The Cinematheque

“Chuck Jones’s best films stand out [for] their impeccably-drawn-and-animated characters and a willingness to experiment with any element of a film.”

On the Ones

The zany, ironic cast of characters designed by the animators at Warner Bros., most of them voiced by Mel Blanc, began life as exaggerations of the silent age of cinema. The studio’s animators, most of them close in age, would have been about 10 years old when Buster Keaton’s Sherlock Jr. was first released, while director Bob Clampett grew up—so the legend goes—next door to Charlie Chaplin. Like slapstick daredevils unbound by the laws of space and time, Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Road Runner, Tweety Bird, and Wile E. Coyote are eternally caught within the binds of their instincts: to hunt, to flee, to plot, to evade. They do battle in front of splashy perspective-skewing backgrounds, which fill with action, then empty when plans go awry. After each blast fades, the scene resets for the next brain-tickling set-up. Loud, sure, violent yes, but there are also tender, existential, and operatic exceptions in this 10-film showcase!

Fast and Furry-ous • 1949 • Chuck Jones The Dover Boys at Pimento University • 1942 • Chuck Jones A Tale of Two Kitties • 1942 • Bob Clampett Rabbit Hood • 1949 • Chuck Jones The Great Piggy Bank Robbery • 1946 • Bob Clampett Feed the Kitty • 1952 • Chuck Jones Duck Amuck • 1953 • Chuck Jones One Froggy Evening • 1955 • Chuck Jones What’s Opera, Doc? • 1957 • Chuck Jones Beep, Beep • 1952 • Chuck Jones

“Bob Clampett is one of the key figures in the history of American animation … [Where] Chuck Jones at his best was a refiner of forms, Clampett can be regarded as an inventor.”

Adrian Danks, Senses of Cinema

“Chuck Jones is out to make you laugh, bluntly and, as it turns out, cold-bloodedly … Ridiculousness is behind every Jones gag, but it is labyrinthine in effect because of how much gentleness is mixed in along with an infinite response to one animal’s brass hunger, manipulative power, or blinding speed.”

Manny Farber, The New Republic