The Bowling Alley-Cat
July. 18,1942 NRTom and Jerry are in a bowling alley. Both spend a lot of time sliding on the well-polished lanes. Eventually, Jerry takes up residence among the pins and Tom tries to bowl him down.
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Reviews
Absolutely the worst movie.
Simple and well acted, it has tension enough to knot the stomach.
This is one of the few movies I've ever seen where the whole audience broke into spontaneous, loud applause a third of the way in.
A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.
I Consider the Realistic Animals Tom and Jerry era to start at Puss Gets the Boot and end in Sufferin' Cats.The Story is that Jerry is having some fun at the Bowling Alley, when Tom appears and wants to eat him, leading some fun and inventive gags, that didn't take place inside a House.This is Tom and Jerry first cartoon to take place outside a house. And for me, it's for the best, it allowed some new gags, that weren't seen in the earlier episodes, such as Jerry using a bowling pin as a baseball bat, Or Tom trying to catch a bowling ball like a baseball ball and gets smashed by it. Another Highlight was Jerry teleporting himself to other Bowling Ball inside another far away bowling ball.I recommend it to every Tom and Jerry fan.
Early Tom and Jerry cartoons have often been accused of being racistwith Mammy Two Shoes' character possibly being a servant and characters often getting a 'blackface' (amongst other stereotypical ethnic representations)but now I'm starting to wonder whether I'm seeing examples of racism where there are none. I'm sure that there's one bowling ball in this short that is inexplicably made to look like a 'blackface'. Or maybe not.Anyway, regardless of my possible hallucinatory concerns, this is actually a pretty entertaining T&J caper, with the guys escaping the confines of their house to wreak havoc in a bowling alley. The fresh environment allows for a whole new wave of creativity, there are plenty of laughs to be had (as well as much cartoonish violence, as one would expect in a place full of machinery and heavy objects), and the animation is as highly polished as the bowling alley we see Jerry skating on, with convincingly weighty bowling balls that look like they could really hurt.
For at least one reason, this was better than the rest of these 1942 Tom and Jerry cartoons: they got out of their house. With new surroundings - in this case, a bowling alley, - it allowed for different and better gags than the normal house scenes.This starts off slowly, however, and I wondered if it was every going to produce some laughs, but it did, especially with Tom caught in the automatic pinsetter and then the caravan of bowling bowls was pictured as a train. Decent, overall, with the really clever stuff to come in a couple of years. This would have been much better, let's say, in 1945, with crazier stunts. Nonetheless, this cartoons starts to set the stage for the really funny (and violent) material that also was to come.
This is one of the early Tom & Jerry cartoons and also one of the best. The animation is superb and extremely well done. The antics of both Tom and Jerry as they try to outwit each other are classic. The parts of Tom trying to bowl with a ball that's much too heavy for him are some of the most fluid and natural looking animation of the entire time period. This and another two other sports shorts they made (Tennis Chumps, 1949, and Cue Ball Cat, 1950) have to be on list of top Tom & Jerry cartoons ever. Definitely one of my all-time favorites.