David Hand - 'Animaland'

A few of these recently ran on on Turner Classic Movies' "Cartoon
Alley" segment...I'd only heard a bit about them, how Disney vet Hand
struck out on his own in the late '40s and started a studio in Britain
which folded in a few years when he couldn't crack the American market.
The Animaland series had nice potential, with different titles working
off specific animal traits, and running a gamut from cute to
gag-filled, with character work and production values as good as
anything from the time.

I was most impressed by 'The Cuckoo'. It begins explaining how the
mother bird leaves its egg in another birds' nest to be taken care of
(depicted in a quite sinister manner, matter-of-factly tossing out an
egg to make room). The egg hatches out a huge voracious oaf of a bird
who crowds out its baby sparrow nestmate. There's a great
nightmare-with-song scene, then the main action comes when the two run
afoul of a hungry weasel - I was convinced the cuckoo would suddenly
show a heroic side, like Baby Huey...but he remained the same rude,
out-for-himself goon to the end! Nice absence of sentiment at work
there.

TCM gets a big virtual high-five from me for running something that
would never otherwise see the light of day in these parts - it's got me
looking for more.

VMacek

.

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