It’s now a cliche to say “this movie couldn’t be made today,” or “this cartoon couldn’t be made today,” but usually it entails something such as a racial stereotype. But the 1936 Betty Boop theatrical cartoon short “Be Human” would be an unlikely candidate to be produced as a theatrical short today.[icopyright one button toolbar]
To be sure, its message of animal cruelty would be welcomed. But the brutality shown by the offender and the near sadistic comeuppance he gets at the end would most assuredly be toned down if it was produced for family audiences today. The showpiece of the cartoon is the catchy song, the cartoon’s title, a plea for humans to demonstrate their humanity in the dealings with animals.
And the cartoon from Fleischer Studios (now in the public domain) is a classic because it has the sumptuous animation that made Max Fleischer Walt Disney’s main competition (in the end he didn’t have the bankrolling that Disney and it was one of the reasons the studio went under).
For cartoon buffs — and friends of animals everywhere:
FOOTNOTE: You can get many Betty Boop cartoon collections on Amazon.com. And this is timely: Simon Cowell is working on a Betty Boop movie, as Daily Variety reports:
Betty Boop is returning to the big screen, with Simon Cowell’s Syco Entertainment and Animal Logic Entertainment developing and producing the first feature-length film for the feisty cartoon flapper.
The project has been in the works for several months with Fleischer Studios, owner of the Betty Boop charater, partnering with Syco Entertainment and Animal Logic — which performed the animation for “The Lego Movie” — on a music-driven hybrid animated comedy.
Producers are Zareh Nalbandian and Jason Lust from Animal Logic and Cowell and Adam Milano from Syco. No writer or director is attached yet.
Betty Boop first appeared in 1930 and made numerous appearances in Max Fleischer’s “Talkartoons” and her own cartoon series as a fun-loving, flirtatious character with a signature line “Boop-oop-a-doop!”
The bobbed-hair, short-skirted character became the first female animated star at the end of the Roaring ’20s.
Betty Boop appeared in over 100 cartoons and had been extensively licensed through King Features in collaborations with Lancome, Coca-Cola, NASCAR, Uniqlo and Chupa Chups. Her last movie appearance was a cameo in “Who Framed Roger Rabbit” in 1988.
Cowell, who has a first-look deal with Sony Pictures, is best known as a TV producer of “American Idol” and “The X Factor.” He’s produced feature films “One Direction” and “One Chance” for Sony.
“Betty is an icon, and one of the biggest stars in the world – I’m thrilled to be working with her,” Cowell said. “Betty, I’ve worked with some serious divas but I think you could be the biggest of them all!”
Actually, Cowell might want to listen to the lyrics of “Be Human” before he passes judgement on young people who perform in front of him on the tube..
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.