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Coal Black and de Sebben Dwarfs (1943) Banned Looney Toons

grspec says...

Again rick you are making a lot of assumptions about things he may have/should have experienced and that should have helped him see the light. He was born and grew up in a time that was very very different and I don't think its fair to say you or me know the facts that surround the making of this video. I can however read and find out as much as I can about the why the episode was created and make a judgement which you may or may not agree with.

A quote from this bob clampett site:

Coal Black is one of the clearest explorations and illustrations of this break with the Disney tradition. Rather than ignore the dominance of Disney's feature production it is a very deft, energetic and controversial parody of Snow White that illustrates the brevity, visual rhythm and rapid-fire pacing of the studio's best work (15). Nevertheless, it is probably more accurately viewed as a riff on rather than a parody of Disney's film. Unlike much of the Disney studio's work, Coal Black is a raunchy, contemporary, extreme and shockingly racist film (the racism of many Disney films is often less up-front and more cloying). It updates the Disney story to a contemporary war-time setting in which Queenie calls in Murder Inc. “to black out So White”, and to stop her from stealing the zoot-suited Prince Chawmin'. This is a cartoon widely regarded as a masterpiece in absentia, a seldom seen product of the sexual mores and ethnic stereotyping of its time. Nevertheless, many writers understandably go out of their way to both underline the ideological problems of the film – especially for contemporary audiences – and its extraordinary energy and vibrant style as a truly animated cartoon. As Terry Lindvall and Ben Fraser suggest:

Coal Black's brazenness earned the film much of its notoriety, but even as shocking as it is for its racial content, the aesthetic and musical brilliance, the unabashed raunchiness, and the pure cartooniness salvage it as a masterpiece for most audiences, even some black audiences (16).


part 2 below

Coal Black and de Sebben Dwarfs (1943) Banned Looney Toons

maudlin says...

Whoa. Upvote for being a significant work, but that was incredibly hard to watch. The energy and creativity are certainly there, but I literally had my hands over my face for large swatches of the movie.

Wikipedia

In addition, Martin "Dr. Toon" Goodman:

Because the film is a cartoon masterpiece, a cultural tour de force of 1940's America, and a vital example of how animation is often able to capture a nation's social nuances in ways that live-action films can never hope to do, Coal Black and de Sebben Dwarfs should be seen by animation fans and anyone else interested in the evolution of our cultural mythos. There is, however, a problem. The film contains what are today considered shockingly racist images. In fact, one might say that in some circles its reputation is blacker than coal. Defenders of this short are quick to point out that the cartoon was made without malice, meanness of spirit, and with the full cooperation of black performers who by all accounts found the cartoon hilariously entertaining. It has been noted that Clampett, by insisting on using Watso, Beals, and the Dandridges, struck a blow agaist the inherent racism of 1940's Hollywood. Again, the concept of black men (though in caricature) wearing US Army uniforms while performing heroic deeds has been lauded in some quarters as one of the few depictions of blacks in that sort of role during the war years. Beacause the country adopted racist attitudes, it has been reasoned, cartoons carried these images forth, as did radio, stage, and movies. For good or ill, such were the times.

Yet for many, the coat-of arms bearing dice and switchblades, the dice that serve as Prince Chawmin's front teeth, the wild-eyed jitterbigging, the black dialect, and the thick-lipped caricatures mark this cartoon as far from harmless. Even though Clampett may have meant to show the Teutonic Master Race that even the blacks they despised were a formidable foe to reckon with when gathered under the American flag, the racist images speak only of contempt, bigotry, and ridicule. Some feel that this cartoon is so offensive to African-Americans that it should be consigned to the censor's vault for all eternity, lest any showing of it at all spark an outpouring of anger, shame, and outrage among blacks and indeed, all who rightfully seek to eradicate racism from our society.

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