Jumping Beans (1922)

User Rating:

7.6/10   

Director:

Dave Fleischer

Release Date:

15 December 1922 (USA)

Genre:

Animation | Comedy | Short

Plot:

Koko the Clown plants a jumping bean that becomes a beanstalk. Later, he creates duplicates of himself and attacks his creator.

Plot Keywords:

Clown | Koko The Clown | Jumping Bean | Giant | Drawing

Country:

USA

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.33 : 1

Sound Mix:

Silent

Company:

Out of the Inkwell Films

Quotes:

[first lines]
Koko the Clown: Hey, where am I?

Movie Connections:

Follows The Challenge (1922/I)

The Fleischer Brothers Must Have Stunned Their Audiences

This is a long cartoon: almost 11 minutes, which can seem longer when there is absolute silence including sound-effects noises. However, because it's Max Fleischer and his animated "invention," "Koko The Clown," there is usually enough entertaining material to keep to interested.

I never cease to marvel at the ingenuity of these old silent cartoons. Fleischer, and his brother Dave, who directed these cartoons, must have simply stunned the movie audiences back in the early '20s with this material. Some 85 years later, I think it holds up well, except for the lack of sound.

The Fleischer's mixed real-life characters (usually himself) with the animated Koko and you'd see some unique results. For instance, after throwing Mexican jumping beans on the canvas and having Koko go crazy trying to catch them, Max gets an eye dropper and puts a few drops of water on the drawing board. Suddenly, a huge bean stalk starts growing and growing, and growing right out of the canvas to the sky and Koko starts climbing it. It's really clever stuff with a few signs that are still funny today as the clown climbs into outer space past various planets. This is pretty wild material.

What's unusual, even for a totally silent animated effort like this, is that you don't get a title card or comic-strip bubble until after five minutes. In other words: no written dialog of any kind until then. In all, there were only three or four of them so there is almost entirely silent visuals. Yet the sights are so bizarre it hooks you in, wondering what crazy thing you'll see next.

Without giving away too much, suffice to say it ends with a "Gulliver's Travels" twist.

Kudos to the people who produced the "Popeye The Sailor Man Volume One DVD set for including these wonderful classic cartoons. This one can be seen on disc three from the "From the vault" extra features.