Tom And Jerry (cartoon) Plot And Format Characters

Tom and Jerry were an animated cat (Tom) and mouse (Jerry) team who formed the basis of a massively successful series of theatrical short cartoons created by animators William Hanna and Joseph Barbera, produced by Metro-Goldwyn Mayer from 1940 to 1958. MGM later had more Tom & Jerry cartoons produced by outside studios in the 1960s ( Gene Deitch 's Rembrandt Films from 1961 to 1962, and Chuck Jones' Sib Tower 12 Productions from 1963 to 1967). Tom and Jerry later resurfaced in TV cartoons produced by Hanna-Barbera Productions ( 1975- 1977; 1990Events January January 3 Former leader of Panama Manuel Noriega surrenders to American forces. January 7 The Leaning Tower of Pisa is closed to the public due to safety concerns. January 9 Lt Gen Bazilio Olara Okello The man who led the coup aginst Dr Apo- 19931993 is a common year starting on Friday and marked the Beginning of the International Decade to Combat Racism and Racial Discrimination (1993-2003 Events January January 1 Czechoslovakia divides. Establishment of independent Slovakia and Czech Republic.) and Filmation StudiosFilmation was a company that produced cartoons for television during the later half of the 20th century. During a period lasting from the 1960s through the 1980s, the only real competitors to Hanna-Barbera Productions in the field of TV cartoons were Film ( 19801980 is a leap year starting on Tuesday. Events January-February January 1- April 1 National steel strike in United Kingdom January 1 Changes to the Swedish Act of Succession creates Victoria of Sweden, Crown Princess over her younger brother January 5 He - 1982Events January January 6 William Bonin is convicted of being the "freeway killer". January 8 AT&T agrees to divest itself of twenty-two subdivisions January 11 Mark Thatcher, son of the British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, disappears in the Sahara du). The original Hanna and Barbera shorts are notable for having won seven Academy AwardsThis class was known as "Short Subjects, cartoons" from 1932 until 1970, and as "Short Subjects, animated films" from 1971 to 1973. The present title began with the 1974 awards. As Short Subjects (Cartoons 1930s 1931- 1932 Flowers and Trees Walt Disney Pi, more than any other character-based cartoon series.

1 Plot and format

The plots of each short usually center on Tom's frustrated attempts to catch Jerry, and the mayhem and destruction that ensues. Tom is ostensibly attempting to catch Jerry to eat him, but at times he seems content in attempting to either kill/destroy him, or as simply a means of proving himself the craftier of the two. However, Tom never succeeds in capturing Jerry, mainly because of Jerry's own craftiness and cunning. The shorts are famous for using some of the most destructive and violent gags ever devised for theatrical animation: Jerry slicing Tom in half, Tom using everything from axes, pistols, rifles, dynamite, and poison to try and murder Jerry, Jerry stuffing Tom's tail in a waffle iron, and so on. A recurring gag has Jerry causing some sort of an explosive to blow up in his adversary's face, causing Tom to appear in blackfaceAl Jolson in The Jazz Singer (1927) Blackface is a style of theatrical makeup that originated in the United States, used to affect the countenance of an iconic, racist, American archetype, that of the darky or coon . The term blackface also refers to a ge.

Tom and Jerry cartoons are, for the most part, virtually silent, as neither Tom nor Jerry usually speaks. Music therefore plays a very important part in the shorts. Musical director Scott BradleyScott Bradley was a composer, pianist and conductor. He is most famous for his music for Tom and Jerry''. Started with Walt Disney in 1929 and moved to Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer in 1938 when they set up their own cartoon unit. His early style was to incorporate created complex scores that combined elements of jazz, classical, and pop music; Bradley often reprised actual then-contemporary pop songs, as well as songs from MGM such as The Wizard of Oz and Meet Me In St. Louis.

Before 1953, all Tom and Jerry cartoons were produced in the standard Academy ratio and format; from 1953 to 1956 some of the output was dually produced in both Academy format and the widescreen CinemaScope process. From 1956 until the close of the MGM animation studio a year later, all Tom and Jerry cartoons were produced in CinemaScope; some were even had their soundtracks recorded in stereo. The 1960s Gene Deitch and Chuck Jones shorts were all produced in Academy format, but with compositions that made them compatible to be matted to Academy widescreen format as well. All of the Hanna and Barbera cartoons were produced in three-strip Technicolor, the 1960s entries were done in Metrocolor .

2 Characters

Tom is a grey tabby house cat, that lives a pampered life, which Jerry, a small brown mouse, generally tries to disturb and interrupt, provoking Tom to chase him. Though very energetic and determined, Tom is no match for Jerry's brains and wits; so by the iris-out of each cartoon, Jerry is shown to have triumphantly survived, while Tom is left embarrassed, frustrated, in trouble, or in pain...if not all four at the same time. Although neither Tom and Jerry usually speak, co-director William Hanna provides most of the squeaks, gasps, and other vocal effects for the pair (including the most famous sound effect from the series, Tom's leather lunged scream, created by recording Hanna's scream and chopping the head and tail off of the sound; leaving only the strongest part of the scream on the soundtrack).

In his attempts to catch Jerry, Tom often has to deal with the intrusions of characters such as Butch, a scruffy black alley cat who also wants to catch and eat Jerry, Spike (sometimes billed as "Killer"), a vicious guard bulldog, and Mammy-Two-Shoes, his black owner, who usually wallops Tom with a broom when he misbehaves. In the late 1940s, Jerry adopts a little grey mouse foundling named Nibbles (also known as "Tuffy"). During the 1950s Spike is shown to have a son of his own named Tyke, an addition that lead to both a slight softening of Spike's character and a short-lived spin-off theatrical series ( Spike and Tyke ).

3 History and evolution

3.1 The Hanna-Barbera years

William Hanna and Joseph Barbera were both part of the Rudolf Ising unit at MGM's animation studio in late 1930s. Barbera, a storyman and character designer, was paired with Hanna, an experienced director, to start directing films for the Ising unit; the first of which was a cat-and-mouse cartoon called Puss Gets the Boot Completed in late 1939 and released to theatres on February 20, 1940, Puss Gets The Boot centers around Jasper, a grey tabby cat trying to catch Jinx, a cute little mouse, but without breaking anything; Jasper's owner Mammy has threatened to throw Jasper out ("O-W-T, out!") if he breaks one more thing in the house. Naturally, Jinx uses this to his advantage, and begins tossing wine glasses, ceramic plates, tea pots, and any and everything fragile, so that Jasper will get thrown outside. Puss Gets The Boot was previewed and released without fanfare, and Hanna and Barbera went on to direct other (non-cat-and-mouse related) shorts; after all, said many of the MGM staffers, haven't there been enough cat-and-mouse cartoons already? The pessimistic attitude towards Jasper and Jinx changed when the cartoon became a favorite with theatre owners and with the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, which nominated the film for the of 1940. Producer Fred Quimby, who ran the MGM animation studio, quickly pulled Hanna and Barbera off of the other one-shot cartoons they were working on, and commissioned a series featuring the cat and mouse. Hanna and Barbera held an inter-studio contest to give the pair a new name; animator John Carr won with his suggestion of "Tom and Jerry." The Tom and Jerry series went into production with "The Midnight Snack" in 1941, and Hanna and Barbera never helmed anything but the cat-and-mouse cartoons for the rest of their tenure at MGM.

Tom & Jerry in the 1946 Academy Award winning cartoon The Cat Concerto Tom's physical appearance evolved significantly over the years. During the early 1940s, Tom had an excess of detail--shaggy fur, numerous facial wrinkles, and multiple eyebrow markings--all of which were streamlined into a more workable form by the end of the 1940s; Jerry stayed essentially the same throughout the duration of the series. By the mid-1940s, the series had developed a quicker, more energetic (and violent) tone, thanks to inspiration from the work of MGM Animation colleague Tex Avery, who joined the studio in 1942.

Even though the basic theme of each short is virtually the same, Hanna and Barbera found endless variations on that theme. Barbera's storyboards and rough layouts and designs, combined with Hanna's timing, resulted in the most popular, successful, and highly acclaimed series the MGM animation department ever had. 13 entries in the Tom and Jerry series (excludingPuss Gets The Boot) were nominated for the ; seven of them went on to win the Academy Award, breaking the Walt Disney studio's winning streak in that category. Tom and Jerry won more Academy Awards than any other character-based theatrical animated series.

Tom and Jerry remained popular throughout their original theatrical run, even when the budgets began to tighten a little in the 1950s and the pace of the shorts slowed slightly. However, after television became popular in the 1950s, box office revenues decreased for theatrical films, and short subjects. At first, MGM combated this by going to all- CinemaScope production on the series; but after the MGM accountants realized that their re-releases of the older shorts brought in just as much revenue as the new films, the studio executives decided much to the surprise of the staff, to close the animation studio. The MGM animation department was shut down in 1957, and the final of the 115 Hanna and Barbera Tom and Jerry shorts, Tot Watchers, was released on August 1, 1958. Hanna and Barbera started their own television animation studio, Hanna-Barbera Productions, in 1957, which went on to produce such popular shows as The Flintstones, The Jetsons, and Scooby-Doo.

3.2 The Gene Deitch era

In 1960, MGM decided that they wanted to produce new Tom and Jerry shorts again, and had producer William Snyder make an arrangement with Czech animation director Gene Deitch and Deitch's studio, Rembrandt Films , to make the films overseas in Prague. Since the Deitch/Snyder team only saw a handful of the original Tom and Jerry shorts, the films that resulted from the arrangement were considered unusual and, in many ways, bizarre. The Deitch/Snyder team turned out 13 shorts, all of which were released in 1961 and 1962.

3.3 The Chuck Jones era

After the last of the Deitch cartoons were released, MGM turned to American director Chuck Jones, who had just ended his thirty-plus year tenure at Warner Bros. Cartoons and started his own animation studio, Sib Tower 12 Productions, with partner Les Goldman. Jones and Goldman went on to produce 34 more Tom and Jerry shorts starting in 1963, all of which carried Jones' distinctive style (and a slight psychedelic influence), but with varying degrees of critical success. MGM ceased production of animated shorts in 1967, by which time Sib Tower 12 had become part of MGM, and Jones had already begum to move on to television specials and the feature film The Phantom Tollbooth.

3.4 Tom & Jerry hit television

During the period of the late 1960s, the Hanna and Barbera Tom and Jerry films began to appear on television in heavily edited form: the Jones team was required to take the shorts that featured Mammy, rotoscope her out, and replace her with a thin white woman. Lillian Randolph 's original voice tracks were replaced with June Foray performing in an Irish accent. Much of the extreme violence in the cartoons was also edited out.

In 1975, Tom and Jerry were reunited with Hanna and Barbera, who produced new Tom and Jerry cartoons for Saturday morning. These 48 7-minute short cartoons were paired with Grape Ape and Mumbly cartoons, to create " The New Tom & Jerry/Grape Ape Show ", " The Tom & Jerry/Grape Ape/Mumbly Show ", and The Tom & Jerry/Mumbly Show ," all of which ran on ABC Saturday Morning from September 6 1975 to September 3 1977. In these cartoons, Tom and Jerry, who had been enemies during their formative years, became nonviolent pals who went on adventures together, as Hanna-Barbera had to meet the stringent rules against violence for children's TV.

In 1980, Filmation Studios (in association with MGM Television) also tried their hands at producing a Tom and Jerry TV cartoon series, this one called The Tom and Jerry Comedy Show and also featuring new cartoons starring MGM cartoon star Droopy. Although they returned Tom and Jerry to the original chase formula, the Filmation cartoons were of noticeably lesser quality than Hanna-Barbera's efforts; this incarnation lasted on on CBS Saturday Morning from September 1980 to September 1982.

One of the biggest trends for Saturday morning television in the 1980s and 1990s was the "babyfication" of older, classic cartoon stars, and in 1990, Tom and Jerry Kids , produced by Hanna-Barbera Productions in association with Turner Entertainment, debuted on FOX, featuring a youthful cat and mouse (or possibly the originals' offspring) chasing each other. Spike and Tyke, and Droopy and his son Dripple, appeared in back-up segments for the show, which ran until 1993.

3.5 Tom & Jerry's new owners

In 1986, MGM was purchased by Ted Turner. Turner sold the company in 1988, but retained MGM's film library, thus Tom and Jerry became the property of Turner Entertainment (where the rights stand today via Warner Bros.), and have in subsequent years appeared on Turner-run stations, such as TBS, TNT, Cartoon Network, Boomerang, and Turner Classic Movies.

4 Feature films

In 1945, Jerry made an appearance in the live-action MGM musical feature film Anchors Aweigh, in which, through the use of special effects, he performs a dance routine with Gene Kelly. In this sequence, Gene Kelly is telling a class of school kids a fictional tale of how he earned his medal of honor. Jerry is the king of a magical world populated with cartoon animals, whom he have forbidden to dance as he himself does not know how. Gene Kelly's character then comes along and guides Jerry through an elaborate dance routine, resulting in Jerry awarding him with a medal. Jerry speaks and sings in this film; his voice is performed by Sara Berner . Tom has a cameo in the sequence as one of Jerry's servants.

Both Tom and Jerry appear with Esther Williams in a dream sequence in another MGM musical, Dangerous When Wet (1953). In the film, Tom and Jerry are chasing each other underwater, when they run into Esther Williams, with whom they do an extended synchronized swimming routine. Tom and Jerry have to save Esther from a lecherous octopus, who tries to lure and woo Esther into his (many) arms.

1992 saw the overseas release of Tom and Jerry: The Movie , produced by Film Roman , was released to U.S. theatres in 1993 by Miramax. A musical in the typical Disney-esque vein, Tom and Jerry: The Movie was criticized by reviewers and audiences alike for being unoriginal, predictable, and for giving Tom and Jerry dialogue (and songs) through the entire film. The movie did poor business in America. In 2001, Warner Bros. which had by then merged with Turner and assumed most of its properties, released the direct-to-video movie The Magic Ring , in which Tom covets a ring that Jerry wears on his head that will give him mystical powers.

5 Other formats

Tom and Jerry also appeared in a series of comic books and various video games as well.

6 The Oscar-winning shorts

The following cartoons won the :

1943: The Yankee Doodle Mouse
1944: Mouse Trouble
1945: Quiet, Please!
1946: The Cat Concerto
1948: The Little Orphan
1952: The Two Mouseketeers
1953: Johann Mouse

These cartoons were nominated for the , but did not win:

1940: Puss Gets the Boot (Jasper and Jinx)
1941: The Night Before Christmas
1947: Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Mouse
1949: Hatch Up Your Troubles
1951: Jerry's Cousin
1954: Touché, Pussy Cat!

7 External links

Hanna-Barbera and Cartoon Network Studios cartoons and characters Tom and Jerry (MGM) New Tom & Jerry/Grape Ape Show, The New Tom & Jerry/Grape Ape Show, The Tom & Jerry Kids Tom & Jerry Kids

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