Jasper and the Haunted House

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Jasper and the Haunted House
Directed byGeorge Pal (uncredited)
Story byGeorge Pal
Produced byGeorge Pal
Animation byStop-motion artist:
Ray Harryhausen (uncredited)
Color processTechnicolor
Distributed byParamount Pictures
Release date
October 23, 1942
Running time
7 minutes
LanguageEnglish

Jasper and the Haunted House is a 1942 American animated short film in the Madcap Model series by George Pal.[1] It is an early entry that features the popular yet controversial Paramount Puppetoons characters Jasper and his friend/nemesis Professor Scarecrow and Blackbird.

Plot

The original Paramount opening titles feature vocals singing the preparation of the pie and the credits displayed as part of the pie's ingredients.[2]

Jasper walks with a

mammy. Professor Scarecrow opens Jasper's pie (by unzipping and zipping the crust) and finds out it is gooseberry. Jasper walks away, irritated by Professor Scarecrow and Blackbird's curiosity. Professor Scarecrow switches a nearby sign (one pointing to the Deacon's home and the other pointing to a haunted house) to trick Jasper so he can get his hands on Jasper's pie. Jasper comes back, then Professor Scarecrow and Blackbird lie about the sign. Jasper doesn't believe him at first and says "There ain't nothin' down that way but a ha-haunted house". Professor Scarecrow and Blackbird lie again and say that the house is no longer haunted as the "haunts" were drafted for World War II
. Jasper is now convinced, so he thanks Professor Scarecrow for showing him the right way; however, Professor Scarecrow and Blackbird laugh once Jasper has left.

The next scene begins as Jasper arrives at the (obviously) haunted house. He enters and yells for the Deacon, but instead the door slams shut and locks behind him. Trapped and frightened, Jasper walks forward into the room (with a gag where his shadow walks back), and Professor Scarecrow and Blackbird scare Jasper into leaving the pie on a table by the staircase; Jasper then hides in an old piano. It seems as if the plan worked, but when Professor Scarecrow gets in an argument with Blackbird about sharing the pie, the pie itself is taken by a ghost. Professor Scarecrow then accuses Blackbird of taking the pie, but the argument ends when they find that it was a ghost who took it. Frightened, Professor Scarecrow and Blackbird hide in the piano with Jasper after the pie is eaten and the invisible ghost tosses back the pan ("There ya' are, boys. Get you a refund on the tin.") The ghost walks across to the piano and gets ready to play it. ("Nothin' like a little music after dinner", says the ghost.) The three characters whisper that they cannot see him, and there's a swing boogie-woogie piece played

billboard
.

Jasper, afraid he will get in trouble, asks "What am I gonna tell my mammy about that pie?" Professor Scarecrow gives Jasper the empty pie pan as a way to prove that the pie was delivered. Jasper, furious, begins hitting the pie pan on their heads. The camera zooms out with a controversial advertisement for a fake brand of pie that says "Next Time Try Spook's[5] Gooseberry Pie". Jasper drops the pan onto the ground revealing the Paramount Pictures print logo of the time on it.

Later releases

Jasper and the Haunted House has not been seen on TV for many years because it was deemed racist.

Image Entertainment
, and again later the Blu-ray of the same film.

The film has also fallen into the public domain as NTA failed to renew the copyrights on the film, except possibly underlying music rights issues with Famous Music, as well as the eventual Arnold Leibovit's later trademarking of Puppetoons.

Because of this, Jasper and the Haunted House found its way to numerous public domain video collections.

References

  1. . Retrieved 6 June 2020.
  2. ^ Article title [dead link]
  3. ^ DataBase, The Big Cartoon. "Jasper And The Haunted House (Paramount Pictures)". Big Cartoon DataBase (BCDB). Archived from the original on July 22, 2012.
  4. ^ "Jasper and the Haunted House". 23 October 1942 – via www.imdb.com.
  5. ^ Spook
  6. ISSN 0015-1386
    .
  7. .

External links