Betty Boop Cartoon Classics - Volume 2 (DVD)

Betty Boop was one of the most popular creations in the Max Fleischer stable. Her cartoons were known for their raciness and surreal humor, making them a hit with adult audiences. With their use of looming shadows and scary characters, Leonard Maltin has even called them a kind of animated film noir. All this was too much for the National Legion of Decency, formed in 1933 to combat objectionable content in motion pictures. When the Production Code was implemented in 1934, censor Joseph Breen took special notice of Betty. He felt her winks and shaking hips were "suggestive of immorality." Consequently Betty's skirt was lengthened and her garter would no longer show. In addition to curtailing Betty's sex appeal, the Fleischers also removed the surreal, at times disturbing humor that made their work so unique. The cartoons subsequently became more about domesticity, with most of the storylines centering around Betty's dog Pudgy, her wimpy boyfriend Wiffle Piffle, and eccentric inventor Grampy. In the span of a few years, Betty went from being a carefree flapper to a civic-minded old maid. With the cartoons' popularity plummeting, Fleischer finally gave up the ghost and retired Betty in 1939, shortly before his studio was taken over by Paramount.

Featuring 20 cartoons, including On with the New, Musical Mountaineers,The Scared Crows, My Friend the Monkey, Rhythm on the Reservation, More Pep, Happy You and Merry Me, House Cleaning Blues, The Impractical Joker, Ding Dong Doggie, The Candid Candidate, Grampy's Indoor Outing, Pudgy Takes a Bow-Wow, Pudgy Picks a Fight, So Does an Automobile, Making Friends, Hot Air Salesman, Training Pigeons, Whoops! I'm a Cowboy and You're Not Built That Way.

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