(1946) Among the earliest sound pictures to combine cartoon animation (directed by Wilfred Jackson) with live actors (directed by Harve Foster), Walt Disney's musical motion picture has Uncle Remus (James Baskett) in his gray hat and white whiskers - from Joel Chandler Harris's book - telling his tall tales of the adventures of Br'er Rabbit (voiced by Johnny Lee) and antagonists, Br'er Fox (Baskett's voice) and Br'er Bear (voice of Nicodemus Stewart).

"It happened on one of those zip-a-dee doo dah days" after little Johnny (Bobby Driscoll) arrives with his parents, John (Eric Rolf) and Sally (Ruth Warrick), and Aunt Tempy (Hattie McDaniel), their Negro servant, at his grandmother's (Lucile Watson) plantation in the antebellum South.

But when Johnny finds out that his father has to return to Atlanta, the boy attempts to run off, coming instead upon Uncle Remus, who tells the child about "the most bodacious critter ever," Br'er Rabbit, who once also said, "And I ain't never coming back." After escaping from the hands of Br'er Fox and Bear, Br'er Rabbit scampers back to the safety of his abode with the morale of the tale being: "You can't run away from trouble."

Along with his colored companion Toby, Johnny meets little Ginny Favers (Luana Patten), who gives the boy in a suit with a lace collar (which he despises having to wear) a puppy her bullying brothers, Jake and Joe, were about to drown; Johnny hands her his frilly collar. The plantation lad (learning from Br'er Rabbit's exploits that when you're weaker and smaller you have to use your head) and the daughter of a tenant farmer become fast friends, while her two older brothers taunt and harass them.

Uncle Remus relates more of his stories of the trickster rabbit ("How can there be a tale when there ain't no tail?") who gets into trouble by sticking his foot into others' business, such as his encounter with the tar baby, necessitating his having to resort to reverse psychology ("But don't fling me in that briar patch"), and his getting out of another fix with Br'er Fox and Bear by offering to show them "the laughin' place."

Sally, misunderstanding the significance of Johnny's relationship with Uncle Remus, following a mishap during Johnny's birthday party, orders the old black man to stay away from her son. When Johnny sees Uncle Remus leaving in a wagon for Atlanta (Could a slave just pack up and depart?), he runs through the bull pasture, forgetting the danger within: "Uncle Remus, come back!"

This film, which I first saw in the '50s at a drive-in theater, is "mighty satisfaction," though sentimentalized with the slaves appearing as happy folk always singing songs as they trudge to and from the fields or sit around a campfire.

However, it has been a source of controversy since its New York premiere in Times Square, as James Snead notes in his book, White Screens/Black Images, where "dozens of black and white pickets chanted, 'We fought for Uncle Sam, not Uncle Tom,' while the NAACP called for a total boycott of the film, and the National Negro Congress called on black people to 'run the picture out of the area.'"

Click here for links to places to buy or rent this movie in video and/or DVD format, or to buy the soundtrack, posters, books, even used videos, games, electronics and lots of other stuff. I suggest you shop at least two of these places before buying anything. Prices seem to vary continuously. For more information on this film, click on this link to The Internet Movie Database. Type in the name of the movie in the search box and press enter. You will be able to find background information on the film, the actors, and links to much more information.

Copyright © 2009 Patrick Ivers. All rights reserved.
Reproduced with the permission of the copyright holder.

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