The Adventures Of Felix The Cat – Frolics At The Circus is an early Felix the Cat cartoon, directed by Otto Messmer and produced by Pat Sullivan, and released in 1920, which was a big year for Felix the Cat.
The first Felix the Cat film (Feline Follies, which I watched here) was released in 1919, and Felix starred in another two before the end of that year (and it was only in the third one that he was finally actaully called Felix).
But then in 1920 he was in 14 different cartoons, which seems a bit much. Everything was Felix the Cat, and always would be.
(Until 1930, at least, when he died forever).
So, anyway, in Frolics At The Circus, a mouse scares away an elephant, in time honoured fashion, and poor old Felix has to get the elephant back, which, without spoiling things too much, he does. Good old Felix.
Also he actually kills the mouse (in a fairly wonderful way), which as someone brought up on Tom and Jerry cartoons, was pretty shocking, I can tell you.
In animation terms, the whole thing is fairly basic, although with some nice little tricks here and there. It is slightly strange seeing the use of word balloons in this, I find, largely because they’re entirely superfluous, as are all the bits where they have to draw sight lines from the eyes of the characters to tell you what they’re looking at. The use of illustrated sound effects is better, though, especially the way some of these are put to good use by Felix.
And the elephant is very endearingly drawn.
So in conclusion, this cartoon made me laugh at least three times it was good I liked it. Also the twenty seconds at the start of the circus man happily stroking Felix are really wonderful, and it’s worth watching just for that.
(I wish I had a cat)
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Notes
1. I watched this on the British Pathe website
2. Although their version on youtube seems to be much better quality
3. So you should probably watch that version instead.
4. Also if you watch it on youtube you can speed it up to 1.25 playback speed
5. Which makes it much better
6. And less awkwardly slow.
7. British Pathe also says this is from 1930, but everywhere else says it’s from 1920
8. Which seems much more likely, given the stiltedness of the animation
9. Compared to later Felix the Cat cartoons
10. When Felix the Cat actually looks like Felix the Cat.
11. Also I can’t help but feel this cartoon should have been called Frolix at the Circus rather than Frolics.
12. Although that might have caused Philip K. Dick to sue from some time in the future.
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Film Information
Title: The Adventures Of Felix The Cat – Frolics At The Circus
Director: Otto Messmer
Year: 1920
Duration: 5 minutes
Watch: British Pathe; youtube