Home | Movies By Year | Movies from 1930


Fiddlesticks (1930 film)

Buy Fiddlesticks (1930 film) now from Amazon

First, read the Wikipedia article. Then, scroll down to see what other TopShelfReviews readers thought about the movie. And once you've experienced the movie, tell everyone what you thought about it.

Wikipedia article




{{Infobox film

| name = Fiddlesticks

| image = File:Fiddlesticks (1930).ogg

| caption =

| director = Ub Iwerks

| story =

| animator = 'Drawn by:'
Ub Iwerks
Fred Kopietz
Tony Pabian

| background_artist = Fred Kopietz

| starring =

| music = Carl Stalling

| producer = Ub Iwerks

| distributor = Celebrity Pictures

| released =

| country = United States

| color_process = Harriscolor

| runtime = 6 minutes 12 seconds

| language = English

}}

'Fiddlesticks' is a 1930 Celebrity Pictures theatrical cartoon short directed and animated by Ub Iwerks, in his first cartoon since he departed from Walt Disney's studio. The short features Iwerks' character Flip the Frog. It is the first complete sound cartoon to be photographed in color. The film went into the public domain after the copyright owner failed to renew the copyright after the film's 28 year term.

The film was simultaneously released with 'King of Jazz', a musical revue, and was released with a cartoon depicting how Paul Whiteman, the music director of the film, "became the King of Jazz".

Plot synopsis



Flip is seen dancing on lilypads until he reaches land and dries himself off. He walks to a party, where he performs a dance for the audience, accidentally climbing to a spider web. He also performs a duet, playing piano alongside a mouse (who bears a striking resemblance to Mickey Mouse, which Iwerks co-created with Walt Disney during his days at Disney's company) playing the violin. They perform two songs. In the first song, the mouse starts crying, and so do Flip and the piano. The second song makes Flip start hugging the piano, which then kicks Flip. The cartoon ends with Flip beating on the piano; he kicks all the piano keys into the air, and they drop onto him.

Significance



'Fiddlesticks' was the first in the Flip the Frog series. The sound system was Powers Cinephone, the same system used for Disney's 'Steamboat Willie' (1928).

The unnamed mouse in the cartoon bears a striking resemblance to Mortimer Mouse, the original concept behind Mickey Mouse, both of whom were first animated by Ub Iwerks.[https://d23.com/a-to-z/mortimer-mouse/ Mortimer Mouse - D23]

In popular culture



The cartoon appeared on a television set in the music video for Eminem's song "The Real Slim Shady", which the viewer laughs at.

References




Buy Fiddlesticks (1930 film) now from Amazon

<-- Return to movies from 1930



This work is released under CC-BY-SA. Some or all of this content attributed to http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=1106951954.