"A Silly Symphony"

Synopsis

A retelling of Aesop's fable where the hare learns that slow and steady wins the race.

Characters

Max Hare

Toby Tortoise

Credits

Director : Wilfred Jackson

Animation

Hamilton Luske

Larry Clemmons

Dick Heumer

Ward Kimball

Frenchy de Tremaudan

Story : Larry Clemmons

Sources

Based on the fable by Aesop, "The Hare and the Tortoise."

Awards

1935 Academy Award (Short Subject - Cartoons)

Bloopers

When we first see the four bunny girls, their dresses are in the order blue, orange, blue and yellow from left to right. However when we see them from the reverse in a subsequent scene, the dresses are in the same order from left to right when they should have been reversed as well.

Videos

United States

Cartoon Classics : First Series : Volume 7 : More of Disney's Best 1932-1946

Cartoon Classics : Second Series : Volume 8 : Starring Silly Symphonies

Italy

I Capolavori di Walt Disney

Le Meravigliose Fiabe del Grillo Parlante

France

Les Chefs-d'Oeuvre de Walt Disney

Laserdiscs

United States

Silly Symphonies / Animals Two by Two

Japan

The Tortoise and the Hare

The Academy Award Review of Walt Disney Cartoons

DVD

Disney Treasures : Silly Symphonies

Region 1 : United States

Region 2 : France

Region 2 : Germany

Region 2 : Italy

Region 2 : Sweden

Region 2 : United Kingdom

Region 1 : United States

Walt Disney Animation Collection : Classic Short Films : Volume 4 : The Tortoise and the Hare

Timeless Tales : Volume 1

Region 2 : United Kingdom

Walt Disney's Fables : Volume 4

Television

The Ink and Paint Club : #1 : Award Winners

The Ink and Paint Club : #49 : More Storybook Silly Symphonies

Technical Specifications

Color Type : Technicolor

Animation type : Standard

Sound mix : Mono

Aspect ration : 1.37 : 1

Negative format : 35mm

Print format : 35mm

Cinematographic process : Spherical

Original language : English

Released by United Artists Pictures

Gallery

Sketches of Toby Tortoise and Max Hare courtesy of Van Eaton Galleries.

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Resulted in a sequel, "Toby Tortoise Returns."

An educational version of this short was released entitled "Aesop's Hare and the Tortoise."

There has been a continuing dispute among animation buffs that the character of Max Hare was a prototype for Bugs Bunny. From my point of view, they were, and are separate characters. But, there is a common point between them, and that is Chuck Thorsen. Thorsen designed Max Hare (and Little Hiawatha, for that matter) and he also designed one of the embyonic Bugs Bunny's (He appears in "Hare-um Scare-um"). Probably because of this, the controversy still rages.

While not one of my favorites, I still find this a fun, enjoyable cartoon. The main interest for me is how the original Aesop Fable is adapted for the cartoon.

I enjoy this fun little cartoon. I really njoy the part bit of dialog where Toby Tortise tells Max Hare "May the best man win." Max responds with "Thanks, but I'll try not to beat you too hard!" Max Hare's character, as stated before, was probably the inspiration for Bugs Bunny. In fact, there were some Bugs cartoons based on this fable where Bugs races Cecil Turtle.

To those who read this comment can anybody please tell me why is Mickey's face on the screen during the title presintation? He doesen't appear in the cartoon. The same thing happened in "Elmer Elephant". Although it's kind of weird it's quite cool because if it were real you could pull of his face and then you'd have a blank Mickey Mouse icon. Anyway back to the cartoon, I haven't seen this cartoon in a while, but I remember quite a bit of it, I enjoyed Max Hare's character!

As I read Baruch Weiss' comment, I think maybe I can help him out. I agree with him that when I watch Silly Symphonies cartoons, the Mickey Mouse title card comes on first . I think that sometimes the Mickey Mouse title comes on for Silly Symphonies because sometimes on other different Silly Symphonies title cards, it says "Mickey Mouse presents Walt Disney's Silly Symphonies" with the cartoon name at the bottom. Anyway, back to the cartoon. This is one of my favorite Silly Symphonies cartoons. My favorite part is when Toby Tortoise was running to the finish line when Max Hare was speeding to catch Toby to win the race, Toby won and he feels proud of himself. I give this a 596 out of 596.

A classic re-telling of Aesop's fable, and a very good one. Both protagonists are very defined characters: the shy and honest Tony Tortoise and the flamboyant but brashy Max Hare. The latter steals the show, impressing four cute girl bunnies with his tricks in speed, playing baseball and tennis with himself. But, as we all know, his showing-off makes him forget the race, and he looses, leaving all the honours to the tortoise. "The Tortoise and the Hare" is one of the best Silly Symphonies of the period in its strong characterization, its humour and the absence of focus on sweetness and morality. It's also exceptional among the Silly Symphonies in lacking a themesong or dance routine (even though the characters speak in rhyme most of the time).

OK, so this is one of the very few Silly Symphonies where we all know what is going to happen. Usually, there is some tense drama that occurs during the second half of those cartoons, however, this one is an exception even if Aesop doesn't say so.

We all know that it's a simple race between Toby Tortoise (slow but sure) and Max Hare (blue streak). The animals are all on the hare's side - even the skunks who received special seating. Toby, meanwhile, stumbles out of the gate and gets mocked by all in attendance. Toby wishes Max well, but Max arrogantly tells him that he won't beat him too bad, so as they shake, Max pulls the hand away twice on the poor turtle.

The raccoon signals the start of the race and Max gets off to a flying start, leaving Toby spinning at the starting gate. The raccoon assists by shooting a few pellets at his shell and Toby finally gets going, but not until Max leaves a tree, a stork, an owl, and almost anything in his path in the dust. Max decides to pull under a little tree and take a nap while Toby is casually galloping with the snails around him. To Toby's disbelief, he sees Max sleeping, so quietly he tip-toes by Max and takes the lead. Little does Toby know that Max was playing possum with him, so once Toby got out to what looked to be a safe lead, Max ignored all speed limit rules and nearly broke the sound barrier by whizzing by Toby. It was such a gust of speed that Toby's hat remained airborne for at least 10 seconds!

The biggest mistake Max made (which later cost him the race) was stopping in front of four female bunnies (possible Funny Little Bunny rejects) who called him over. They all think that Max is handsome, so Max decides to impress the bunnies - but before he does, Toby passes Max and ignores all calls by the bunnies even though he did crash into a tree stump. Thinking that he still has this race in the bag, Max decides to put on a one-hare show by playing solitare Robin Hood (he shoots the arrow at an apple he puts on his head and splits it in two), solitare baseball, and solitare tennis. By the time his show is finished, the bunnies have won him over. However...

... a huge scream comes from the crowd as they see a shocker in the making. The tortoise is way ahead of Max at this point, so Max has to go and finish Toby off. Max makes one last mistake by blowing kisses at the bunnies as he speeds his merry way. The gap would close very quickly for sure.

Toby sees Max come from nowhere, so Toby had to pull off a trick of his own to fend him off. Toby pulls up his shell and stretches his legs and runs for the finish line. Max closes the gap very quickly, and just as they saw the finish line, Max thought he had closed the entire gap, but Toby stretches his neck as long as he could and crossed the finish line before Max did - by a foot and a half (well, I meant a neck and a half). To the crowd's delight, and Max's disbelief, Toby was carried off by the animals as the cartoon closes. Replays of the finish clearly showed that Toby did cross the finish line before Max did.

The moral? Slow and steady wins the race ... most of the time. If Max's racing career was that short-lived, imagine what his boxing career was like two years later.

This oscar-winning Silly Symphony is still a great one after nearly 75 years! Who'd have thunk Max Hare was a pioneer for what Bugs Bunny would look like? This short had a sequel called Toby Tortoise Returns, and both of these are in Volume 4 of Disney's Animation Collection! Both racers were in the audience of Mickey's Polo Team the next year, before their sequel short. In that short and Toby Tortoise returns, it's mostly Silly Symphony characters who make up the audience! (One noticable exception was Goofy!) Anyway, in this short, Max Hare really was "The blue streak" when he runs past anything or anyone! When he was showing off for the girl bunnies, he was a one-rabbit sports team! As for Toby Tortoise, he just kept on running and wasn't distracted much at all, even though he shushed the audience to not wake Max up from his "nap". Slow and steady does win the race, even if a speed demon like Max Hare wasn't napping at all! The race ended up neck-and-neck, quite literally! I hope you all enjoy this oscar-winning racing classic from 1935!

Referenced Comments

Who Killed Cock Robin? (1935)