Little Johnny Jet (1953)

User Rating:

7.2/10   

Director:

Tex Avery

Writer:

Heck Allen (story)

Release Date:

18 April 1953 (USA)

Genre:

Family | Short | Comedy | Animation

Plot:

Virtually identical in plot terms to 'One Cab's Family' (1952), but this time round it concerns a family...

Plot Keywords:

Jet | Airplane | Statue Of Liberty | Birth | Surrealism

Awards:

Nominated for Oscar.

Cast

Daws Butler

...

Father Jet (uncredited)

Directed by
Tex Avery

Writing credits
Heck Allen		(story)

Produced by
Fred Quimby	....	producer

Original Music by
Scott Bradley

Animation Department
Robert Bentley	....	animator
Walt Clinton	....	animator (as Walter Clinton)
John Didrik Johnsen	....	background artist
Michael Lah	....	animator
Ray Patterson	....	animator
Grant Simmons	....	animator

Music Department
Thomas A. Beckett	....	music arranger: "Columbia, the Gem of the Ocean" (uncredited)

Production Companies

• Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM)

Distributors

• Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM) (1952) (USA) (theatrical)
• Warner Home Video (2006) (USA) (DVD)

Other Companies

• Film Score Monthly  score album released by (limited edition)

Runtime:

7 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color (Technicolor)

Sound Mix:

Mono (Western Electric Sound System)

Certification:

USA:Approved (PCA #15997)

Company:

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM)

Trivia:

Though intended strictly as a spoof of circa-1952 domesticity, the cartoon's theme of a B-29 competing against Mach 1-capable jets reflected a building debate within the US Air Force then and later over the utility of piston-engined aircraft in the age of jets. In real life the B-29 that tries to reenlist in the Air Force would not have been rejected; the Air Force assigned B-29s and similar piston-engined aircraft to missions such as tactical and counterinsurgency bombing, photo-reconnaissance, and search-and-rescue.

Goofs:

Continuity: When Johnny takes off after John uncovers him, John and Mary go to the door. John's tails colors mysteriously switch.

Quotes:

John: [looking at his son] What? No propellors?
Mary: John, Junior's a jet plane.
John: [crying out in despair] A JET? MY GOODNESS! JETS! JETS! JETS! I CAN'T STAND JETS!

Soundtrack:

Capriccioso

The best of Tex Avery's cartoons giving human characteristics to inanimate objects

This cartoon was nominated for an Oscar, which is welcome although a bit puzzling, as this is a prototypical Tex Avery cartoon-take something ordinary, twist it in some odd or extraordinary way and fire sight gags at the audience for the bulk of the cartoon. Avery often gave inanimate objects human traits, as he does here and this is a marvelous cartoon, but he did at least a dozen that were as good or better that weren't nominated. Which proves that the Academy Awards process is as much chance as anything else. This shows on Cartoon Network often. Recommended