The Dognapper

A Mickey Mouse Cartoon

Release Date : November 17, 1934

Running Time : 7:44

Synopsis

Officers Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck have to capture Pegleg Pete, who's stolen Minnie's dog and is holding it for ransom. A wild chase in a sawmill (including an extended battle to avoid the saw itself) is soon in order.

Characters

Mickey Mouse
Minnie Mouse
Pete
Fifi, the Pekinese
Donald Duck

Credits

Director
Ben Sharpsteen
Animation
Marvin Woodward
Hardie Gramatky
Dick Lundy
Johnny Cannon
Gerry "Clyde" Geronomi
Bob Wickersham
Bill Roberts

Cut Scenes

Cuts include some gunplay scenes and Pete backhanding Fifi when Fifi bites him.

Video

Italy
Topolino Pesca Guai

Laserdiscs

United States
Mickey Mouse in Black and White: Volume 1
Japan
Fisherman Mickey
Mickey Mouse : The Black and White Years

DVD

United States
Mickey Mouse in Black and White
Germany
Mickey Mouse in Black and White

Television

The Ink and Paint Club: Episode 32: Goin' to the Dogs
Mickey's Mouse Tracks: Episode 28
Donald's Quack Attack: Episode 54
The Mickey Mouse Club : November 1, 1955

Original Animator's Drafts


Page 1
Page 2
Page 3

Technical Specification

Color Type: Black & White
Animation Type: Standard animation
Sound Mix: Mono
Aspect Ratio: 1.37 : 1
Negative Format: 35mm
Print Format: 35mm
Cinematographic Process: Spherical
Original Language: English

Released by United Artists Pictures

Comments

  • This short was released to the home movie market under two different the titles; "Fast and Furious" and "Buzz Saw Battle."
From Ryan Kilpatrick at The Disney Film Project : Now, this is what I’m talking about! The Dognapper is a short full of action, adventure, gags and classic characters. Watching it, I got that “Disney” feeling inside, of wanting to go to the parks, or cuddle up by a fire and watch a marathon of shorts. This is what Disney animation is all about.

What makes it so great? It’s all the things I listed above. First of all, it’s full of great action. The short opens with a shot of a newspaper outlining the plot: Pete has dognapped Fifi from Minnie, and the police are hot on his trail. That’s all the set up you need, as Pete goes zooming by policemen Mickey and Donald, and the chase is on.

This short jumps right into things, and it’s the better for it. And pairing Mickey with Donald is a bit of inspired genius. The contrast between them – Mickey the dashing hero and Donald the coward – is classic, and continues to this day. As they chase Pete all around the countryside, there are great gags, like Pete knocking out the bridge and Mickey and Donald stretching their motorcycle and sidecar to ride the rails.

They finally corner Pete in a sawmill, by driving up a log and crashing through the side. We get the classic silhouette of the characters in the hole they leave behind, which is another fun gag. The sawmill sets up all kinds of opportunities for fun as well.

Throughout the sawmill, Mickey and Donald chase Pete, but they constantly get in each other’s way. One will have a gun trained on Pete only to have the other crash into him and ruin it. They get trapped in a ladder while Pete chases them, which makes for more great visuals.

The final scenes feature some great work, as Pete turns a saw on too high, and it breaks loose and chases the three of them around the building. This is high energy, frenetic animation at its best, as good as anything produced at Warner Bros. The action never stops, as the saw blade goes from Pete to Mickey to Donald without pause.

Finally, Mickey and Donald are able to corral Pete, when his peg leg gets trapped on the saw blade, and they throw a corset over him. It’s a funny way to end this short, which is funny throughout, but deals with a “serious” subject.

The Dognapper may be my favorite short so far. Yes, it’s that good. I am a huge Donald Duck fan, so it doesn’t hurt that he is in this one. But the tone, the action and the style of this short remind me of later buddy shorts like Lonesome Ghosts, which is also one of my favorites. You’ve got to see this one, as I think it’s one of the lost treasures of the Disney shorts.

From Mac : It's interesting to see theses early appearances of Donald. It's obvious Disney were already thinking of him as a new star character, appearing as Mickey's sidekick in only his third cartoon. Although Donald's voice was key to part of his early appeal, I think Disney must have been conscious of the fact that he can be hard for some people to understand and much of his dialogue is merely repeating what someone else has already said. Of course, none of the characters tend to speak much in these Mickey cartoons anyway.
From Jerry Edwards : An exciting cartoon with lots of actions and gags - full of gun play. The colorized version keeps the newspaper info and picture in black and white.
From J. D. Weil : At the time this cartoon was in production, Walt was traveling in Europe and was unavailable to record Mickey's voice. So for the first (and only) time in his career, Clarence (Ducky) Nash spoke for Mickey.
From Ryan : Here we've got Donald Duck in his third appearance (after The Wise Little Hen and Orphans' Benefit). Mickey and Donald follow Pete to an abandoned saw mill and some action begins. I found it quite interesting reading JD Weil's comment on this short. I had no idea that Clarence Nash did the voice for Mickey in this short. I guess Mickey's voice isn't very hard to do. I can do it myself.
From Patrick Uhr : This short was shown in a continuous loop of films at the orientation building at Disneyland (California), back in the 80's.

After a long hard day of going all over Disneyland my wife and I happened to go into this building right at the entrance. We noticed the old cartoons that were playing on a screen and started to watch.

We had no idea of what we were seeing exactly except that it was a Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck cartoon in some kind of big hassle with Black Pete (Pegleg Pete), and they were having an even bigger hassle with a buzz saw which was after everybody.

My God, you have no idea how hard we were laughing watching this spectacle. I laughed so hard my whole body hurt. My belly hurt, my back hurt, and I got a headache from laughing, with tears pouring down my face. It was simply the funniest cartoon I've ever seen and nothing else even comes close.

I've been wanting to buy it ever since and just tonight I finally found it in a two-disk DVD collection from 2002, which I'm going to have to pay dearly for, but I don't care. That's one bad thing about the Disney corp. -- they put something out for a short time and then they simply quit producing it. You either buy it early, or pay through the nose to get it later.

But hooray for The Dognapper -- it is in a class by itself!!

From Bill : A simple story, but one action packed, gag filled short! There are so many great gags it's hard to name 'em all. The short starts out with a bang and never stops. Some of the funniest gags: Mickey splitting the cycle and sidecar to run up the sides of the bridge Pete tore up; the gags with the sawmill blade chasing Pete, Donald And Mickey; and don't forget the great animation shot when the cycle with Mickey and Donald hits the rail on the bridge and spins round and round. This short also had a great amount of slapstick. If you are a Three Stooges fan or Abbott and Costello, you'll see that they copied a lot from this short, especially when Mickey and Donald keep going ahead of each other to avoid the sawblade. The parts when Mickey or Donald get the drop on Pete, one gets hit with the coal chute, Mickey gets clobbered with the ladder, etc. The nice thing about this short is that Mickey gets almost all the gags, while Donald basically watches, which is reversed years later. It just goes to show that with the right storyline, Mickey is just as funny as any of the "five." Best action short!
From Maxwell Morton "Max" Goudiss : This short could also be called "The Great Mouse Detective" as they went to save the dog from a tough bad guy.

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