. . . delayed the creation of Michael Jackson's "Beat It" by at least half a century. Some clown named Leon Schlesinger decided that Music Video fans would go Gaga if he began his five-minute productions with two or three Artsy Fartsy minutes of random construction paper conglomerations (looking like they were fashioned by his young grandchildren in a DISAPPOINTMENTS ROOM) being passed behind crude fractured geometric cut-outs as they hang from dental floss, as a weird instrumental version of his Blue Light Special Sheet Music drones in the background being played One Finger Charlie on an organ. Worse yet, Old Leon passed over thousands of talented performers capable of meting out a "Beat It"--or something better--to feature Opera Phantom, Jr. (aka, Milton Charles, "The Singing Organist"). Young Milt seems to be a shirt-tail cousin in the ADDAMS FAMILY, and his crooning of CRYING FOR THE CAROLINES would fit right in at a mortuary, since it's a funeral dirge if there ever was one ("The birdies have gone bye-bye--they don't come around any more" and "Where is the girl that I used to meet down where the pale moon shines?"--you just can't make this stuff up!). Old Schlesinger wisely ordered all the evidence that his disastrous "Spooney Melodies" Music Video Line ever existed to be Burned, Buried, Deep-Sixed, and otherwise Destroyed. Unfortunately, Milt's Maiden Voyage on Crying Caroline proved more fire resistant than asbestos, since Satan has it on his Redhot Playlist in one of Hell's Lower Circles.

Leon Schlesinger will forever be remembered as the penny-pinching producer of many wonderful Looney Tunes & Merrie Melodies cartoons at the Warner Brothers studio. He also produced an apparently limited series of live-action shorts known as Spooney Melodies, and "Crying for the Carolines" is believed to be the only surviving one. In it, Milton Charles, "The Singing Organist", performs the title song, which to me is quite beautiful, while we see a cavalcade of hypnotizing, swirling images of music notes, tall buildings, ships, trees, stars, moons, and such.Usually when I write film commentaries for the Internet Movie Database, I describe certain scenes that are highlights, that are funny, that are interesting, or that otherwise stand out in some fashion, but with "Crying for the Carolines", I cannot really do so. I do, however, enjoy how the tempo increases to a more jazzy beat during the last minute or so of this short.You can find "Crying for the Carolines" along with some other interesting bonus material on the Looney Tunes Golden Collection Volume 6 Disc 3.

The opening credits of this Vitaphone short suggest that we're about to see a cartoon of some sort: the text is set within a gently spinning, Art Deco sunburst, but the apparent clincher comes when we're told this is a "Spooney Melody" from the studio of Leon Schlesinger, the man who went on to produce scores of Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies in later years. As it happens, Crying for the Carolines isn't exactly an animated film in the conventional sense, but rather a musical short illustrated with semi-abstract imagery combined with live action. The images we see were probably manipulated by hand, enhanced at times with rudimentary camera tricks, but however the effects were accomplished the resulting six-minute short is imaginative and intriguing.The title tune came from Spring is Here, a screen adaptation of a Rodgers & Hart Broadway show. This particular song was written by other tune-smiths specifically for the movie, and tells a tale of a young man from the South lured to the big city—presumably New York—who becomes disillusioned with urban life and feels desperately homesick for his birthplace and the girl he left behind. It's a bluesy lament with a haunting melody, performed in this short by a gent named Milton Charles who sings in a reedy voice, and accompanies himself on an impressive looking organ with multiple keyboards. (I don't know if Mr. Charles is playing a "mighty Wurlitzer," but whatever his instrument was it's a fascinating thing to see.) At times the visuals suggest the images found in the Fleischer Studio's Bouncing Ball cartoons, i.e. literal depictions of the situations described in the lyrics, but for the most part the imagery here is free-form and dreamlike, and not tied specifically to the song. The big city is suggested by a jagged skyline, circular swirls of auto traffic and stylized silhouettes of cops. Expressionistic stars glide past overhead, but so does a ghostly galleon never mentioned in the song. The mysterious ship, whose mainsail is decorated with musical notes, is a recurring motif. The cityscape stands in contrast with idyllic rural images: woods, a country lane, and a modest farmhouse seen under the rise of a full moon. Perhaps the most striking image is a close-up of singing organist Milton Charles at his keyboard, looking very clean-cut and proper, crooning earnestly into the camera surrounded by the kind of kaleidoscopic visuals we associate with the psychedelic music videos of a much later day.The products of the Vitaphone Corporation are a treasure trove, and it's always a pleasure to discover an off-beat novelty short made with flair; Crying for the Carolines is one of those unexpected cinematic treats.

At first glance, "Cryin' for the Carolines" isn't much. Barely a minute long, it features some guy named Milton Charles singing about the Carolines (whoever they were). What should make our eyes open is that this is the first of the Spooney Melodies cartoons, which were the precursors of the Merrie Melodies (hence, the Looney Tunes).So, even if there's nothing really to catch the attention of 20-ish people in the 21st century, it's good knowing that this short movie indirectly led to Bugs, Daffy, Porky, Elmer, etc. Leon Schlesinger had a good eye and ear for some things (to the point where he appeared as himself in the Porky/Daffy short "You Ought to Be in Pictures"). Worth seeing as a historical reference.