8mm Forum: SUNSHINE MAKERS!! (Van Buren) Super 8 C/S

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Posted by Osi Osgood (Member # 424) on July 05, 2008, 05:51 PM:

Why do I list the obvious, about this being Super 8, on an 8mm forum?!

Because, with all my inquiries and rabbit trails I have been on, I never really thought that I would find a print of this beloved cartoon on Super 8, and now, it does in fact exist, as I have just aquired a copy and am happy to do a review of this film!

This cartoon was done by an almost unknown (in this day and age) cartoon company entitled "Van Buren", which only survived from 1928-1936. Thier only other claims to fame were thier other "Rainbow Parade" cartoons, three which starred the silent animation star "Felix the Cat" and the Toonerville Trolley cartoons, (Oh, and Molly Moo Cow, which wasn't anything to write home about).

Then, they did a cartoon which would make them truly remembered; a one shot cartoon entitled, "Sunshine Makers".
This cartoon was directed by Ted Ashbaugh, a good director and co-directed by the great 1930's director, Burt Gillett.

It should be noted that the cartoon was not created for "Borden" foods, but they recieved the the extra "ommph" to get it into theaters through Bordens sponsorship of the cartoon. Borden liked the idea of the happy Gnomes bottling sunshine, (which looked exactly like Milk, which made Borden happy), and since it advertised "milk", it could be called one of the very first "adverts", though you see no actual Borden product.

The story is as follows ...

At the break of dawn, the Gnomes get up, so that they can head up the hill to greet the sun with worship, (and, strangely enough, do thier calistenics), before going off to the factory, where they harness the power of the sun and make "Sunshine" milk, which they bottle and do thier rounds and deliver, with the happy Gnome singing his "sunshine" song.

One of the Gloomies spies on the Happy delivery man and taking bow and arrow into hand, shoots off the Gnomes hat.

This means war!!

The Happy Gnome sends a bottle of milk over and it hits the Gloomie on the back. The milk shines and glows brightly, the gloomie runs in horror.

We now enter the world of the Gloomies, a dark and almost monotone enviromment. The gloomies prowl about (in formation)
singing ...

"Were happy, when we're, sad,
We're always, feeling, bad ...
How are Ya?
Terrible!
That's Grand!
We're Happy, when we're, sad ... "

The gloomies are scared into thier homes by the light of joy shining from the gloomies back. He's not even welcome in any of thier houses, (they draw the blinds). He has no choice but to take his coat off and bury it!

He then goes to the town square and hits the gong, which rallies all the gloomies to war. They get thier spray devices, fill them with mist from a depressing bog and, in formation, (a wonderful little bit of animation) march out to attack the "Happies".

The Happies have had a sentry on guard for them and he signals the happy troops to battle. They are soon lobbing
"happy bombs" onto the gloomies left and right, turning them into happy laughing joyful people (with glowing stomachs showing thier skeltons). They try to counteract the happy toxin, but to no avail.

They are even bombed out of thier homes with happy milk. In fact, the whole gloomy countryside, trees, birds, EVERYTHING is turned happy, as the Happies are now "saturation bombing" the gloomies whole territory by air, (all to very happy music, Frickin EGAD!).

In one of the most memorable moments of this cartoon, one of the last gloomies remaining is about to be dunked in the milk of kindness when he proclaims sadly but honestly ...

" I don't want to be happy ... I want to be sad! "

... before being forcibly dunked in Sunshine Milk, now responding with ...

" I want to be happy, I want to be gay! I want to be happy and gay!! "

The cartoon ends with all the gloomies transformed, glowing skeltons ablaze. Cartoon ends with a "Borden:The End"
title card.

There are a lot of interpretations to this cartoon. Some have even called it "socialistic dogma" and a little disturbing,
considering that the gloomies are forcibly transformed. Others that I have read, have stated that they think the moral of the cartoon is that, no matter how one protests, everybody would really rather be be happy and need the help to be so. Whatever the opinion, this is one of the most pure examples of good vs. evil that I have ever seen.

There is not a false moment to this cartoon, every scene is needed. Another wonderful thing about the cartoon is just how fully realized this cartoon is. Both territories, the happies and the Gloomies, are completely realized (right down to morning excercises), with thier own flora and fauna and color scheme. The Happies world is lovely and colorful; the gloomies is dark (different shades of blue) and almost monotone, even down to territorial animals.
The Happies world expresses life and purpose, the gloomies world represents a preoccupation with emptiness.

I have never seen a cartoon (besides "balloonland/Pincusionman" which I have also reviewed, by the way, on this forum) that has such good fantasy elements and in fact, I feel is the perfect example of the genre, which was almost all but unique to 1930's cartoons.

Now onto the print quaility.

Color ...

I am extremely HAPPY to say that this cartoon has better color than I have ever seen for this film! I have seen myriads of copies on DVD,Laserdisc and VHS, and none have come up to this. The latest DVD copy that I have, (one of the better ones) for a comparison :

DVD : Tree's do not have perfect green and a very imperfect brown to the trunk.

Super 8 : Tree's have almost perfect green to foilage and spot on browns for the trunk.

Very important to me, as I had at first felt that this must have been a two strip technicolor print, (as you would not get a perfect spectrum of color), but this has the full range.

But only so much color. Why? Because the title card says, very clearly, "Processed in "Cinecolor", which means that this was NEVER Technicolor, it was always Cinecolor, and while Cinecolor could look quite good, (as in the case of the many Ub Iwerks Color cartoons), it would never be Technicolor.

In fact, the "Cinecolor" makes absolutely perfect sense, as I had always noted a slight "sandwiching" problem between the color layers matching, (which is also evident on the Ub Iwerks Cinecolor cartoons.)

I have to say that this film appears to have the very slightest fade, but this may also be due to not perfect black to begin with. There is another scene when the Gnomes are heading up a hill where there is foilage and flowers that actually have color, where in the DVD print, alsmost appear to be non-existent.

I suspect that perhaps those who made the DVD source material, may have used a filter to try to restore color to a print that was very pinked. Either that, or the print they used was just badly faded with the 70 plus years since it originally came out.

The film stock is Eastman, but must be the better Eastnman, (not L.P.P.) as the colors are still very vibrant, just no perfect blacks.

Sharpness

This print has a slightly off sharpness, but I think that this may be due to the early "Cinecolor" process, as it seems that there is almost a slight seperation of the color layers, which you usually associate with cinecolor. The sharpness is actually quite good, and matches the DVD though, (it must be said that the DVD copy was taken from a badly degraded film trasfer).

Contrast

This is another revelation to this print! The DVD print is slightly overexposed, especially when we see the Happies land. On the Super 8 print, the Happies land is not quite as over-exposed and the colors come out much better. Super 8 outshines the DVD once again!

SOUND

A loud mono, which also surprises, as the sound on the DVD is loaded with background noise, and this Super 8 is much better; however, the sound distorts, so sometimes in the future, i may attempt to find a pristine soundtrack and redo this.

There was only one flaw I found to the print, but it's not the manufacturers fault. There is a slight, coming and going green scratch off the far right hand side, but no other scratches, just that one. Too bad about that.

NOW ... THE REALLY IRRITATING THING!!!

There is absolutely nothing on the print or the original box that says anything about what Super 8 company manufactured this print. The film has the full leader, and all it says is "Sunshine Makers", that's it. The box says nothing more than ... you guessed it ...

"Sunshine Makers".

So I have absolutely NO idea as to who made this print, but I am heartfully thankful to have it! I had thought that it would be a Derann print, but it's in a faded, plain, browonish white box with "Sunshine Makers" stamped on the side.

One last note concerning this print. having compared it to the print on DVD, I noted that a good deal of the image is cut off on the DVD. A good example is when the Gnomes are doing thier exercises in front of the sun. On the DVD (and all copies I have seen on DVD, which may mean they may just be pirated from the same source material). On the DVD, we see fully three Gnomes, with one Gnome on either side of the three cut in half, while on the Super 8mm print, we see ALL five Gnomes completely. That gives an idea as to how much is cut off. I have heard that with each dupe of a print, the image can TEND to come in closer, losing more of the full image.

I also noted that the print used for the DVD had a lot of surface dirt and white specks throughout. This Super 8 copy is incredibly free from almost any specking; perhaps a little evidence to the negative being of earlier and more pristine generation?

So, my Holy Grail Super 8 print is found. This cartoon meant so much to me that I actually replaced the reel it came on and used a standard 8mm reel from 1935, the year that it originally came out! (my Super 8 projector takes either Super 8 or standard 8mm reels)

I heartfully encourage you to seek it out for yourself, as you will not be disappointed.

Pardon my long windedness on this review, but you must understand, this has always been a long lusted after title for me!

LONG LIVE SUPER 8MM!!!!

[ July 06, 2008, 06:24 PM: Message edited by: Osi Osgood ]

Posted by James N. Savage 3 (Member # 83) on July 11, 2008, 05:50 AM:

Great review Osi! That sounds like a great find.

There were a couple of companies in the U.S. that released obscure cartoons like this one. One was FEF films, the other one was STEVE VILARINO FILMS. I'm thinking it may have been the later, since SVF never marked the leader on their films.

James.

Posted by Osi Osgood (Member # 424) on July 11, 2008, 10:38 AM:

James, does this fine fellow, (the second one mentioned) still exist among us? I'd love to write and find out, just to solve this wonderful mystery!

Posted by James N. Savage 3 (Member # 83) on July 11, 2008, 03:02 PM:

Mr. Vilarino seemed to have disappeared around 1999-2000. He had a very extensive list, but was not easy to do business with. I've often wondered about what happened to all of his film negatives. He had some really neat stuff.

James.

Posted by Osi Osgood (Member # 424) on July 11, 2008, 08:17 PM:

That's a shame, James. I reiterate that the color on this print, whether Steve's or someone elses, is better than what you'll find on video, honestly! I must admit, i really wasn't expecting the color to be anything special, and I was pleasantly surprised.

Now, onto trying to find, "The Fresh Vegetable Mystery" (Fleischer studio's)

Posted by Patrick Walsh (Member # 637) on July 14, 2008, 10:05 PM:

I have this in 16mm and the colors are great and still hold up well after all these years.
there is a certain look about this cartoon that makes it standout from the rest.

Posted by Osi Osgood (Member # 424) on July 16, 2008, 08:45 PM:

I agree Patrick.

While Van Buren did a number of interesting cartoons, none were really standouts until this "Sunshine Makers". It's the kind of cartoon that makes any number of writers come up with all kind of theories about the "ultimate meaning" behind the cartoon, (as many have done with Chuck Jones: "One Froggy Evening", when Chuck Just said, "It's about a Frog and greed") ...

While I'm sure that Burt Gillett and company, as they worked on this, just found it to be a cute cartoon.

"We're happy, when were, sad!"

(Never can get that out of my head)

Posted by Panayotis A. Carayannis (Member # 1220) on November 25, 2008, 04:34 PM:

Jim Savage ,(and others)
Steve Villarino was OK with me.While he sold legitimate films from Morcraft (Thunderbird),Perry's,Steel Valley and others ,he was basically a pirate.I bought too many cartoons from him ,years before Derann issued many of them officially, and several features,very few of which I have seen in second hand lists ever since.He was reliable in his dealings,waiting patiently my paying in installments,and taking back faulty prints.I dealt with him from about 1980 to 1986 when a severe economic slump forced me to stop buying for a time and told him to stop sending me his lists.I have kept most of them (hand written in the beginning,then ,typewritten).

UBB.classic^TM 6.3.1.2