Winsor McCay, the Famous Cartoonist of the N.Y. Herald and His Moving Comics (1911)

Directors:

Winsor McCay
J. Stuart Blackton

Writers:

Winsor McCay (comic strip "Little Nemo in Slumberland")
Winsor McCay (screenplay)

Release Date:

8 April 1911 (USA)

Genre:

Short | Animation | Documentary

Plot:

Cartoon figures announce, via comic strip balloons, that they will move - and move they do, in a wildly exaggerated style.

Plot Keywords:

State In Title | Artist | Surrealism | Animator | Based On Comic

Cast

John Bunny
Winsor McCay	...	Himself
George McManus

Also Known As:

Little Nemo (USA) (alternative title)
Winsor McCay
Winsor McCay Explains His Moving Cartoons to John Bunny
Winsor McCay Makes His Cartoons Move
Winsor McCay and His Animated Comics (UK)

Runtime:

7 min | 10 min (16 fps)

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Black and White | Color (hand-colored) | Black and White (tinted) (some sequences)

Aspect Ratio:

1.33 : 1

Sound Mix:

Silent | Silent

Company:

Vitagraph Company of America

Trivia:

Released as a split reel along with the documentary Bob Sledding (1911).

Movie Connections:

Version of Little Nemo: The Dream Master (1990) (VG)

Breathtaking...

Suddenly seeing Little Nemo and his friends from Slumberland come alive took my breath away and almost brought a tear to my eye. This is pure cinematic magic: ingenuous, fantastic, and charming. Like peeping into a world of harmless ghosts and fairies.

As someone else has pointed out in this forum, the action of LITTLE NEMO unfolds unrestricted by narrative conventions. Nemo and Flip stretch as if they're waking, and for a viewer today, that's where the marvel is. Nemo wakes in 1911 into the world of moving, hand drawn pictures and, after so many years of neglect, he wakes, again, for us.

Well, I could just go on for days expressing my enchantment with this jewel from the past.

Musidora