Play 500 with Daffers: Daffy Duck

Showing posts with label Daffy Duck. Show all posts

Sunday, June 01, 2008

Yoinks and awaaayyyyyyyyyyyyyyy!!!!!!!!!

Craig - you asked for it. I agree, its brilliant! Chuck Jones' Daffy is my favourite.

The film features Daffy Duck in the role of legendary outlaw Robin Hood, and opens to the strains of his playing an instrument similar to an archlute or bouzouki. As he prances along singing, he trips and tumbles down a bank into a lake. Watching is Porky Pig, here a Friar Tuck figure, who laughs uproariously at Daffy's inglorious plunge. The annoyed Daffy tries to prove his skill with a "quarterstaff" (Daffy: "Actually, it's a buck-and-a-quarter quarterstaff, but I'm not telling him [Porky] that."), but manages to hit himself in the face with it, bending his bill in what becomes a recurring visual gag throughout the film. He tries again, but while he is spinning his quarterstaff, Porky stops it with a mere toothpick, resulting in Daffy falling back into the lake.

Having given up trying to impress the friar, Daffy attempts to leave, but Porky follows and asks him if he knows the whereabouts of Robin Hood's hideout as he wants to join his band of outlaws. Daffy proudly announces that he is Robin Hood, but Porky disbelieves him. To prove himself, Daffy informs Porky that he will attempt to rob a rich traveller on a bouncing mule (and give his money to some poor unworthy slob). Daffy fails in each and every attempt he makes to stop the traveller, usually injuring himself in the process, be it accidentally firing himself from his own bow, or slamming into a succession of trees while trying to swing on a rope. Eventually the rich traveller, oblivious to Daffy's attempts to rob him, reaches his castle unharmed. The frustrated Daffy gives up, and in the final scene walks on with a shaven head and wearing a habit, having decided to become a friar himself: "Never mind joining me, I'll join you. Shake hands with Friar Duck (a pun of the name Friar Tuck)." As the film irises out, Daffy's bill bends back up one more time.

Other notable lines:

Daffy, fighting with his $1.25 quarter staff : "Ho! Haha! Guard! Turn! Parry! Dodge! Spin! Ha! Thrust!" (quarter staff bounces off log, bending his bill. He straightens it back to normal, and starts speaking to himself) "Let's see now. Something amiss here... hmm, I'll run through it. Ho, haha, guard, turn, parry, dodge, spin, ha, thrust." (bill bends again) "Got it." (straightens bill, and starts his fighting moves again.) "Ho! Haha! Guard! Turn! Parry! Dodge! Spin!" (Porky comes up and holds a toothpick up against the quarterstaff while Daffy is spinning it, stopping and causing Daffy to spin instead. Daffy then falls back down into the lake)
See yon rich unwary traveller? I'll rob him of his gold, and give it to some poor unworthy slob. That'll prove that I'm Robin Hood, hmm? Prithy, hmm?
"Yoicks . . . and away!" (Daffy swings from a treetop and hits another tree) "Yoicks . . . . and away!" (Daffy swings from the other treetop and hits another tree. This happens a few more times, slurring his speech a little more each time, until he's at ground level.) "Why you...!" (Daffy gets an axe and starts chopping down the last tree he hit. Eventually, all the trees that got in his way are now out of his path, and he is back on top of the first tree.) "Now then, yoicks . . . . . and, away. . ." (Daffy swings over all the trees he's chopped down and hits a rock)
"Ho ho, very funny; Ha ha, it is to laugh."
"Oh, knock it off. How jolly can you get?"

Saturday, May 31, 2008

Duck Amuck

Duck Amuck is a surreal 1951 animated cartoon directed by Chuck Jones and produced by Warner Bros. Cartoons. The short was released in early 1953 by The Vitaphone Corporation, the short subject division of Warner Bros. Pictures, as part of the Merrie Melodies series. It stars Daffy Duck, who is tormented by a sadistic, unseen animator who constantly changes Daffy's location, clothing, voice, physical appearance, and even shape. Pandemonium reigns throughout the cartoon as Daffy attempts to steer the action back to some kind of normality, only for the animator to either ignore him or, more frequently, to over-literally interpret his increasingly frantic demands. In 1994 it was voted #2 of The 50 Greatest Cartoons of all time by members of the animation field.

According to director Chuck Jones, this film demonstrated for the first time that animation can create characters with a recognizable personality, independent of their appearance, milieu, or voice. Although in the end, the animator is revealed to be Daffy's friend and rival Bugs Bunny (who famously declares "Ain't I a stinker?"), according to Jones the ending is just for comedic value: Jones (the director) is speaking to the audience directly, asking "Who is Daffy Duck anyway? Would you recognize him if I did this to him? What if he didn't live in the woods? Didn't live anywhere? What if he had no voice? No face? What if he wasn't even a duck anymore?" In all cases, it is obvious that Daffy is still Daffy; not all cartoon characters can claim such distinctive personality.

Mel Blanc does the voices. It was directed by Chuck Jones with a story by Michael Maltese. The film contains many examples of self-referential humor, breaking the fourth wall.

In 1999 the film was deemed "culturally significant" by the United States Library of Congress and selected for preservation in the National Film Registry. This was the second of three animated shorts by Jones to receive this honor (the others are 1957's What's Opera, Doc? and 1955's One Froggy Evening). Jones has the distinction of being the only director (as of 2006) with three animated shorts in the registry.

The cartoon's plot was essentially replicated in one of Jones' later cartoons, Rabbit Rampage (1955), in which Bugs Bunny turns out to be the victim of the silly animator (Elmer Fudd). A similar plot was also included in an episode of Baby Looney Tunes, only Bugs was the victim, Daffy was the animator, and it was made on a computer instead of a pencil and paper.

In Looney Tunes Comics Issue #94, Bugs Bunny gets his back at Daffy Duck by making him the victim, in switching various movie roles, from Duck Twacy in "Who Killed Daffy Duck," a video game character, and a talk show host, and they always wound up with Daffy starring in Moby Dick (the story's running gag). After this, Bugs comments, "Eh, dis guy needs a new agent."

From Wikipedia

Just who is the Duck?

Daffy in his masterpiece, Duck Amuck, directed by Chuck Jones

It's no wonder Daffy Duck has a split personality. In his early years, Daffy was manic, explosive, and unpredictable, engaging in adventures that seemed outlandish even to him. As his personality gained depth at the hands of Warner Bros. cartoons' directors, the little black duck became more self-analytical, competitive, peevish, paranoid, and neurotic. Eventually, Daffy found himself more and more at the mercy of a universe that seemed to favor everyone but him.

So why do audiences love him? Despite his failures, Daffy, like the Greek hero Sisyphus, is a victim of injustice who continuously protests. And it's his refusal to surrender his will to the whims of the conspiring universe that makes him heroic. How could one not feel sorry for an ill-equipped duck with Daffy's voice that just can't seem to get a break? At least Daffy aims high. And when he fails, he resets the bar . . . even higher.

Daffy Duck has evolved from the talents of Tex Avery, Friz Freleng, Bob Clampett, and Chuck Jones. It's not like he's a total failure. Daffy's been an Oscar presenter and he's starred or appeared in more than 150 cartoons and movies, often as a self-described hero matched with his polar opposite and sidekick -- the bashful and far less brash Porky Pig. Over the course of several hilarious cartoons, again and again, Daffy always manages to get the short end of the schtick.

In Drip-Along Daffy and My Little Duckaroo the comic pair, portraying Wild West lawmen, get more than they bargained for when they face desperado Nasty Canasta. Duck Dodgers in the 24½th Century, has space star "Duck Dodgers" (Daffy) and "Eager Young Space Cadet" (Porky), traveling to Planet X to battle with Marvin The Martian while in search of Illudium Phosdex, the shaving cream atom. In Deduce, You Say Daffy is "Dorlock Homes" and Porky is "Watkins", Baker Street sleuths who aim to capture the Shropshire Slasher. It is Watkins, the sidekick, and not Homes, that is successful.

In Chuck Jones' masterpiece Duck Amuck, Daffy is antagonized by an unseen animator who torments him by switching backgrounds and props, fooling with the soundtrack, and humiliating him by erasing and re-drasniff.os.wing him. Fittingly, the culprit is none other than Bugs Bunny, whose astounding success would, over the years, become the lightning rod for Daffy's envy and resentment. In shorts such as Jones' Rabbit Fire and Rabbit Seasoning and Freleng's A Star Is Bored, the pair carried on a timeless screen battle of wits, with Daffy entering the battle mostly unarmed.

In the end, he may have to re-align his bill and sweep up his dignity in a dustpan, but Daffy Duck always gets something that, unfortunately, he never really hears: a grateful audience's laughter.

Article from Looney Toons