vs. The Red Dragon. The story goes that the ambitious film did very poorly at the box office and lost so much money that the studio was forced to shut down. Although your correspondent has never seen it, perhaps the film (A.K.A. Marco Polo, Jr.) is available on DVD in Australia and New Zealand.



Last but not least, for various clips in today's posting, Way Too Damn Lazy To Write A Blog thanks the outstanding film preservationists at the National Archives Of Australia, the National Film And Sound Archive, and those who authored the Australian Film Institute website. Cheers, mates!