Classic Bugs Bunny short directed by Chuck Jones from a story by Michael Maltese. This one tells of Bugs' efforts to get a little penguin home to the South Pole. The journey involves hobos, cannibals, crocodiles, Humphrey Bogart, and more. The animation is crisp and attractive with some great action. Love the colors. The music is exciting and fits the action well. The voice work is phenomenal. In addition to the incomparable Mel Blanc, here we have the talents of impressionist Dave Barry doing a perfect Bogart (he had previously voiced Bogart in 1947's Slick Hare). It's a hilarious short with an adorable character that doesn't get in the way of the laughs, as sometimes happened when Looney Tunes got too cute. The Bogart caricature, for me, is the highlight. Love those scenes.

. . . or however many dozen of the Bugs Bunny "Merrie Melodies" cartoon shorts have been locked up in vaults for decades because what was agreed to be "funny" by the majority of Americans in the 1930s, 1940s, and 1950s has been Blacklisted by the cultural elite as being incompatible with free speech today. Very few people now alive, therefore, have seen EVERY "Merrie Melodie" ever released. In order to decide for yourself what you should have access to watch, you either need to be about 100 years old (which theoretically would enable you to have seen each of these censored cartoons during their initial release; let's hope that you're not one of the 90% of your age group suffering from Old People's Disease) or you must be a "researcher" belonging to the cultural elite, in which case you probably can even read the stuff locked away from Tom Hanks in THE DA VINCI CODE movie. Still, it's hard to fathom WHY the Black hobo in the boxcar willing to murder anyone for fried chicken and the gibbering South American tribesmen gyrating in circles did not put 8 BALL BUNNY behind the proverbial Eight Ball on the cultural elites' S--- List.

I like this cartoon a lot. Much of it is probably due to just how gosh darn cute the penguin is who co-stars in the cartoon! Bugs is minding his own business asleep at home when a tiny penguin comes falling into his hole. The penguin missed his truck when the show he was in folded and Bugs feels sorry enough for him he vows to help bring him home. They go across the globe getting into some awful scrapes in order to get the little guy home. At one point, they have to fight off hobos who want to eat the penguin ("they taste practically like chickens"), headhunters and being shipwrecked! Finally, they make it to the South Pole, at which point the penguin gives Bugs a copy of a newspaper clipping indicating he was born in Hoboken, NJ!

If you're a bird lover like me, that is. Otherwise, he's pretty cute, but kind of ditzy. A professional ice skater, this little bird is accidentally left behind when the Ice Frolicks leave town, and he appeals to Bugs to help him find his way "home". Unfortunately, Bugs' only source of info is an encyclopedia and he assumes that this little pen-guin is from The South Pole.The two endure many misadventures, running into Humprey Bogart several times along the way!!! The tears that turn into ice cubes really get to me. I don't know why, it's only a cartoon...but they do. The same little bird starred in the earlier BB cartoon, "Frigid Hare".