Horst in Translation ([email protected]) Legendary animator Rudolf Ising's "We're in the Money" is a 7-minute cartoon from 1933, so this one will have its 85th anniversary next year already. It is a Schlesinger production distributed by Warner Bros and this black-and-white animated short film is still from a time that may have counted already as the Golden Age of Animation, but not at its peak yet. It is a work we have here that is acceptable because these mediocre cartoons were needed to carve the path for the greatness about to come. It's Toy Story from soon a century ago. Toy stores and the toys coming to life was a premise they did on more occasions back then in animation. This one is not at all about fun really, but the focus is on experimenting with animation and even more so with sound really as the film's title is also a song used in this little movie. The fact that the term "in the money" is not really common today anymore also shows you how old this one is. It's really only worth seeing for the very biggest lovers of old cartoons. Everybody else can skip it without missing much. I give it a thumbs-down. Not recommended.

tavm This is one of three Merrie Melodies cartoons based on songs from Gold Diggers of 1933 that was included on that movie's DVD. This was a Harmon-Ising production and it has toys coming to life singing and playing the title song to amusing life though I laughed heartily when the carbon heads of Laurel & Hardy did some nonsense gibberish. The movements were pretty good especially when one of those human toys was playing on the xylophone with his feet. Oh, and the coins in the cash register with the presidential heads were also amusing when they were singing. Really, I was just charmed by the whole thing so on that note, We're in the Money is worth a look for anyone interested in these early talkie cartoons.

Lee Eisenberg There were a few instances during the 1930-35 Warner Bros. cartoons when inanimate objects came to life, but the Termite Terrace perfected the genre in the late '30s. "We're in the Money" has a gaggle of toys dancing to the title song in a department store. Frank Tashlin's cartoons "Speaking of the Weather" (about magazines), "Have You Got Any Castles?" (about books) and "You're an Education" (about travel brochures) were the first really clever cartoons in which azoic things animate themselves. Later there was Bob Clampett's "Goofy Groceries" (about various objects in a supermarket), and finally, the crowning achievement, Clampett's "Book Revue" (books again). I saw the latter several times when I was a little boy and naively laughed at it, but didn't really understand it until I saw it when I was twenty-two.Anyway, this one is good as a historical reference.

didi-5 The first few Merrie Melodies were not particularly original or inventive - the best years were yet to come - but this Harman/Ising production based around the Dubin/Warren tune from 'Gold Diggers of 1933' is OK.The basic premise surrounds a group of toys who start to walk, talk, sing and play instruments when the shop owner has gone to bed. In a blatant plug for the song (which Warners owned), toys, hats, and the like join together in chorus.The trouble is there were quite a few cartoons with the same plot, all using a song as a centre, and this is nothing new. As a historical document though, it has its interest.