The Other Fleischer Feature Film: MR. BUG GOES TO TOWN

After the success of GULLIVER'S TRAVELS in 1939, 

Paramount Pictures requested FLEISCHER STUDIOS to make another animated flick for the studio in time for Christmas 1941.

The film would be MR. BUG GOES TO TOWN.

To go from GULLIVER to MR. BUG in less than 2 years is either quite a feat or an insanity even for 1940s animation standards if you stop to think about it.

Typically, Feature Length animation takes 3-4 years to complete.

2 years if you're lucky to make that mark.

The film looks like it's Fleischer trying to beat Disney to making a feature length version of the classic Fable THE ANTS AND THE GRASSHOPPER but make no mistake, MR BUG is not based on the classic AESOP'S FABLE.

The film was actually susposed to be an adaptation of Maurice Maeterlinck's novel THE LIFE OF A BEE.

but Paramount was unwilling to purchase the film rights from Samuel Goldwyn.

And thus, the original Idea of Hoppity trying to save his fellow bug friends from the threat of Humanity was born.

This film, while lighthearted in it's presentation at least in 1940s standards,

It's actually surprisingly dark in tone.

Not because this film would debut 2 days before the infamous Attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7 1941,

but rather it's due to the fact that it portrays insects having their habitat under the threat of:

Land Development.

But unlike with Richard Adam's WATERSHIP DOWN, 

which wouldn't debut until 31 years after Mr. Bug's release, 

where the Rabbits flee their Warren due to residential development, 

The Bugs go out of their way to help their Land Owner DICK DICKENS' win an appeal with a Government check so that their home doesn't get snatched and used for Land Development.

Aside from Full WEST COAST STYLE Art and Acting now having permeated the perennially EAST-COAST studio known as FLEISCHER, this film also had a new major problem and that had nothing to do with emulating Disney but rather a newfound feud between the two brothers who founded the company.

Apparently there was rift between Max and Dave Fleischer that began during the production of Gulliver's Travels back in the late 30s.

The rift got so bad that the two brothers refused to communicate in person, instead preferring to communicate with written memos so a physical fight doesn't occur between the two.

And Paramount was made aware of the rift between the two so the studio devised a solution that either one of the brothers would resign after production of Mr. Bug concluded.

We all know how that went...

Despite all that as well as the film having ditched the EAST COAST feel of the early BETTY BOOPS and POPEYES, MR BUG still is a classic for all of us.

It has the classic condescending villain who we know is evil but he tries to hide that by pretending to be a good guy, only to feed bad info and let schmucks fall for his schemes.

The environment message is somehow better executed and not as preachy as films like

FERNGULLY or ONCE UPON A FOREST would try.

You have to remember that this film was released 3 days before the United States' entry into WWII but the tense atmosphere of environmental damage to a Bug's habitat was still real even in the 1940s.

I also dig the detail on some of the characters during closeups such as the light source used on C. Bagley Beetle shown below.

Somehow Human-like though I doubt BEETLE's face would get the 

KNOW YOUR MEME "CHAD" treatment in 2025.....

we'll see. 

The opening credits with the New York Skyline is also impressive too.

I don't know if that's the Patented Stereo-Optical Setback Camera or something similar but the 3D-feel of the buildings do reek of the Setback Camera that Fleischer was famous for back in the Betty Boop and Popeye days.

Many of my VLC screenshots of MR.BUG are coming from this unusual restored copy of the NTA Print of the film.

Now here's an interesting True Story:

Did you know that Sci-Fi writer HARLAN ELLISON was so obsessed with MR. BUG during his childhood that he tried many times to sneak into the various movie theaters just to watch the film without paying for a goddamn ticket?

"To be a REAL MAN of a writer, 

you must sneak into your most coveted Childhood Animated films

while they're still playing in Theaters."

While he didn't see the film in it's entirety during his childhood, Ellison eventually saw MR. BUG in it's entirety through it's May 1989 REPUBLIC PICTURES VHS/Laserdisc release.

And get this, even HAYAO MIYAZAKI likes this film. Enough Said....

And no, MR.BUG did not influence PIXAR or DREAMWORKS when they made ANTZ & A BUG'S LIFE in 1998 despite both of them being CGI FILMS about ANTS.

I don't know what was the influence for ANTZ....

*COUGH*Bosnia*COUGH*& Kosovo*COUGH*

but I do know that A BUG'S LIFE was inspired by the classic fable THE ANT & THE GRASSHOPPER.

And as for the 31 year timeframe for WATERSHIP DOWN I mentioned earlier, don't question the timeframe from between Mr. Bug and WATERSHIP DOWN.

I know what timeframe I was referring to....

OK OK. You've got me. I confess....

I was actually referring to Richard Adam's 1972 Novel, not Martin Rosen's 1978 Film.