Three Blind Mouseketeers (1936) User Reviews

Road Runner and Wile E. Coyote's possible inspiration

[lee_eisenberg · 5/10 · 6 January 2014]

"Three Blind Mouseketeers" comes across as a possible inspiration for the Road Runner-Wile E. Coyote cartoons, as the cat sets traps for the mice, who avoid them without realizing that they're in danger. Since I always preferred the Looney Tunes to any of the Disney stuff, I have to go with Wile E. Nonetheless, I did like that end sequence. In the end, the best version of "The Three Musketeers" is the 1973 and 1974 back-to-back movies directed by Richard Lester (they were planned for a few years earlier and Lester was planning to cast the Beatles, but that fell through and he assembled a different cast).

Anyway, this one's OK as entertainment. A piece of trivia is that Pinto Colvig, who did one of the voices, is best known as Goofy's voice.

Why would you have blind swordsmen in the first place?!

[planktonrules · 6/10 · 17 January 2014]

Not surprisingly, "Three Blind Mouseketeers" finds three blind mice dressed up like Musketeers. Now this begs the question 'Who would want blind musketeers in the first place?!' as well as 'What qualifications did these mice think they needed to be expert swordsmen?!'. Perhaps they'd listened to a few Zatoichi films--all I know is that the premise is bizarre to say the least.

Eventually, a nasty cat arrives and plans on eating the Mouseketeers. Now this SHOULD have been incredibly easy. Yet, somehow, these little guys manage to outsmart the cat--mostly because the cat is an idiot. After all, blind rodents shouldn't pose much of a challenge.

Like any Disney short of this era, the animation is superb. The story is decent but not a lot more. Worth seeing but certainly not among Disney's best at the time.

The incipient Disney MegaCorp decides to malign . . .

[pixrox1 · 6/10 · 5 October 2017]

. . . the visually impaired throughout this brief cartoon, THREE BLIND MOUSEKETEERS. One-eyed "Captain Cat" fancies himself to be some sort of Pirate King in the Land of the Blind, Lording it over a trio of totally sightless rodents. However, Disney portrays this White Cane Crowd as devious kleptomaniacs, swift to scarf up anything of value that's not nailed down. As the Front Line of Household Defense, Captain Cat proves to be an ineffectual malingerer, sleeping on the job. (Though the Homeowner is not shown in this fairly uninspired rendering of an ancient feud often done far better by Warner Bros.' Looney Tunes with Sylvester Cat versus Speedy Gonzalez, one can assume that this feckless feline soon will be fed to the dogs). Captain Cat is anthropomorphic enough to cry out for a peg leg (along the lines of L.J. Silver), but lacks the charisma of even Jim Hawkin's salt pork barrel hideout. Disney appears to be informing viewers that having a fly in your soup is better than being forced to down a full serving of its Crape De Mousse. Who could argue with that?

Some Good Stuff Here

[Michael_Elliott · 27 June 2015]

Three Blind Mouseketeers (1936)

*** (out of 4)

The title characters - three blind mice - are hated by a large cat who plans to capture them no matter what it takes. The cat comes up with some very clever traps but will the mice be able to avoid them while at the same time taking the cheese? The traps used in this Disney short were decades ahead of the SAW series that's for certain. With that said, this here is certainly an entertaining short but I think it falls well short of being a classic. Still, there is some great stuff here including the music score, which really pumps you up as you watch the film. Another major plus are the four characters as the three mice are certainly likable and the cat is such a good villain that you love to hate him. I think the first portion of the short works best as we see the mice trying to steal the cheese.

Silly Symphonies short gives Dumas the Disney treatment...

[Doylenf · 6/10 · 30 March 2008]

THE THREE MOUSKETEERS gives a cartoon spin to the Alexander Dumas tale of "all for one" as they have to use their combative skills with sword and derring-do to defeat a fat cat bent on their destruction. "My traps are set in every room, those cats are munchin' to their doom." Predictably, the mousketeers outmaneuver the traps either by remarkable luck or skill (or both) and the sleeping cat (who dreams about victory) is soon awakened by the rather boisterous musketeers as they congratulate each other on escaping his booby traps.

The rest of the cartoon is strictly a series of cat-and-mouse chases with the mice winning at every turn. The scene where one of them is hiding under a teacup is reminiscent of the later gag used for Lucifer in Disney's full-length "Cinderella".

Nothing really extraordinary here, although it's clear to see that the animation techniques were undergoing vast improvement by 1936.

Someone asked, "Why would the visually disabled . . . "

[cricket30 · 7/10 · 19 October 2021]

" . . . Be so keen on fencing?" I couldn't agree more with this gent's bewilderment. Swords tend to be fairly sharp, especially when their safety is off, which seems to be the case for the title trio's weapons throughout this picture. The evidence for the keenness of their blades is augmented several times, when they utilize their rapiers to slice and dice various objects. Surely it is far more practical for those with failing vision to avail themselves of firearms, as opposed to unwieldy sabers, scimitars, daggers and whatnot. A shooting iron is generally effective clear across a room. (If your roommates do not believe this--and your hearing is sound--why not load up a beebee gun or .22, close your eyes or wear a blindfold, and then challenge any skeptic to sneak past you unscathed.) No sightless person wants to rely on a blade in the close quarters needed for it to be effective against a skilled antagonist. So after watching this cartoon, do not forget to support your local chapter of BANGS (Broke Americans Need Gun Stamps).

Dangermice

[CuriosityKilledShawn · 5/10 · 7 February 2015]

If you've seen any random Tom and Jerry short then you've already seen everything that Three Blind Mouseketeers has to offer. The titular trio invade cabin or pantry of sorts patrolled by Captain Katt (who looks a lot like a beagle boy) that has laid a series of traps for said mice to blindly (pun intended) walk into. However chance is on their side and they bumble harmlessly through the room, much to the irritation of the cat.

Forgettable mayhem ensues, which inevitably leads to Katt stumbling through his own traps and hurting himself. Once this cartoon is over I doubt you'll ever think about it again.

All for one and one for all!

[TheLittleSongbird · 10/10 · 18 September 2009]

True it is predictable, but this is so entertaining that I don't care. The music is terrific, the characters are at least likable- although Captain Katt is evil, there are times when you do feel sorry for him. The silly symphony is beautifully drawn, with excellent character animation and nice backgrounds. There are some truly hilarious bits, my favourite bit has always been the one when Captain Katt is looking for the mousketeers under the three bowls. Considering when it was made, this is an enormously entertaining and beautifully done silly symphony. It is not the best one out there, but it is well worth watching for entertainment value.

All for one, and one for all! 10/10 Bethany Cox

Boring, predictable, unremarkable - one of the worst Silly Symphonies.

[OllieSuave-007 · 1/10 · 15 June 2018]

This is a predictable, boring, and annoying cartoon starring three blind mouseketeers, who attempt to banish a cat from its quarters.

There's really nothing in this cartoon short that we haven't seen before. But, there is virtually no humor, unfunny slapstick stuff, unexciting scenes, and unremarkable characters. These three mice were not memorable and sang this really, really annoying song throughout the cartoon short. Their shouts of "one and one for all" were very cheesy.

Overall, this is clearly one of the worst Silly Symphonies.

Grade F

Old school Disney short!

[the amorphousmachine · 16 October 2005]

Not really much to spoil. Old school Disney short revolving around three blind Mouseketeers, who walk into Captain Cat's many booby traps, but somehow come out on top, and outsmart that wily fat cat. For 1936, it's as much fun as a short can be, and it certainly entertains! The animation is great for its time, and I wouldn't have picked it for being in the 30s. More like the 40s, or at least, that was my initial impression. Enjoyable! There is not much more I can say about this short animated piece, other than I watched it via 'The Rescuers' DVD, so if you are interested in old school Disney shorts, it's worth a look.

***1/2 out of *****

Very cute, beautifully drawn and animated and a lot of fun to watch!

[llltdesq · 8/10 · 1 January 2007]

This cartoon, with a very basic and not very significant plot, is loads of fun and very nice to look at. Because I do want to touch on the short to some degree, there are mild spoilers:

The title basically says it all-the protagonists are the Three Blind Mouseketeers and they are "all for one and one for all" when it comes to finding cheese. Captain Katt (think of "Pegleg" Pete done up as a cat) has sworn that, tonight, he's finally going to trap and destroy the Three Blind Mouseketeers, so he sets traps everywhere, hides inside a split barrel-and promptly falls asleep.

The Mouseketeers, in the meantime, through fortuitous circumstances, manage to repeatedly slip through and around the traps with nary a scratch on them, many of the gags being excellently timed animation, frequently timed to the beat. There's one particularly nice bit of animation, where one of the mice becomes isolated from the others and Captain Katt is coming toward him when he starts yelling to his comrades as though he's surrounded by an army, which in a sense, he is-he's standing in front of a great many pieces of reflective glass, each of which has a tiny mouse dressed astonishingly like him and brandishing a sword. Captain Katt is overwhelmed and turns to run. Add in a large quantity of exploding corks from bottles and Captain Katt is once again routed by the Three Blind Mouseketeers.

This short is available on the Disney Treasures More Silly Symphonies DVD release and it and the set are recommended.

Disney Spoofs Dumas

[Ron Oliver · 10/10 · 22 August 2000]

A Walt Disney SILLY SYMPHONY Cartoon Short.

The THREE BLIND MOUSEKETEERS set about getting their cheesy meal, despite the best efforts of villainous Captain Katt to destroy them.

An enjoyable, though unremarkable, spoof of swashbuckling movies. Disney would revive the term `Mouseketeer' two decades later for use in the Mickey Mouse Club TV show. Katt seems to owe a lot to the personality of character actor Noah Beery; and is that Walt vocalizing the skinny mouse?

The SILLY SYMPHONIES, which Walt Disney produced for a ten year period beginning in 1929, are among the most interesting of series in the field of animation. Unlike the Mickey Mouse cartoons in which action was paramount, with the Symphonies the action was made to fit the music. There was little plot in the early Symphonies, which featured lively inanimate objects and anthropomorphic plants & animals, all moving frantically to the soundtrack. Gradually, however, the Symphonies became the school where Walt's animators learned to work with color and began to experiment with plot, characterization & photographic special effects. The pages of Fable & Fairy Tale, Myth & Mother Goose were all mined to provide story lines and even Hollywood's musicals & celebrities were effectively spoofed. It was from this rich soil that Disney's feature-length animation was to spring. In 1939, with SNOW WHITE successfully behind him and PINOCCHIO & FANTASIA on the near horizon, Walt phased out the SILLY SYMPHONIES; they had run their course & served their purpose.