Jerry Beck's The 50 Greatest Cartoons

Elmer Fudd is again hunting rabbits - only this time it's an opera. Wagner's Siegfried with Elmer as the titular hero and Bugs as Brunnhilde. They sing, they dance, they eat the scenery.

The short-tempered Daffy Duck must improvise madly as the backgrounds, his costumes, the soundtrack, even his physical form, shifts and changes at the whim of the animator.

Mickey is trying to lead a concert of The William Tell Overture, but he's continually disrupted by ice cream vendor Donald, who uses a seemingly endless supply of flutes to play Turkey in the Straw instead. After Donald gives up, a bee comes along and causes his own havoc. The band then reaches the Storm sequence, and the weather also starts to ...

Space hero Daffy battles Marvin the Martian for control of Planet X.

A workman finds a singing frog in the cornerstone of an old building being demolished. But when he tries to cash in on his discovery, he finds the frog will sing only for him, and just croak for the talent agent and the audience in the theater he's spent his life savings on.

Although not the first feature-length animated film, as is sometimes thought, it was the first cartoon to feature a character with an appealing personality. The appearance of a true character distinguished it from earlier animated "trick films", such as those of Blackton and Cohl, and makes it the predecessor to later popular cartoons such as th...

Tired of always playing the same roles, Little Red Riding Hood, her grandmother and the Wolf demand a new version of the tale. The story then plays out in a more contemporary urban environment, with Little Red Riding Hood working as a pin-up girl in a night club.

Porky Pig travels to a surreal land in order to hunt and catch the elusive Do-Do bird, reportedly the last of its kind.

The story of a little boy who would only talk in sound effects. With story by Dr. Seuss (and Bill Scott of Rocky and Bullwinkle fame) this cartoon won the Oscar for best short subject (animated) for 1950.

A hungry cat has the idea of giving "Jumbo Gro" fertilizer to a scrawny canary to make him a bigger meal, which leads to a race between the cat, the canary, a dog, and a mouse to see who can grow the biggest.

The two pigs building houses of hay and sticks scoff at their brother, building the brick house. But when the wolf comes around and blows their houses down (after trickery like dressing as a foundling sheep fails), they run to their brother's house. And throughout, they sing the classic song, "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf?".

Behind the Hollywood Bowl stage which is playing the opera The Barber of Seville, Bugs Bunny flees into the backstage area with Elmer Fudd in close pursuit. Seeing his opportunity to fight on his terms, Bugs raises the curtain on Elmer, trapping him on stage. As the orchestra begins playing, Bugs comes into play as the barber who is going to mak...

Mickey Mouse, piloting a steamboat, delights his passenger, Minnie Mouse, by making musical instruments out of the menagerie on deck.

We see the various birds, mice, and bats that have moved into an old windmill, followed by the frogs, crickets, and fireflies making their music in an adjacent pond. Then a storm comes, shaking loose parts in mill and threatening everything we've seen.

A kitten who is being tormented by a bulldog finds a savior in a black cat (from the "Black Cat Bad Luck Company") who merely has to cross the dog's path for something very unlucky to happen to the bully.

While reading his favorite comic book, Daffy accidentally knocks himself unconscious and dreams he's Duck Twacy, famous detective, trying to solve the case of the missing piggy banks. Taking a streetcar (conducted by Porky Pig, in a non-speaking cameo role) to the gangsters' hideout, he meets up with such grotesque criminals as Pickle Puss, Eigh...

After wrecking Popeye's ship and stealing away Olive Oyl, hero of Arabic legend Sindbad decides to test him and his ever-resilient new rival's strength in order to prove their supremacy as the "most remarkable, extraordinary fella" of Sindbad's menagerie island.

The clock strikes midnight, the bats fly from the belfry, a dog howls at the full moon, and two black cats fight in the cemetery: a perfect time for four skeletons to come out and dance a bit.

Trouble starts when the queen's magic mirror says Betty Boop is fairest.

Betty Boop and Bimbo run away from home, but that night they are scared by a chorus of ghosts singing the title song.

Spoof of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937) with an all-black cartoon cast. One of the “Censored 11” banned from TV syndication by United Artists in 1968 for racist stereotyping.

A marching band of Germans, Italians, and Japanese march through the streets of swastika-motif Nutziland, serenading "Der Fuehrer's Face." Donald Duck, not living in the region by choice, struggles to make do with disgusting Nazi food rations and then with his day of toil at a Nazi artillery factory. After a nervous breakdown, Donald awakens to ...

The last of Tex Avery's variations on "Red Hot Riding Hood" (1943), in which the country wolf visits his city cousin, who tries to teach him the rudiments of civilized behavior when watching girls in nightclubs - without, it has to be said, a great deal of success...

A man's sanity is a point of contention as he confesses to murdering an elderly man, driven by the victim's pale blue 'vulture eye', culminating in guilt-induced auditory hallucinations of the victim's beating heart.

A couple has a fight over a game of Scrabble unaware that a full-scale nuclear war has started.

When a giant threatens the land, the cityfolk mistake Mickey's boast of killing seven flies with one blow to be giants. He is then forced to fight the giant for real.

It's time to laugh like crazy as Mickey, Goofy and Donald fight against raging gears, twisted springs, deafening bells and a sleeping stork. Watch them reach new heights of humor as their valiant efforts to clean a bell tower turn into a real circus!

The wolf escapes from Alka-Fizz prison, but persistent Sergeant McPoodle (Droopy) of the Canadian Mounties follows his trail wherever he goes.

A crash course on the history of Western musical instruments.

Elmer Fudd is hunting both Daffy Duck and Bugs Bunny again.

Daffy tries to sell movie studio head J.L. his script for a swashbuckler set in Merry Olde England, a plot involving a maiden in distress, a scheming Chamberlain, an evil Grand Duke and a dashing masked hero (to be played by Daffy, of course).

A pesky yellow cat becomes the bane of Mr. Johnson's life as it constantly outsmarts his increasingly desperate attempts to get rid of it.

After The Daily Planet receives a letter from a mad scientist threatening to wreak destruction with his Electrothanasia Ray, Lois Lane heads out in the hopes of getting more information for a news story.

Daffy Duck convinces Porky Pig to quit the cartoon biz and try his luck in the features. Porky's adventures begin when he tries to enter the movie studio.

Bugs and Daffy get lost on the way to Pismo Beach, and find a cave full of treasure in the Arabian Desert, guarded by Hassan.

A bulldog adopts an adorable kitten, but he can't let his owner know.

Bimbo finds himself surrounded by a mysterious group of robed figures who invite him to become a member of their secret organisation. When he refuses, they fling him through a nightmarish sequence of terror and torture devices. Will our hapless hero make it out alive?

A deer, disillusioned by the consumerism that defines his life. A lizard, ostracized from society, forever wandering. A chance meeting in the middle of a field. Who will survive? And who will transcend existence? Preserved by the Academy Film Archive in 2009.

Bugs, the Wolf and bobby-soxer Red chase each other around while Grandma is off working at Lockheed aircraft.

Two baby squirrels ask grandpa to explain what "men" are when he comes in singing "peace on earth, goodwill to men". Grandpa tells the story of man's last war. This classic animation short was an Academy Award Best Short Subject, Cartoons nominee.

Frankie walks into a bar, where she catches her boyfriend Johnny with the sensuous Nellie Bly and kills him in a fit of jealousy.

Tom Cat is a concert pianist who plays beautifully until he is interrupted by Jerry Mouse.

Woody is standing outside the Seville Barber Shop looking at the ads. Wanting a "victory haircut", he decides to enter the shop only to find the owner has stepped out for a physical. Woody decides to cut his own hair ("I cut my own teeth") but unfortunately is mistaken for the owner when two other customers enter, one an Indian who wants a quick...

The story of one shepherd's single-handed quest to re-forest a desolate valley in the foothills of the French Alps throughout the first half of the 20th century.

A secluded bookstore comes to life in madcap, pop culture reference-heavy fashion.

Quasi, a duck, spends the day at a bizarre amusement park with fellow duck Anita and a robot named Rollo, but his rude and annoying behavior soon becomes impossible for his companions to tolerate.

Elmer Fudd introduces two pieces of classical music: "Tales of the Vienna Woods" and "The Blue Danube", and acted out by Bugs Bunny, Porky Pig, Laramore the Hound Dog, a family of swans, and a juvenile Daffy Duck.

Based on James Thurber's short-story about a mild, henpecked man who, while preparing his breakfast, looks out the window and sees a unicorn eating flowers in the garden. He rushes upstairs to inform his domineering wife, and she accuses him of being crazy and threatens to have him put away. He persists that he did see a unicorn in the garden, a...

Three fun-loving, morally upright brothers from Pimento University save their fiancée from their fiendish archenemy, Dan Backslide, in this spoof of the Rover Boys.

A starving actor, reduced to trying his luck in the movies, travels to Hollywood. His cat, Felix, poses as a travel bag and comes along.