Robert Reynolds This is a Koko the Clown short produced by the Fleischer Brothers studio. There will be spoilers ahead:Koko the Clown is a character created by Max Fleischer and was in more than 100 shorts before becoming a secondary supporting character in the Betty Boop shorts. The Koko shorts are a mix of live action and animation, with Max Fleischer typically drawing Koko and then creating some situation to put Koko in to create some tension or action.This short begins with Max Fleischer using electric current to animate various real items on a desk blotter. The stop motion animation here is good. He then completes drawing Koko and the turns on the current to make Koko jump. Koko goes off running and pleading for Fleischer to shut the current off. His words appear on the screen in the original silent 1924 release, with a voice track added in the 1930s.Koko next comes across a drawing machine, which, after Koko starts it, first draws a chicken dinner and then erases it, much to Koko's disbelief and sorrow. Then it draws a woman who flirts with Koko and then blows him a kiss. The machine erases her as well, dismaying Koko further. Koko then hops on the machine, which takes off, drawing scenery, a building and then a room, which turns out to be a real room.Koko then discovers a machine shop, which produces a life size toy soldier version of Max Fleischer. Fleischer winds up as the soldier, but gets even by drawing a veritable army of soldiers to send after Koko. A mini-conflict ensues, with Koko erasing soldiers as fast as Fleischer can produce them. The machine shop starts spitting out soldiers rapidly and Koko decides discretion is the better part of valor and heads for the inkwell, jumping in. The soldiers, now drawings, do likewise and Max once again fixes the stopper to the inkwell.This is available on DVD. I think it works a bit better as a silent, but both versions are worth watching. Recommended.

tavm I watched this Max Fleischer/Out of the Inkwell short starring Koko the Clown on the "Saved from the Flames" DVD collection. In this one, Max has Koko literally wired to do his will. Then, using an ink machine, Koko draws a chicken and a woman but the machine erases them both before he eats and kisses them, respectively. So he then goes to a factory and has a large soldier built that looks like Max inhabit his drawn-on-the-outside but photographed-on-the-inside house hoping to control him. But this "Max" then draws-via stop-motion-various soldiers to go after his creation...And so on, pretty amusing and the synchronization of the music and voices are almost perfect. Well worth a look for anyone curious about these silent films that happen to still exist despite the nitrate materials that the movies were printed on then.

JoeytheBrit This was the first Koko the Clown cartoon I had seen, and I was mightily impressed. The Fleischers had a fairly wild imagination and put it to good use in films such as these in which Max Fleischer interacts with his creation. Their relationship seems to be an adversarial one, for no sooner has Max drawn Koko than he is tormenting him by wiring him to an electrical cable and zapping him with a few volts to make him run. The tables turn, however, when Koko stumbles upon the titular cartoon factory, and it's at this point that things start to get a little surreal. Koko uses the machine to create a toy soldier real-life version of Max and a house - so that, in effect, the cartoons are creating the real world. Koko bombards the toy soldier Max with cartoon cannonballs that become real when they hit their target, and Max responds by drawing an army of cartoon soldiers. The film grows increasingly insane - and more enjoyable - as it moves along, and leaves you wanting more because you feel as if these guys would never run out of wild ideas.The version I saw was on a Retour de Flamme DVD and featured a synchronised soundtrack.

Cineanalyst Juxtaposing live action with animation is nearly as old as film animation itself. Emile Cohl and Winsor McCay interweaved live-action narratives about the animator with the animated cartoon. The next step was taken by John Randolph Bray, Walt Disney with his Alice's Wonderland series and the Fleischer Brothers, among others; they created films where the real, live-action world and the cartoon world interact. This particular Fleischer Brothers short, part of their Out of the Inkwell series, is notable for its play on the notion of creators and creations and for an exceptionally well executed version of the battle between creator and creation that usually occurred in the series."The Cartoon Factory" begins, as usual in the series, with Max Fleischer drawing Koko the Clown, who instantly comes to life. Max arbitrarily torments his creation for a while, but then Koko happens upon a drawing machine and shop--a cartoon factory--within the cartoon world, all of which can create live-action within the cartoon world (sometimes merely still photographs). In the Out of Inkwell series, it was the cartoon that usually entered the real universe. But no, here, Koko, who was originally modeled on Max (via Max's invention, the rotoscope, which was abandoned for a more cartoony Koko this episode), eventually creates a toy soldier, which comes to life as the live-action Max. Max sets about drawing subordinate toy soldiers, whom he orders to attack Koko.This animation short features an especially clever exploration of the interactions between the universe of the creator and that of the creation. Koko the Clown was the Fleisher's first popular character, who in his later incarnations was often accompanied by Fitz the Dog, such as in the very inventive, apocalyptic "Ko-Ko's Earth Control" (1928). Koko isn't as well remembered as the Fleisher's later creations Betty Boop and Popeye, but with Felix the Cat and Mickey Mouse, he was one of the first popular and sustained cartoon characters in film history. The interaction between creators and creations, however, were the lasting importance of the Out of the Inkwell series featuring Koko.