Popeye the Sailor

Popeye the Sailor (1933)

**** (out of 4)

First film in the series of shorts was also the first I've seen of any of these early films. I watched some of the later ones when I was a kid and I wasn't sure what to expect out of these theatrical shorts but this first one was great. Popeye takes Olive Oyl to a fair when Bluto shows up to start trouble. There's a lot of great humor here and I really loved the animation style. The opening scene of Popeye singing his famous song is priceless as is the appearance by Betty Boop.

Now available through Warner in a 4-disc box set.

While I have never been a huge fan of Popeye because the cartoons are so darn repetitive, this very first Popeye is well worth seeing--for historical reasons, because it was significantly better than the efforts of most other studios (which tended towards cutesy singing cartoons) and because it was so original at that time. However, the Fleischer Studios was a bit hesitant to just toss Popeye out there and hope that people will like him. Instead, they billed this as a Betty Boop cartoon on the title screen. Additionally, Betty makes a short but risqué appearance mid-way through the film--sort of like she was giving her seal of approval to the series.

One big difference between this and most of the later Popeye cartoons is with Olive Oyl. Her voice was not provided by the usual Mae Questel (also the voice of Betty Boop). Olive's horribly annoying voice is not so annoying and Bonnie Poe's voice is noticeably deeper and less migraine-inducing! Aside from that, the cartoon is pretty much like any of the early Popeyes. The art work is the usual beautifully detailed black & white Fleischer animation that you can't help but respect. Bluto and Popeye do their usual routines, though Popeye does seem a bit more macho without his spinach than later films and so the difference that the spinach makes is less notable. Also, notice the final scene where our hero saves Olive--and possibly kills a train load of innocent people in the process!

One sad thing in the film many won't notice is the carnival bit where Popeye and the rest are throwing balls at a guy's head. Such ball throwing booths were common back then and involved throwing baseballs at a Black man's face! While the guy in the cartoon is pretty cartoony, he is Black skinned and this is a sick little aspect of the 1930s that has been forgotten--and that probably isn't a bad thing at all.

I had always wondered when Popeye started his animated career, until I've watched this cartoon online. I found out that this short was intended as a test cartoon to see if Popeye could work as an animated character. He was originally a character from a comic strip by a guy named E. C. Segar. This cartoon combines my two favorite cartoon characters coming together - Betty Boop and Popeye the Sailor. Even though Betty's appearance is more of a cameo than a full-time character in this cartoon. And also, this cartoon is really part of the Betty Boop series.

The only thing that bothers me about this cartoon, is Olive Oyl's voice; I really didn't like it. I really prefer Mae Questel's take on Olive, but I got to bear with what they got. My favorite scene is when Betty and Popeye do the hula on stage.

The first Popeye cartoon ever, although it was marketed as a Betty Boop cartoon. It was also the first in a series of cartoons where Betty Boop met various characters from newspaper comics (Such as The Little King) in animated form. Naturally, Popeye was the only one who the Fleischer Brothers got any mileage out of.

Very entertaining, like all the early Popeye's. Betty Boop makes only a small cameo, but it's hard to miss. Try to get the black and white version, since the colorized version, I dunno. It just seems to take away some of the excitement.

4/4

The Popeye character we know and love is already intact in this, his first animated appearance on film. So is Olive Oyl and Bluto. Betty Boop is also in this, in fact, she was put on in order to attract filmgoers already familiar with her but not with Elzie Segar's popular newspaper strip. It's already known that William Costello was the first voice of Popeye but very few know that a woman named Bonnie Poe was the first voice of Olive, in fact when I first saw this cartoon I already noticed how different she sounded from Ms. Oyl's usual voice! Since she was also Betty Boop, Mae Questal probably didn't want to do two voices in the same cartoon or maybe the public would be confused since they both sound the same anyway! Before Jackson Beck, William Pennell did Bluto, though I really can't tell the difference here. Fleischer-type gags abound throughout and, yes, we have the now-famous Popeye theme song and spinach finale introduced here. Well worth seeing for Popeye and animation fans.