The Pink Panther Classic Cartoon Collection
Pink Panther DVDs
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One of the unforeseen (and hugely profitable)
benefits of the first Pink Panther movie was the popularity
of the cartoon cat from that film's classic credits sequence. Added
on a hunch by director Blake Edwards and concocted by the
DePatie-Freleng animation team, the slinky pink feline immediately
spawned his own series of cartoons, first for theatrical release and
later for television. The saga is gathered in The Pink Panther
Classic Cartoon Collection, five discs of 124 cartoons, plus
extras. This would have to be considered the ultimate such
collection, and more than the average fan could handle in a few
sittings (or a few dozen). But they're all here.When
United Artists commissioned David DePatie and Friz Freleng (whose
new company was born from the eclipse of the old Warner Bros.
cartoon unit) to make freestanding Pink Panther cartoons, their
first effort struck gold. Literally: The Pink Phink won the
Oscar for best animated short subject, and is still a prime example
of circa-1964 line drawing and visual humor. Most of the early
shorts display a sure sense of timing and a cheeky feel for the era;
they were directed by Freleng and Hawley Pratt (Pratt's design for
the Pink Panther had been selected by Blake Edwards from dozens of
offerings at the time of the first feature). In two of the first
handful, Sink Pink and Pink Ice, the Pink Panther
himself speaks stray lines of dialogue, a mistake that would not be
repeated later. One unwelcome aural intrusion: some of the cartoons
here have a laugh track from the TV series, even on the
Oscar-nominated Pink Blueprint.
Animation voiceover veterans of the era chimed in with narration
or voices for other characters; for instance, the indefatigable Paul
Frees does the narration on Phinkfinger, a funny spoof of
007-style spy movies. But most of the cartoons are wordless, which
is one reason they remained popular internationally for so many
years. The main reason is the slinky character of the Panther, a
mischievous hipster who could be either the instrument of chaos or
the victim, depending on the cartoon. The plots tend toward the
cartoon verities: the necessity of catching a mouse or silencing an
alarm clock, for instance. A documentary, Behind the Feline,
gives a fine account of the history of the character; it is also
bundled on a previous boxed set, The Pink Panther Film Collection.
Useful new extras include a portrait of Friz Freleng by his
daughters, an illuminating interview with animator-director Art
Leonardi, and a delightful vignette with Leonardi instructing us on
how to quickly draw the Pink Panther. The opening-title sequences
from five Pink Panther movies are included. Throughout the
cartoons and the extras, you will be reminded of one incalculable
boost to the series: Henry Mancini's lithe, foxy theme music, which
surely had much to do with the character's enduring fame. Mancini
gets an onscreen shout-out in Pink, Plunk, Plink, in which
the Panther tries to inject his theme into an orchestral performance
of Beethoven's Fifth. --Robert Horton
