Speedy Gonzales (film)

Speedy Gonzales
Speedy Gonzales
Directed by	I. Freleng
Story by	Warren Foster
Produced by	Edward Selzer (uncredited)
Starring	Mel Blanc; (all other voices); Stan Freberg; (Mice - uncredited)
Music by	Carl Stalling
Animation by	Gerry Chiniquy; Ted Bonnicksen; Arthur Davis; Harry Love (uncredited)
Layouts by	Hawley Pratt
Backgrounds by	Irv Wyner
Color process	Technicolor
Distributed by	Warner Bros. Pictures
Release date	September 17, 1955;
Running time	6:45
Country	United States
Language	English

Speedy Gonzales is a 1955 Warner Bros. Merrie Melodies animated short directed by Friz Freleng from a story by Warren Foster.^[2] The short was released on September 17, 1955, and stars Speedy Gonzales and Sylvester.^[3]

Plot

The short opens on a small, worried group of Mexican mice thinking of how to get cheese from the AJAX cheese factory across the Mexico–United States border that is guarded by Sylvester. Sylvester has eaten any mice who have tried. The leader comes up with a brilliant idea: Gain the services of the aptly named "Speedy Gonzales". The group agrees, so the leader goes to the carnival where Speedy resides.

Speedy Gonzales is at the carnival attraction "Shoot Speedy" in which people try to shoot Speedy with bullets from a gun in order to "win a beeg prize." The leader tells Speedy, in Spanish, about the dire situation the mice are in, not having access to the cheese guarded by Sylvester. Speedy agrees to help and runs through the field between the mice and Sylvester to fetch an armful of cheese with each turn. After failing to catch Speedy by hand, Sylvester employs a hand net, mousetraps, landmines, baseball equipment, and a pipe to funnel Speedy right into his mouth, but Speedy manages to thwart him every time.

Finally getting fed up, Sylvester gets all the cheese from the factory, stacks it, and uses dynamite to blow it all up. However, all the cheese ends up raining down on the mice, causing Sylvester to cry and bang his head on an electric pole in vexation. Speedy ends the short by saying: "I like this pussycat fellow; he's silly!"

Production notes

Speedy Gonzales won the Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film in 1955.^[4]^[5]

This short marks the first appearance of a redesign for Speedy, after his initial appearance in Cat-Tails for Two.

Home media

Speedy Gonzales can be found on Disc 4 of the Looney Tunes Golden Collection: Volume 1.

Warner Bros. Home Entertainment Academy Awards Animation Collection: 15 Winners (restored)

References

^ Beck, Jerry (1991). I Tawt I Taw a Puddy Tat: Fifty Years of Sylvester and Tweety. New York: Henry Holt and Co. p. 129. ISBN 0-8050-1644-9.
^ Beck, Jerry; Friedwald, Will (1989). Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies: A Complete Illustrated Guide to the Warner Bros. Cartoons. Henry Holt and Co. p. 277. ISBN 0-8050-0894-2.
^ Lenburg, Jeff (1999). The Encyclopedia of Animated Cartoons. Checkmark Books. p. 137. ISBN 0-8160-3831-7. Retrieved June 6, 2020.
^ "The 28th Academy Awards (1955) Nominees and Winners – Short Subject (Cartoon)". Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. Archived from the original on November 11, 2014. Retrieved June 9, 2014.
^ "Speedy Gonzales". IMDb. Archived from the original on March 5, 2016. Retrieved April 26, 2018.