1.
Paramount Pictures
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Paramount Pictures Corporation is an American film studio based in Hollywood, California, that has been a subsidiary of the American media conglomerate Viacom since 1994. In 1916, film producer Adolph Zukor contracted 22 actors and actresses and these fortunate few would become the first movie stars. Paramount Pictures is a member of the Motion Picture Association of America, in 2014, Paramount Pictures became the first major Hollywood studio to distribute all of its films in digital form only. Paramount is the fifth oldest surviving studio in the world after the French studios Gaumont Film Company and Pathé, followed by the Nordisk Film company. It is the last major film studio headquartered in the Hollywood district of Los Angeles. Paramount Pictures dates its existence from the 1912 founding date of the Famous Players Film Company, hungarian-born founder, Adolph Zukor, who had been an early investor in nickelodeons, saw that movies appealed mainly to working-class immigrants. With partners Daniel Frohman and Charles Frohman he planned to offer feature-length films that would appeal to the class by featuring the leading theatrical players of the time. By mid-1913, Famous Players had completed five films, and Zukor was on his way to success and its first film was Les Amours de la reine Élisabeth, which starred Sarah Bernhardt. That same year, another aspiring producer, Jesse L. Lasky, opened his Lasky Feature Play Company with money borrowed from his brother-in-law, Samuel Goldfish, the Lasky company hired as their first employee a stage director with virtually no film experience, Cecil B. DeMille, who would find a site in Hollywood, near Los Angeles, for his first feature film. Hodkinson and actor, director, producer Hobart Bosworth had started production of a series of Jack London movies, Paramount was the first successful nationwide distributor, until this time, films were sold on a statewide or regional basis which had proved costly to film producers. Also, Famous Players and Lasky were privately owned while Paramount was a corporation, in 1916, Zukor maneuvered a three-way merger of his Famous Players, the Lasky Company, and Paramount. Zukor and Lasky bought Hodkinson out of Paramount, and merged the three companies into one, with only the exhibitor-owned First National as a rival, Famous Players-Lasky and its Paramount Pictures soon dominated the business. It was this system that gave Paramount a leading position in the 1920s and 1930s, the driving force behind Paramounts rise was Zukor. In 1926, Zukor hired independent producer B. P. Schulberg and they purchased the Robert Brunton Studios, a 26-acre facility at 5451 Marathon Street for US$1 million. In 1927, Famous Players-Lasky took the name Paramount Famous Lasky Corporation, three years later, because of the importance of the Publix Theatres, it became Paramount Publix Corporation. In 1928, Paramount began releasing Inkwell Imps, animated cartoons produced by Max, the Fleischers, veterans in the animation industry, were among the few animation producers capable of challenging the prominence of Walt Disney. The Paramount newsreel series Paramount News ran from 1927 to 1957, Paramount was also one of the first Hollywood studios to release what were known at that time as talkies, and in 1929, released their first musical, Innocents of Paris
2.
Betty Boop
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Betty Boop is an animated cartoon character created by Max Fleischer, with help from animators including Grim Natwick. She originally appeared in the Talkartoon and Betty Boop film series and she has also been featured in comic strips and mass merchandising. Despite having been toned down in the mid-1930s as a result of the Hays Code to appear more demure, she one of the best-known. Betty Boop made her first appearance on August 9,1930, although Clara Bow is often given as being the model for Boop, she actually began as a caricature of singer Helen Kane. The character was created as an anthropomorphic French poodle. Betty Boop appeared as a character in 10 cartoons as a flapper girl with more heart than brains. In individual cartoons, she was called Nancy Lee or Nan McGrew – derived from the 1930 Helen Kane film Dangerous Nan McGrew – usually serving as a girlfriend to studio star, Bimbo. Within a year, Betty made the transition from an incidental human-canine breed to a human female character. By the release of Any Rags Betty Boop was forever establish as a human character and her floppy poodle ears became hoop earrings, and her black poodle nose became a girls button-like nose. Bettys voice was first performed by Margie Hines, and was performed by several different voice actresses, including Kate Wright, Bonnie Poe, Ann Rothschild. Questel, who began voicing Betty Boop in Bimbos Silly Scandals, today, Betty is voiced by Tress MacNeille, Sandy Fox and Cindy Robinson in commercials. Although it has assumed that Bettys first name was established in the 1931 Screen Songs cartoon, Betty Co-ed. There are at least 12 Screen Songs cartoons that featured Betty Boop or a similar character, Betty appeared in the first Color Classic cartoon Poor Cinderella, her only theatrical color appearance in 1934. In the film, she was depicted with red hair as opposed to her black hair. Betty also made a appearance in the feature film Who Framed Roger Rabbit, in which she appeared in her traditional black. Betty Boop was the star of the Talkartoons by 1932 and was given her own series that same year, from that point on, she was crowned The Queen of the Animated Screen. The series was popular throughout the 1930s, lasting until 1939. Betty Boop is regarded as one of the first and most famous sex symbols on the screen, she is a symbol of the Depression era
3.
Queen (Snow White)
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Other versions of the Queen appear in Snow White derivative works, and the character has also become an archetype for unrelated works of fiction. The Queen is Snow Whites evil and vindictive stepmother who is obsessed with being the fairest in the land, the young princess Snow White makes her jealous, so the Queen concocts several plans to kill Snow White through the use of witchcraft. A driving force in the story is the Queens Magic Mirror, in the traditional resolution of the story, the Queen is grotesquely executed for her crimes. The tale is a lesson for young children warning against narcissism and she is often regarded as the most interesting character in Snow White and has been extensively analyzed and evaluated by literature scholars and psychologists. Various other versions of the Queen appear in subsequent adaptations and continuations of the fairy tale, including novels. In these, the Queen is often re-imagined and sometimes portrayed more sympathetically, such as being morally conflicted, or suffering from madness, in the revisionist stories, she can even become an antihero or a tragic hero. In some instances, she serves as the protagonist or narrator of the story, one particularly notable version is Disneys version. The Queen has also become an archetype that inspired several characters featured in the works that are not directly based on the original tale, the Queen is a very beautiful but proud and arrogant woman who is secretly dabbling in dark arts. When the Kings first wife, the Good Queen passes away, the Kings new and second wife is a very beautiful but a wicked and vain woman who becomes the new and second Queen, and Snow Whites stepmother. She owns a magic mirror, which one day informs her that her young stepdaughter, after deciding to eliminate Snow White, the Queen orders her huntsman to take the princess into the forest and kill her. The Queen tells him to bring back Snow Whites lungs and liver, however, the huntsman takes pity on Snow White, and instead, brings the Queen the lungs and liver of a boar. The Queen then eats what she believes are Snow Whites organs, while questioning her mirror, the Queen discovers that Snow White has survived. Intending to kill Snow White herself, she uses witchcraft to prepare poison and she visits the dwarfs house and sells Snow White laces for a corset that she laces too tight in an attempt to asphyxiate the girl. When that fails, the Queen returns, as a different old woman, when the comb fails to kill Snow White, the Queen again visits Snow White, this time disguised as a farmers wife, and gives Snow White a poisoned apple. Sara Maitland wrote that we do not tell this part of the story any more, we say it is too cruel, therefore, many revisions of the fairy tale often change the gruesome classic ending in order to make it seem less violent. In some versions, instead of dying, the Queen is even just merely prevented from committing further wrongdoings. Already the first English translation of the Grimms tale, written by Edgar Taylor in 1823, has the Queen choke on her own envy upon the sight of Snow White alive. The Queens origins can be traced to the character of Silver-Tree, according to Kenny Klein, the enchantress Ceridwen of the Welsh mythology was the quintissential evil stepmother, the origin of that character in the two tales of Snow White and Cinderella
4.
Library of Congress
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The Library of Congress is the research library that officially serves the United States Congress and is the de facto national library of the United States. It is the oldest federal cultural institution in the United States, the Library is housed in three buildings on Capitol Hill in Washington, D. C. it also maintains the Packard Campus in Culpeper, Virginia, which houses the National Audio-Visual Conservation Center. The Library of Congress claims to be the largest library in the world and its collections are universal, not limited by subject, format, or national boundary, and include research materials from all parts of the world and in more than 450 languages. Two-thirds of the books it acquires each year are in other than English. The Library of Congress moved to Washington in 1800, after sitting for years in the temporary national capitals of New York. John J. Beckley, who became the first Librarian of Congress, was two dollars per day and was required to also serve as the Clerk of the House of Representatives. The small Congressional Library was housed in the United States Capitol for most of the 19th century until the early 1890s, most of the original collection had been destroyed by the British in 1814, during the War of 1812. To restore its collection in 1815, the bought from former president Thomas Jefferson his entire personal collection of 6,487 books. After a period of growth, another fire struck the Library in its Capitol chambers in 1851, again destroying a large amount of the collection. The Library received the right of transference of all copyrighted works to have two copies deposited of books, maps, illustrations and diagrams printed in the United States. It also began to build its collections of British and other European works and it included several stories built underground of steel and cast iron stacks. Although the Library is open to the public, only high-ranking government officials may check out books, the Library promotes literacy and American literature through projects such as the American Folklife Center, American Memory, Center for the Book, and Poet Laureate. James Madison is credited with the idea for creating a congressional library, part of the legislation appropriated $5,000 for the purchase of such books as may be necessary for the use of Congress. And for fitting up an apartment for containing them. Books were ordered from London and the collection, consisting of 740 books and 3 maps, was housed in the new Capitol, as president, Thomas Jefferson played an important role in establishing the structure of the Library of Congress. The new law also extended to the president and vice president the ability to borrow books and these volumes had been left in the Senate wing of the Capitol. One of the only congressional volumes to have survived was a government account book of receipts and it was taken as a souvenir by a British Commander whose family later returned it to the United States government in 1940. Within a month, former president Jefferson offered to sell his library as a replacement
5.
National Film Registry
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The National Film Registry is the United States National Film Preservation Boards selection of films for preservation in the Library of Congress. The NFPB, established by the National Film Preservation Act of 1988, was reauthorized by acts of Congress in 1992,1996,2005, and again in October 2008. The NFPBs mission, to which the NFR contributes, is to ensure the survival, conservation, the 1996 law also created the non-profit National Film Preservation Foundation which, although affiliated with the NFPB, raises money from the private sector. To be eligible for inclusion, a film must be at least ten years old, for the first selection in 1989, the public nominated almost 1,000 films for consideration. Members of the NFPB then developed individual ballots of possible films for inclusion, the ballots were tabulated into a list of 25 films which was then modified by Librarian of Congress James H. Billington and his staff at the Library for the final selection. Since 1997, members of the public have been able to nominate up to 50 films a year for the NFPB, the NFR includes films ranging from Hollywood classics to orphan films. A film is not required to be feature-length, nor is it required to have been released in the traditional sense. As of the 2016 listing, there are 700 films preserved in the Registry, currently, the earliest listed film is Newark Athlete, and the most recent is 13 Lakes. Counting the 11 multi-year serials in the NFR once each by year of completion, the years with the most films selected are 1928,1939, the time between a films debut and its selection varies greatly. The longest span is 119 years, Newark Athlete was originally released in 1891, the shortest span is the minimum 10 years, this distinction is shared by Raging Bull, Do the Right Thing, Goodfellas, Toy Story, Fargo and 13 Lakes. For purposes of this list, multi-year serials are counted once by year of completion
6.
Snow White
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Snow White is a fictional character and a main character from Walt Disney Productions first animated feature film Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. The character of Snow White was derived from a tale known from many countries in Europe. Snow White is the first Disney Princess and the first fictional character with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Snow White first appears in the film Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, after many years, the Queens Magic Mirror confirms Snow White as being the fairest of them all, which causes the Queen to cast Snow White out and send a huntsman to kill her. But when he refuses to do so because she means no harm, Snow White stumbles upon the home of the Seven Dwarfs, who happily aid her. When the dwarfs are away the hag arrives at the cottage and offers Snow White the poisoned apple. Snow White bites into the apple and falls into a coma, the dwarfs discovering what had happened track down the Queen, a short fight ensues and the Queen is killed. Believing her dead too, the build a open grave for Snow White to rest on. Time passes and the Prince comes across Snow White, saddened by her apparent death, he kisses her, causing her to awaken. As the Seven Dwarfs dance with joy, Snow White and the Prince go off to live together, Snow White is a princess, and the fairest in the land. She is described by her stepmothers Magic Mirror as having hair as black as ebony, lips as red as the rose and her voice is also the inspiration for that of Minerva Mink in Animaniacs. Along with yellow shoes, a red cape, and a red bow in her hair, Snow White is innocent, kind, gentle, sweet, and cheerful. Her generous, trusting and helpful nature can cause her trouble, as people might take advantage of it, such as her vain. Although she is sensitive and soft-spoken, she can be energetic and stern, Snow White is motherly, compassionate and delights in keeping house for the lovable Seven Dwarfs while she waits to meet her beloved prince again. With her kindness and ethereal beauty, Snow White charms every creature in the kingdom except the Queen and she also shows great resilience and an inner strength against adversity. Animators initial sketches for Snow Whites character, some of which bore a resemblance to Betty Boop, did not meet Walt Disneys expectations, as they were too cartoonish. This was a challenge Luske and co-animator Les Clark had previously asked to explore while developing the character of Persephone for the Silly Symphonies animated short The Goddess of Spring. Of that project, Les Clark later remarked, Im sure Walt was thinking ahead to Snow White, Snow White and the Queen were refined by Grim Natwick and Norm Ferguson, who would often override Walt Disneys instructions
7.
Internet Archive
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The Internet Archive is a San Francisco–based nonprofit digital library with the stated mission of universal access to all knowledge. As of October 2016, its collection topped 15 petabytes, in addition to its archiving function, the Archive is an activist organization, advocating for a free and open Internet. Its web archive, the Wayback Machine, contains over 150 billion web captures, the Archive also oversees one of the worlds largest book digitization projects. Founded by Brewster Kahle in May 1996, the Archive is a 501 nonprofit operating in the United States. It has a budget of $10 million, derived from a variety of sources, revenue from its Web crawling services, various partnerships, grants, donations. Its headquarters are in San Francisco, California, where about 30 of its 200 employees work, Most of its staff work in its book-scanning centers. The Archive has data centers in three Californian cities, San Francisco, Redwood City, and Richmond, the Archive is a member of the International Internet Preservation Consortium and was officially designated as a library by the State of California in 2007. Brewster Kahle founded the Archive in 1996 at around the time that he began the for-profit web crawling company Alexa Internet. In October 1996, the Internet Archive had begun to archive and preserve the World Wide Web in large quantities, the archived content wasnt available to the general public until 2001, when it developed the Wayback Machine. In late 1999, the Archive expanded its collections beyond the Web archive, Now the Internet Archive includes texts, audio, moving images, and software. It hosts a number of projects, the NASA Images Archive, the contract crawling service Archive-It. According to its web site, Most societies place importance on preserving artifacts of their culture, without such artifacts, civilization has no memory and no mechanism to learn from its successes and failures. Our culture now produces more and more artifacts in digital form, the Archives mission is to help preserve those artifacts and create an Internet library for researchers, historians, and scholars. In August 2012, the Archive announced that it has added BitTorrent to its file download options for over 1.3 million existing files, on November 6,2013, the Internet Archives headquarters in San Franciscos Richmond District caught fire, destroying equipment and damaging some nearby apartments. The nonprofit Archive sought donations to cover the estimated $600,000 in damage, in November 2016, Kahle announced that the Internet Archive was building the Internet Archive of Canada, a copy of the archive to be based somewhere in the country of Canada. The announcement received widespread coverage due to the implication that the decision to build an archive in a foreign country was because of the upcoming presidency of Donald Trump. Kahle was quoted as saying that on November 9th in America and it was a firm reminder that institutions like ours, built for the long-term, need to design for change. For us, it means keeping our cultural materials safe, private and it means preparing for a Web that may face greater restrictions
8.
Brothers Grimm
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Their first collection of folk tales, Childrens and Household Tales, was published in 1812. The brothers spent their formative years in the German town of Hanau and their fathers death in 1796 caused great poverty for the family and affected the brothers for many years after. They both attended the University of Marburg where they developed a curiosity about German folklore, which grew into a dedication to collecting German folk tales. The rise of romanticism during the 19th century revived interest in folk stories. With the goal of researching a scholarly treatise on folk tales, between 1812 and 1857, their first collection was revised and republished many times, growing from 86 stories to more than 200. The popularity of the Grimms best folk tales has endured well, Jacob Ludwig Carl Grimm was born on 4 January 1785 and his brother Wilhelm Carl Grimm on 24 February 1786. They were the second- and third-eldest surviving siblings in a family of nine children, in 1791, the family moved to the countryside town of Steinau, when Philipp was employed there as district magistrate. The family became prominent members of the community, residing in a home surrounded by fields. Biographer Jack Zipes writes that the brothers were happy in Steinau, the children were educated at home by private tutors, receiving strict instruction as Lutherans that instilled in both a lifelong religious faith. In 1796, Philipp Grimm died of pneumonia, plunging his family into poverty, Dorothea depended on financial support from her father and sister, first lady-in-waiting at the court of William I, Elector of Hesse. Jacob was the eldest living son, and he was forced at age 11 to assume adult responsibilities for the two years. The two boys adhered to the advice of their grandfather, who continually exhorted them to be industrious, the brothers left Steinau and their family in 1798 to attend the Friedrichsgymnasium in Kassel, which had been arranged and paid for by their aunt. By then, they were without a provider, forcing them to rely entirely on each other. The two brothers differed in temperament, Jacob was introspective and Wilhelm was outgoing, sharing a strong work ethic, they excelled in their studies. In Kassel, they became aware of their inferior social status relative to high-born students who received more attention. Still, each brother graduated at the head of his class, Jacob in 1803, after graduation from the Friedrichsgymnasium, the brothers attended the University of Marburg. The university was small with about 200 students and there they became aware that students of lower social status were not treated equally. They were disqualified from admission because of their standing and had to request dispensation to study law
9.
Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937 film)
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Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs is a 1937 American animated musical fantasy film produced by Walt Disney Productions and originally released by RKO Radio Pictures. Based on the German fairy tale by the Brothers Grimm, it is the first full-length cel animated feature film and the earliest Disney animated feature film. The story was adapted by storyboard artists Dorothy Ann Blank, Richard Creedon, Merrill De Maris, Otto Englander, Earl Hurd, Dick Rickard, Ted Sears and Webb Smith. David Hand was the director, while William Cottrell, Wilfred Jackson, Larry Morey, Perce Pearce. Snow White premiered at the Carthay Circle Theatre on December 21,1937 and it was a critical and commercial success, and with international earnings of $8 million during its initial release briefly assumed the record of highest-grossing sound film at the time. The popularity of the film has led to it being re-released theatrically many times, adjusted for inflation, it is one of the top ten performers at the North American box office. At the 11th Academy Awards, Walt Disney was awarded an honorary Oscar, Disneys take on the fairy tale has had a significant cultural impact, resulting in popular theme park attractions, a video game, and a Broadway musical. Snow White is a princess living with her stepmother, a vain. The Queen fears that Snow Whites beauty surpasses her own, so she forces Snow White to work as a scullery maid, for several years the mirror always answered that the Queen was, pleasing her. One day, the Magic Mirror informs the Queen that Snow White is now the fairest in the land, the jealous Queen orders her Huntsman to take Snow White into the forest and kill her. She further demands that the return with Snow Whites heart in a jeweled box as proof of the deed. However, the Huntsman cannot bring himself to kill Snow White and he tearfully begs for her forgiveness, revealing the Queen wants her dead and urges her to flee into the woods and never look back. Lost and frightened, the princess is befriended by woodland creatures who lead her to a deep in the woods. Finding seven small chairs in the dining room, Snow White assumes the cottage is the untidy home of seven orphaned children. In reality, the cottage belongs to seven adult dwarfs, named Doc, Grumpy, Happy, Sleepy, Bashful, Sneezy, and Dopey, returning home, they are alarmed to find their cottage clean and suspect that an intruder has invaded their home. The dwarfs find Snow White upstairs, asleep across three of their beds, Snow White awakes to find the dwarfs at her bedside and introduces herself, and all of the dwarfs eventually welcome her into their home after they learn she can cook and clean beautifully. Snow White keeps house for the dwarfs while they mine for jewels during the day, the Queen goes to the cottage while the dwarfs are away, but the animals are wary of her and rush off to find the dwarfs. Faking a potential attack, the Queen tricks Snow White bringing her into the cottage to rest
10.
Cab Calloway
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Cabell Cab Calloway III was an American jazz singer and bandleader. He was strongly associated with the Cotton Club in Harlem, New York City, Calloway was a master of energetic scat singing and led one of the United States most popular big bands from the start of the 1930s to the late 1940s. Calloway continued to perform until his death in 1994 at the age of 86, Calloway was born in Rochester, New York, on Christmas Day in 1907 to an upper-middle-class family. His mother, Martha Eulalia Reed, was a Morgan State College graduate, teacher and his father, Cabell Calloway, Jr. graduated from Lincoln University of Pennsylvania in 1898, and worked as a lawyer and in real estate. Cab Calloway grew up as an adolescent in a household in West Baltimores Sugar Hill, considered the political, cultural. Early on, his parents recognized their sons talent. He continued to study music and voice throughout his formal schooling, despite his parents and teachers disapproval of jazz, Calloway began frequenting and performing in many of Baltimores nightclubs. As a result, he came into contact with many of the local jazz luminaries of the time and he counted among his early mentors drummer Chick Webb and pianist Johnny Jones. After his graduation from Frederick Douglass High School, Calloway joined his sister, Blanche, in a touring production of the popular Black musical revue. His parents had hopes of their son becoming an attorney following after his father, at the Sunset Café, Cab cut his teeth as an understudy for singer Adelaide Hall. Here he met and performed with Louis Armstrong, who taught him to sing in the scat style and he eventually left school to sing with a band called the Alabamians. In 1930 Calloway took over a brilliant, but failing band called The Missourians, later on, they renamed it Cab Calloway, the Cotton Club in New Yorks Harlem was the premier jazz venue in the country. In 1931 Calloway and his orchestra were hired as a replacement for the Duke Ellington Orchestra while it was touring, Calloway quickly proved so popular that his band became the co-house band with Ellingtons, and his group began touring nationwide when not playing the Cotton Club. Their popularity was enhanced by the twice-weekly live national radio broadcasts on NBC from the Cotton Club. Calloway also appeared on Walter Winchells radio program and with Bing Crosby in his show at New Yorks Paramount Theatre, as a result of these appearances, Calloway, together with Ellington, broke the major broadcast network color barrier. Many of his records were vocal specialties with Calloways vocal taking up the majority of the record, in 1931 Calloway recorded his most famous song, Minnie the Moocher. Through rotoscoping, Calloway performed voiceover for these cartoons, but his dance steps were the basis of the characters movements and he took advantage of this, timing concerts in some communities to coincide with the release of the films in order to make the most of the publicity. As a result of the success of Minnie the Moocher, Calloway became identified with its chorus and he also performed in the 1930s in a series of short films for Paramount
11.
Public domain
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The term public domain has two senses of meaning. Anything published is out in the domain in the sense that it is available to the public. Once published, news and information in books is in the public domain, in the sense of intellectual property, works in the public domain are those whose exclusive intellectual property rights have expired, have been forfeited, or are inapplicable. Examples for works not covered by copyright which are therefore in the domain, are the formulae of Newtonian physics, cooking recipes. Examples for works actively dedicated into public domain by their authors are reference implementations of algorithms, NIHs ImageJ. The term is not normally applied to situations where the creator of a work retains residual rights, as rights are country-based and vary, a work may be subject to rights in one country and be in the public domain in another. Some rights depend on registrations on a basis, and the absence of registration in a particular country, if required. Although the term public domain did not come into use until the mid-18th century, the Romans had a large proprietary rights system where they defined many things that cannot be privately owned as res nullius, res communes, res publicae and res universitatis. The term res nullius was defined as not yet appropriated. The term res communes was defined as things that could be enjoyed by mankind, such as air, sunlight. The term res publicae referred to things that were shared by all citizens, when the first early copyright law was first established in Britain with the Statute of Anne in 1710, public domain did not appear. However, similar concepts were developed by British and French jurists in the eighteenth century, instead of public domain they used terms such as publici juris or propriété publique to describe works that were not covered by copyright law. The phrase fall in the domain can be traced to mid-nineteenth century France to describe the end of copyright term. In this historical context Paul Torremans describes copyright as a coral reef of private right jutting up from the ocean of the public domain. Because copyright law is different from country to country, Pamela Samuelson has described the public domain as being different sizes at different times in different countries. According to James Boyle this definition underlines common usage of the public domain and equates the public domain to public property. However, the usage of the public domain can be more granular. Such a definition regards work in copyright as private property subject to fair use rights, the materials that compose our cultural heritage must be free for all living to use no less than matter necessary for biological survival
12.
Coal Black and de Sebben Dwarfs
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The film is an all-black parody of the Brothers Grimm fairy tale Snow White, known to its audience from the popular 1937 Walt Disney animated feature Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. The stylistic portrayal of the characters is an example of darky iconography, as such, it is one of the most controversial cartoons in the classic Warner Brothers library, being one of the Censored Eleven. The cartoon has rarely seen on television, and has never been officially released on home video. The short has been cited as one of the best cartoons ever made, in part for its African-American-inspired jazz and swing music, in this version of the story, all of the characters are African American, and speak all of their dialogue in rhyme. The story is set during World War II in the United States, several scenes unique to Disneys film version of Snow White, such as the wishing-well sequence, the forest full of staring eyes, and the awakening kiss, are directly parodied in this film. Clampett intended Coal Black as both a parody of Snow White and a dedication to the jazz musical films popular in the early 1940s. In fact, the idea to produce Coal Black came to Clampett after he saw Duke Ellingtons 1941 musical revue Jump for Joy, and Ellington, the main character, So White, is voiced by Vivian Dandridge, sister of actress Dorothy Dandridge. Leo Watson is the voice of Prince Chawmin, the other characters, including the Sebben Dwarfs, are voiced by standard Warner Bros. voice artist Mel Blanc. However, Schlesinger refused, and the black band Clampett had hired, Eddie Beals and His Orchestra, the rest of the film was scored, as was standard for Warner Bros. cartoons, by Carl W. Stalling. Coal Black opens in front of a fireplace with a silhouette of a large woman holding a young child in her lap. The little black girl asks her mammy to tell her the story of So White an de Sebben Dwarfs, mammy begins, Well, once there was a mean ol queen. And she lived in a gorgeous castle, and was that ole gal rich. She was just as rich as she was mean, the rich, Wicked Queen then appears, depicted as a food hoarder, with a large repository of items that were on ration during World War II, rubber, sugar, gin and more. Finding So White hard at work doing the laundry, the prince takes her hand, the queen sees this and hires Murder, Incorporated to black-out So White. The assassins arrive in a truck that advertises, We rub out anybody for $1.00, Midgets, 1/2-price, Japs. The assassins kidnap the girl, but after several unseen favors which make the would-be assassins very happy, just before they drive off, the assassins are seen covered with So Whites lipstick, an innuendo as to exactly how she earned her freedom. Meanwhile, the queen has learned that So White is still alive, several worms escape the apple as the queen injects it with poison, one carrying a sign that says Refoogies. The queen disguises herself as an old woman, and arrives at the Sebben Dwarfs camp
Media related to Snow White (1933 film) at Wikimedia Commons
