Here’s a little seen commercial featuring Pluto and his owner, Mickey Mouse. The most interesting thing about the ad is the bizarre, modernist style Mickey is rendered. He looks positively cubist!
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13Oct
Posted by Pluto @ 3:39 pm
Tags: animation, Disney, fifties, mickey, mouse, nash, Pluto, vintage
25 Responses
October 13th, 2009 at 3:39 pm
very ugli car in this times one house was cheaper than car , now the car is suck
October 13th, 2009 at 3:39 pm
Yikes, Mickey and Pluto UPA-style! My first thought was that Pluto didn’t look too good… but the stylized, square appearance of Mickey is just pretty terrible in my eyes! Such re-designing of classic characters can of course work well, but it has to be done with an understanding of what makes the character in the first place. In this case, all the appeal from the classic, round design of Mickey is lost… a truly ill-conceived modernization.
October 13th, 2009 at 3:39 pm
Interesting! Though Pluto looks really well animated save for a few moments where he looks kind of angular too. Methinks a new kid at the time got this assignment. The UPA style would not never gone down well with Walt otherwise
October 13th, 2009 at 3:39 pm
hey I think you live near me! MSG me on M.S.N.
press 111 if ur honry xD fC
October 13th, 2009 at 3:39 pm
School of Visual Arts. Traditional animation of course! When it comes to cartoons I like Popeye and Woody Woodpecker from the 1940’s. Don’t get me wrong, I love Disney features, but Popeye’s zainey nautical wartime antics can be very funny.
October 13th, 2009 at 3:39 pm
Naw. I know a HELLUVA lot, but not nearly enough to go around calling myself a historian.
What school are you about to go to?
October 13th, 2009 at 3:39 pm
Good to know, as I’m going to animation school soon. Are you a cartoon historian?
October 13th, 2009 at 3:39 pm
yakacm: Just want to clear up some misconceptions: Most full animation, even old Disney stuff, is shot on twos (12 drawings per second, each shot twice), instead of ones (24 drawings per second). Ones are usually saved for certain scenes (when they can afford it) or fast action (where twos can look bad).
An example of something done completely on ones, however, is “Who Framed Roger Rabbit”. In that case, twos would have been impossible–for obvious reasons.
October 13th, 2009 at 3:39 pm
Yeah, shoulda mentioned those. Disney was never a fan of those cartoons, as I understand it. He let them be made, but he didn’t encourage more like them. In any case, the shorts were ending around then anyway, so any conflicts that might have developed further between Disney and modern-minded staffers (like Ward Kimball) would have been moot.
October 13th, 2009 at 3:39 pm
I agree. However I noticed some of the non-Micky shorts in the 50’s had a UPA style. “Pigs is Pigs” and “Anyburg USA” are 2good examples. Especially “Pigs is Pigs” which contains more “cartoon” styled movement rather than realistic style that Disney was known for.
October 13th, 2009 at 3:39 pm
The ’55 Nash isn’t ugly at all. You want an ugly car, try the ’89 Pylmouth Voyager.
October 13th, 2009 at 3:39 pm
Too bad it was so god-awful ugly. But they couldn’t afford to restyle very dramatically by that time – and it shows.
October 13th, 2009 at 3:39 pm
The reason mickey is animated like that, UPA style, is one reason it’s cheap. Probably shooting two of the same frame, instead of doing ones 50% less drawing twice as cheap, and there isn’t much background, not much of anything realy. Advertising annimation is an art form in itself, today it is all done on computer but back then it needing to be knocked out realy quickly and cheaply, the main artist would do the keys and then get the tea boy to fill in the tweens, which is what software does now
October 13th, 2009 at 3:39 pm
“Thrill Test” That’s an awesome way to refer to a test drive!
October 13th, 2009 at 3:39 pm
Whoa! I never knew Mickey was ever animated in a modern UPA-influenced style. (Personally, I don’t think this design works for him, but that’s beside the point.)
Given how aesthetically conservative Walt Disney was, it’s surprising he allowed this. He was not a fan of the angular styles that were popular in the 50s. I guess he allowed it in commercials because they were at the forefront of modern design. But he definitely wouldn’t have let Mickey look like that in a regular cartoon.
October 13th, 2009 at 3:39 pm
beautiful car
October 13th, 2009 at 3:39 pm
What a classic! I esp. liked how Mickey strutted out of the yard!
October 13th, 2009 at 3:39 pm
KINDA UGLY TO ME
October 13th, 2009 at 3:39 pm
Considering that Nash didn’t open its front fenders until its last model year, 1957, it’s a miracle any Nash built after 1949 handled well at all…and they jumped the shark when they moved the headlights into the grille…but they had to so they could be distinguished from the ’55 Hudsons!
October 13th, 2009 at 3:39 pm
the 1955 Nash Ambassador V8 used a 320 cubic inch Packard V8 and Packards Twin Ultramatic automatic transmission.
The Nashes rode soft and did not corner well.
October 13th, 2009 at 3:39 pm
I thought Dad’s new 55 Ambassador was ugly, but now I see it as a work of art. It had 6 cylinders w/standard shift, was driven nearly 200 thousand miles and no major repairs! I think it wore out at least three water pumps in 8 years. Thanks for posting that…brought back some good memories.
October 13th, 2009 at 3:39 pm
My grandfather had a 1955 Nash once upon time… Quite interesting ad.
October 13th, 2009 at 3:39 pm
Wow, I never knew Mickey was animated like this o.O
October 13th, 2009 at 3:39 pm
American Motors [Nash division] was one of the first sponsors of “DISNEYLAND” in 1954-’55. And this commercial was created to appear exclusively during the show. The animation was probably done by a Disney unit- in the “UPA” style that Walt didn’t particularly care for.
October 13th, 2009 at 3:39 pm
Pluto Nash! Haw, haw.