"Puss in Boots" is a black-and-white cartoon from 1922 and it runs for 10 minutes almost. This one will have its 95th anniversary next year and then it is also not that long until the 100th anniversary. The title here already says what this silent film is about, namely the Brothers Grimm tale about the Puss in Boots, but honestly, I really struggled during the watch of this little movie in seeing any connections at all to the version I know about the story. The animation is solid for 1922, but obviously still far far away from Disney's best works. To me, this film looks a bit like cheap promotion with the known title here as I felt it really had very little to do and I doubt the Brothers Grimm would have liked it. I know I didn't. The only thing I can say in its favor is that Disney was only around the age of 20 when he made this one and for that it is a bearable achievement. I cannot recommend the watch at all though. Thumbs down.

Walt Disney's first foray into animated cartoons began in 1922 with his Laugh-O-Grams Studio. While "Puss in Boots" isn't his first cartoon, it's among his very first. However, when you watch it there are two things to keep in mind. First, despite the title, this really isn't the fairy tale of "Puss in Boots". Disney often used titles of such stories as a GENERAL starting point but diverged from the stories quite a bit. Here, it's practically nothing like the old story. Second, although the cartoon seems rather naive, for 1922 it was quite good compared to other animated toons. Plus, they ALL were relatively crudely drawn, were in black & white and were silent.As far as the story goes, there really isn't a lot of story. A young man is hanging out with the Princess. When the King notices, he tosses the guy and his poor kitty down the steps--out of the palace (leading to the best gag in the short--involving the cat and his 9 lives). Eventually, to impress the girl and her father, the cat concocts an idea involving a bullfight. As I said, it really has nothing to do with the story! Overall, a slightly better than average cartoon for its time. And, unlike later cartoons, these ones actually were animated, at least in part, by Walt himself--something he'd soon abandon in order to move more to the production and administration sides of animation.

Just discovered this early Walt Disney pre-Mickey Mouse Laugh-O-Grams cartoon on Cartoon Brew as linked from Matinée At The Bijou which linked it to YouTube. It's a modern day-in-the-'20s retelling with the cars and of-the-period clothing plus a matinée showing of the latest Rudolf Vaselino flick. With the King not allowing the commoner young man or his female cat to see his daughter or the cat chauffeur James, young Puss tries to get her master to get her boots to impress James but to no avail until after the movie when she gets him to buy them as exchange for telling him what to do to impress the King. Since the picture was about bullfighting, that's what the young man tries to do...While a little primitive with comic strip balloons to tell us what the characters are saying since this is silent, even this early in his career Disney provides quite a few visual gags that keep this entertaining to the present day. My favorite comes when the inter-title says "Time flies by" while clocks with wings float on screen! Also, when the King gets shocked, his coat flies off! Well worth seeing for vintage cartoon fans, particularly those of Walt Disney.

Walt Disney was barely 21 years old and still working out of Kansas City when he and his earliest cohorts in animation produced this cartoon. Puss in Boots, made for Disney's first company, Newman Laugh-O-Gram, is a slangy update of the old fairy tale, complete with jazzy topical references to flappers, radio, and Rudolph Valentino. (Rudy is parodied in a brief burlesque of his recently released bullfighting saga Blood and Sand, a movie-within-the-movie entitled "Throwing the Bull.") The characters in this silent film converse in dialog balloons, as they would in a comic strip. And along the same lines, when these folks are startled their hats dance in the air, or little lines fly out of their heads-- it's like the Sunday funnies come to life.The story is simple. A boy who is a commoner is in love with a Princess, but naturally her father the King objects. However, the boy's cat comes up with a plan to make him a famous bullfighter, and therefore an acceptable suitor. Lots of cute gags along the way boost the entertainment value of this very early effort beyond what a plot synopsis might suggest. Character movement is a bit jerky at times, but the backgrounds are surprisingly elaborate, rather more detailed than those found in Disney's later 'Alice in Cartoonland' series or in the early Mickey Mouse cartoons. It's especially impressive that these young filmmakers would take on the challenge of animating such a large crowd of spectators packing into the arena for the climactic bullfight. Even this early, Disney wasn't one to play it safe or cut corners. Puss in Boots is charming and funny, an early, inauspicious effort by a young man whose subsequent career would have an impact on popular culture he never could have imagined.