Ye Olden Days

A Walt Disney MICKEY MOUSE Cartoon.

In YE OLDEN DAYS, medieval minstrel Mickey tries to rescue Princess Minnie from marrying a foolish, dimwitted Prince.

This is an excellent old black & white cartoon and features fine animation, action & plenty of humor. As the Prince, Goofy appears in his early - and blessedly brief - Dippy Dawg incarnation. A feisty Clarabelle Cow plays Minnie's lady-in-waiting. Walt Disney provides Mickey's squeaky voice.

Walt Disney (1901-1966) was always intrigued by drawings. As a lad in Marceline, Missouri, he sketched farm animals on scraps of paper; later, as an ambulance driver in France during the First World War, he drew figures on the sides of his vehicle. Back in Kansas City, along with artist Ub Iwerks, Walt developed a primitive animation studio that provided animated commercials and tiny cartoons for the local movie theaters. Always the innovator, his ALICE IN CARTOONLAND series broke ground in placing a live figure in a cartoon universe. Business reversals sent Disney & Iwerks to Hollywood in 1923, where Walt's older brother Roy became his lifelong business manager & counselor. When a mildly successful series with Oswald The Lucky Rabbit was snatched away by the distributor, the character of Mickey Mouse sprung into Walt's imagination, ensuring Disney's immortality. The happy arrival of sound technology made Mickey's screen debut, STEAMBOAT WILLIE (1928), a tremendous audience success with its use of synchronized music. The SILLY SYMPHONIES soon appeared, and Walt's growing crew of marvelously talented animators were quickly conquering new territory with full color, illusions of depth and radical advancements in personality development, an arena in which Walt's genius was unbeatable. Mickey's feisty, naughty behavior had captured millions of fans, but he was soon to be joined by other animated companions: temperamental Donald Duck, intellectually-challenged Goofy and energetic Pluto. All this was in preparation for Walt's grandest dream - feature length animated films. Against a blizzard of doomsayers, Walt persevered and over the next decades delighted children of all ages with the adventures of Snow White, Pinocchio, Dumbo, Bambi & Peter Pan. Walt never forgot that his fortunes were all started by a mouse, or that simplicity of message and lots of hard work always pay off.

This Disney cartoon is a treat for buffs: it's a clever mini-musical with a fast-moving plot, good "production values," and cute gags, made when the enormous popularity of Mickey Mouse was reaching the level of a worldwide phenomenon. Walt's animators were really hitting their stride by the early '30s, and were continually developing new techniques and promptly improving them. In the best Mickey entries, and even in the routine ones, the filmmakers achieve a level of finesse that is pleasurable to experience, in and of itself. These shorts still look great, even after all the decades of technological advances that have taken animation to new realms. Ye Olden Days may not be the funniest or most dazzling cartoon from this rich period, but it wins the day on sheer charm.

The opening credits set the tone: we're in the age of Ivanhoe, and the familiar Disney characters are all playing roles in a Medieval pageant. "Ye Caste" includes Mickey Mouse in the lead as "Ye Wandering Minstrel," Minnie is "Ye Princess," etc. It's also notable that Goofy hasn't yet evolved into the character we know; here he's playing a Prince and is billed as Dippy Dawg, the name for his earliest incarnation. As it turns out he's Mickey's nemesis and rival for Minnie's hand—which would be unthinkable later on, once his persona was fully established. Minnie's father, "Ye Olde Kinge," is a large furry creature who seems villainous at first, in part because he resembles Peg Leg Pete. In the opening scene it's established in fairy tale style that the King has decreed his daughter must marry a Prince from a neighboring kingdom this very day. Unfortunately, the Prince is a fool and the Princess refuses to follow her father's wishes. So the King has his daughter locked in a jail cell in the tower, along with her lady-in-waiting (a nice character role for Clarabelle Cow). Mickey the wandering minstrel shows up riding his humble mule at this juncture, and immediately sets about to rescue the Princess.

In this film Mickey is endowed with almost magical powers, suggestive of Felix the Cat. For instance, once he reaches the castle he effortlessly shinnies up a tree alongside the tower, pausing only long enough to serenade Minnie and win her heart. That accomplished, Mickey steps onto a branch which bends down and then swings slowly upward, sending him smoothly through Minnie's window. It's like he's flying. Things like this only happen in our dreams, or in the movies. Complications set in when Mickey attempts to spirit the Princess away and is caught, and nearly guillotined. Soon he must fight a duel with the Prince, and this event is celebrated with a peppy song. It wasn't until I saw this cartoon a second time that I caught all the lyrics: "We're gonna have a duel, we're gonna have a duel/Which ever one survives the slaughter, wins the hand of my fair daughter!" That's a little surprising for a Disney cartoon, and so is a quick sight gag towards the end, involving a portrait of a horse. But this was still the early '30s; the Production Code wasn't being enforced yet, and filmmakers could get away with things that would be red-penciled a year or two later, even in cartoons.

In any case, Mickey and Goofy (or "Dippy") engage in spirited combat with lances, while their steeds duke it out with their hooves. It's quite a rousing finale, even if we're pretty sure that Mickey is ultimately going to prevail, and when the fight is over another cute gag wraps up the show. Anyone who wants to know why Mickey was a folk hero in the 1930s should give Ye Olden Days a look. There's a reason the Disney studio became such a powerhouse: these films made a lot of people happy at a desperate time, and in the best ones the magic still works.

I saw this short on the Disney Channel a while back and it's pretty good. In the short, Mickey Mouse is a medieval minstral riding his donkey. He comes to a castle and sings to princess Minnie who is being forced to marry Prince Goofy. Goofy looked a lot differnt than he does today. He had a little bit of a beard on his chin and he would laugh like he was autistic or something instead of his normal "Yuh-Huck" type of laugh. He had a doglike tail (of course Goofy is a dog, but a human-like dog not a dog like Pluto) As Mickey helps Princess Minnie escape, the king notices and orders the guards to behead Mickey in a guillotine. Minnie stops the guards and after a "goofy" battle, Minnie chooses to marry Mickey.

In this a somewhat mediocre and less funny cartoon that is set in medieval times, where the King offers his daughter, Minnie, to wed Goofy, a dippy prince. When Minnie refuses, the King locks her up in the tower. Afterward, Mickey, a wandering minstrel, sees this and comes to her rescue.

It's kind of odd seeing Goofy as the villain in this cartoon - quite out of character for him. But, that is actually the most interesting part of the cartoon. The battle between Mickey and Goofy toward the end was also unique to see, I mean, Mickey and Goofy on opposing sides doing battle? The rest is just the usual Minnie saves Minnie cliché with lesser excitement.

Grade C-

This 1933 B&W cartoon is notable for the fact that it was made before the character 'Goofy' was known as 'Goofy'. He was called 'Dippy Dawg'. The opening scene containing a scroll listing the character,'The Prince' as 'Dippy Dawg'. That is the reason for the appearance of a tail, as noted by a prior reviewer. Goofy is not the only Disney character who underwent a metamorphosis, and it is interesting to compare the older characters with the ones that evolved, in this case 'Goofy'/'Dippy Dawg'.