Name That 'toon

February 21, 2006 11:00 AM

In the early 70s, I saw a cartoon "short" in some movie theatres. It was about "the little people who live inside us." Does anyone remember this cartoon? What was it? Who made it?

I have a dim recollection of it (I was born in '65), but it's always stayed with me. My guess is that it was about five or ten minutes long, and it played before the main feature. I remember seeing it several times. (Before the same movie? Before different movies?)

I remember that you could see inside the bodies of the main characters. Each character had a little man or woman who lived inside him/her. The little person (the soul?) was the controller. He guided his host. He would watch through his host's eyes with a periscope. This may be wrong, but I remember the artwork as being sort of James-thurberish.

posted by grumblebee to media & arts (9 comments total)

It was live action rather than a toon, but the Woody Allen film Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex * But Were Afraid to Ask from 1972 has a section that is similar to that description.
posted by Pollomacho at 11:17 AM on February 21, 2006

I know there's a classic Disney animated short with that theme... It was probably from the 60s, but I don't remember it looking very James Thurberish...

At first I thought maybe it was one of the Goofy shorts, but none of the titles from the Complete Goofy DVD seem to ring a bell.
posted by Robot Johnny at 11:33 AM on February 21, 2006

Okay, this is probably not the one you were thinking of, but I found the one I mentioned: Reason and Emotion from 1943 (I was clearly off by a few years) about "the need for emotional control for the war effort."

Here's a picture.
posted by Robot Johnny at 11:44 AM on February 21, 2006

How about To See or Not to See? It seems to fit the time frame, and the few descriptions I can find seem to fit the plotline you describe.
posted by Gator at 12:10 PM on February 21, 2006

Gator, my hand is quivering over "mark as best answer." That sure SOUNDS like it. I wish I could see an image from it. That would seal it.

Robot Johnny, I'm SURE the cartoon did NOT feature Disney characters.

Pollomacho, I love that segment of "Everything You Always..." but what I saw WAS a cartoon. Still, thanks for reminding me of it.
posted by grumblebee at 2:27 PM on February 21, 2006

grumblebee, there are several images (and what appear to be a couple of clips in .ram format) on this page (roll over the 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10)...it does seem vaguely Thurber-esque from those images, but I haven't tried to open the video clips.
posted by Gator at 2:33 PM on February 21, 2006

Gator, via your first response, I googled and found this, which I think you also link to, above.

THAT'S IT!!!!

Amazing work. Thank you.

Now that I watch the video clip, I can't see much Thurber in the style, but that what nearly 40 years of memory can do to something.

The following is a self-link, so don't click it self-linking offends you, but I wanted to note that I saw this cartoon when I was about five and it has stuck with me ever since, affecting my own illustration style.

100 points for anyone who knows how I can get the entire thing on DVD, VHS or via download.
posted by grumblebee at 2:39 PM on February 21, 2006

Answered my own question. COOL! VHS only, but still better than nothing.
posted by grumblebee at 2:45 PM on February 21, 2006

Awesome! I actually did link that page in my first response, in the "few" part. :)

In case anyone cares, I tried a bazillion Google searches before I found the one that brought up the answer: "animated short" "little person inside"

On preview, I was gonna say, maybe you could write to the National Film Board of Canada (same site where the clips and images are hosted), since they are the ones who originally produced the short, and see if they can hook you up, but you've already done the legwork.

In conclusion, yay!
posted by Gator at 2:48 PM on February 21, 2006