Hit or Miss: Corn on the Cop?

[Marty26]

With Irv Spector getting a rather long thread and CoTC being the most popular mid-60s Daffy short, I thought I'd poll everybody to see whether or not they think it was a half decent cartoon overall.

I voted "Hit." The criminal was funny, and some of Daffy/Porky's attempts at catching him were also pretty funny (even though some of the jokes seemed a little contrived).

[Duck Dodgers]

I voted " hit " because i think it's one of the very very few good cartoons made by WB in the late Sixties ( it is funny to see Porky and Daffy teamed together after too many years in which their potential as a Laurel and Hardy-like team was not used ) .


I also appreciate the fact that this short reminds me of the atmosphere of Laurel and Hardy 's two-reel classic sound short " The Midnight Patrol " ( 1932 ) .

[chuckamuck45]

IMHO, a bore...though its better than many of the other DFE-WB toons

[J Lee]

Promises more than it delivers, though at least its a pairing that makes more sense than most of the D-FE cartoons with Daffy. If Friz and Irv had come up with a better gag than the one with Porky yanking the nails out of the board I'd rate it as a hit (at least by 1965 standards), but as I said last week in the thread on Irv Spector, the gag goes against what Porky's supposed to represent when he's teamed with Daffy, in the cartoons Jones and McKimson did during the 1950s (I feel the same way about the "one bad gag messes up the cartoon" problem with McKimson's "Rushing Roulette" -- take away the handcar gag, which is totally out of character for the Road Runner, and the rest of the cartoon is pretty good for a 1965 short).

[angilbas]

Spector's inexperience as a director hurt this film. The animation had more off-model moments than one is accustomed to seeing in a :ham: cartoon, and Bill Lava didn't get enough of the director's guidance that he needed when scoring animated shorts. As others have pointed out, :ham: was jarringly stupid when he pulled nails from the bridge which :daffy: was building ... it was always better to let :daffy: set up his own pratfalls for :ham: to observe.

Most of the artists and animators involved in this short also worked on better-looking McKimson cartoons which were released around the same time: Suppressed Duck and Rushing Roulette. Comparing Corn on the Cop with those two is a good way to appreciate the value of an experienced director.


-Tony

[Marty26]

The "Porky Pulling Nails Out Of Board" scene is the contrived scene I was talking about. I don't remember Porky being THAT stupid (plus that particular joke is probably the oldest in the book) - and I guess it is a testament to the inexperience of Irv Spector as a director. Alex Lovy had that same problem with Speedy Ghost To Town (remember the "Daffy overhearing Speedy behind the fence" scene?).

[gilligan fanati]

Miss: I never really liked this one. It has been years since I last saw it though.

[AardvarkDog]

This one's a miss from me, too. In my opinion, Porky and Daffy seemed out of character for me, case in point above, as well as there was a lot of dialogue used from begining to end (So much, they ended up overlapping the Grocer's voice with the Policeman's!) Plus, the gags Porky and Daffy used to capture the crook left me dizzy as to WHICH window was Granny's and which was the crook's? :befuddled
But I'll admit that the crook was good and some of his lines were humerous in this one.

Agreed, Freleng's better as a director than a writer.

[Toonami]

Hit for me. I loved how stupid Granny was in thinking they were :daffy: & :ham: were kids in suits. I thought those two morons as cops was a great idea. The crappy animation reminded me of early Hanna-Barbera, so it wasn't that bad for me. When I first saw it I said "I didn't know these 60's cartoons were so good!"

[Mr. Semaj]

Miss.


Seeing as how this was Porky's first and only real theatrical appearance in a seven-year period (the last being China Jones), it shows how much the character had fizzled in comparision to his super-star days.

[Nick]

Seeing as how this was Porky's first and only real theatrical appearance in a seven-year period (the last being China Jones), it shows how much the character had fizzled in comparision to his super-star days. I've always wondered why Porky was used less and less as the years went on during the 50s and 60s. There was a brief period in the early 40s when the directors focused more on newer stars like Bugs and Daffy as they felt burnt out on Porky, but throughout the decade they continued to make solo Porky cartoons as well as ones with Daffy. The last solo Porky cartoon that I can think of is "Dog Collard", released in 1952. After that, all of them had him paired with Daffy, but not as the main star of the cartoon. Does anyone here have any idea why he was used less during the late 50s and 60s?

[Dr. Killpatient]

I voted Miss.


This cartoon just seemed a waste of time. I didn't really find any of it funny, and some of it was awkward (Porky ripping out the nails comes to mind).

The only saving grace I can see is the sheer campiness of the story itself.

[angilbas]

Miss.


Seeing as how this was Porky's first and only real theatrical appearance in a seven-year period (the last being China Jones), it shows how much the character had fizzled in comparision to his super-star days.

Four years before Porky became a cop, he was cast as an innkeeper who became an oil baron in Daffy's Inn Trouble. Admittedly Daffy had more screen time, but Porky had a substantial enough presence -- without him, Daffy might not have uttered such a good closing line.


-Tony

[Mr. Semaj]

Does anyone here have any idea why he was used less during the late 50s and 60s?

Same reason as Mickey Mouse, probably.