Cartoon Classics-Volume 5

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General		Extras
Category	Animation	None
Rating
Year Of Production	?
Running Time	79:16
RSDL / Flipper	No/No	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Menu
Region Coding	1,2,3,4,5,6	Directed By	Chuck Jones Robert Clampett
Studio Distributor	Flashback Home Entertainment	Starring	Mel Blanc
Case	C-Button-Version 2
RPI	$9.95	Music	Carl W. Stalling

    As mentioned in previous reviews of this series, these cartoons are now in the public domain as their copyright has expired. In this group of cartoons are some of the earliest examples of some very well known characters that I have personally seen. The Goofy Gophers stars those wonderful two little gophers that are ever-so-polite to each other. Scent-Imental Over You stars none other than Pepi Le'pu, although it is a small dog rather than a cat that is the focus of his unwelcome attentions. Also, Buckaroo Bugs stars the rabbit himself. I have seen earlier versions of Bugs, but not by much. There are also appearances by Elmer Fudd and Tweety Pie.

    The only complaint I have about the content on this disc are that there are two very bad examples of racism. Blackface and the associated stereotype reflects a society with real problems.

    Roughly Squeaking (7:25) Two mice play mind games with a very slow pussy cat.

    Of Fox And Hounds (9:21) The age-old fox and hound story with a very different twist. An intellectually challenged hound is given the run-around by a wily fox.

    The Goofy Gophers (7:15) You just have to love these guys. Our two ever-so-polite gophers work over a poor guard dog that really didn't stand a chance.

    Scent-Imental (7:20) As soon as you see an innocent animal end up in black with a white stripe down their backs you just know who will be appearing very quickly. The greatest of the Parisian lovers, Pepi.

    Goofy Groceries (8:55) This is a very strange cartoon. Back in the days that this cartoon was made groceries had all sorts of strange pictures and animals on their covers. In this cartoon, all these animals and creatures come to life and dance around only to be interrupted by a large gorilla.

    Buckaroo Bugs (8:42) Bugs versus what just may have been the inspiration for Yosemite Sam.

    Wacky Wildlife (7:39) A take-off of wildlife specials complete with voice-over.

    An Itch in Time (8:32) Poor little doggy has a flea. Another interesting reference to rationing in this one.

    Gruesome Twosome (7:27) Two cats and Tweety Bird - do I have to tell you who comes out on top ?

    Bacall To Arms (6:09) A strange night at the movies with Bogey Gocart and Laurie Becool.

Video

    Presented at 1.33:1 and not 16x9 enhanced, in all likelihood this is the original aspect ratio.

    The image is very blurred all the way though. Shadow detail is acceptable but the blacks are not really fully black. There is abundant low level noise present. The worst part of the transfer is the complete blowing out of the lighter sections of the transfer. Any light colour is completely lost and white patches had me worried about burn-in on my projector. Most scenes show this problem with a particularly bad example at 35:19.

    The problem with the chroma being out of sync is as bad on this disc as the others. For those with little or no overscan, you can see a black bar on the right. As you move left, the luminance information appears, followed some time later by the chroma. This can be most clearly seen during the classic opening with the circle pattern such as at 7:55. On the right, the red of the circles is visible over the blue and on the left the blue appears over the circle. Other than this, the colours are washed out and full of noise.

    MPEG artefacts are hard to spot in amongst the other problems but they are there. They mostly consist of posterization. There is some minor aliasing but again it is hard to spot where there are no sharp lines. Film artefacts abound with grain, dirt and every other defect in the book present. The transfer also suffers badly from interlacing. Also, see how many reel change marks you can spot.

    There are no subtitles.

    This is a single layered disc.

Video Ratings Summary

Sharpness
Shadow Detail
Colour
Grain/Pixelization
Film-To-Video Artefacts
Film Artefacts
Overall

Audio

    There is a single English Dolby Digital 2.0 sound track on this disc. It is not in bad condition considering the rest of the disc. There is some hiss and the occasional pop and crackle but it is actually not excessive on this disc.

    Dialogue quality is pretty good considering. The audio appears to be in sync.

    The music is exactly what you expect - a full and real live orchestra with impeccable timing. I do like the goofy but themed music that accompanies these cartoons.

    There is no surround nor subwoofer activity.

Audio Ratings Summary

Dialogue
Audio Sync
Clicks/Pops/Dropouts
Surround Channel Use
Subwoofer
Overall

Menu

    While there are other series of old cartoons available in R1, this series has not been released there.

    You don't realise just how far we have come in toning down racism in daily viewing, so to see it these days actually comes as a bit of a shock. Other than these unfortunate references, I still say that these cartoons are not too bad. It is a shame the source material was not a little better.

    The video is shocking.

    The audio is not too bad.

    There are zippo extras.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall