Bone Sweet Bone (1948) User Reviews

Definitely a kids cartoon

[lukeneedssand · 7/10 · 28 June 2021]

I recently found this Cartoon on HBO max, and while it has its flaws, It's largely a pretty good cartoon, that will entertain kids of a younger age for sure. The war of the Dogs is probably the highlight, but a Archaeologist character is not something we get very often in cartoons, so I admire adding some new ideas onto the table.

This cartoon is Funny at least, but Not laugh-out-loud funny. The Animation is Substandard, and Shep's character isn't fleshed out very often, but thats okay, Because this cartoon is pretty good, regardless of some minor problems.

All in all, Not a bad cartoon certainly, but doesn't stand out to me in particular.

7.5/10 at least.

Shep's bone trouble

[TheLittleSongbird · 7/10 · 1 February 2018]

Love animation, it was a big part of my life as a child, particularly Disney, Looney Tunes and Tom and Jerry, and still love it whether it's film, television or cartoons.

Arthur Davis may not have been one of the all-time greats when it came to animation directors, and he was in the shadow of a stiff competition of animation directors (won't name them right now because that wouldn't be fair on Davis) with more distinctive and imaginative styles. He was nonetheless a competent director with enough solid cartoons under his belt. 'Bone Sweet Bone' is another one of his solid cartoons without being a great one.

As was said for Davis' 'The Rattled Rooster' (nothing to do with Foghorn Leghorn), the story in 'Bone Sweet Bone' is pretty unoriginal and slight in story. it's handled amusingly and paced well but there is an over-familiarity too much of the time for anybody familiar with the not so novel concept.

Some of the content could have done with more variety. It's not repetitive, there is a general freshness and again it's amusing, but again over-familiarity creeps in.

However, the animation is excellent. Beautifully drawn, very detailed and the colours are vibrant, complete with some great expressions and Davis' distinctive style of the characters moving from foreground to background.

Carl Stalling's music score is typically lushly and cleverly orchestrated, with lively and energetic rhythms, it's also beautifully synchronised with the action and gestures/expressions and even enhances the impact.

Although not hilarious, 'Bone Sweet Bone' amuses and entertains with some nice wit and good timing. The characters may not have much distinct personality or enough to have made them bigger or even stars but they were engaging and not hard to like, especially the bulldog, and the conflict is fun. The ever versatile Mel Blanc's voice acting is stellar.

Overall, quite good fun though won't blow anybody away. 7/10 Bethany Cox

History reveals that BONE SWEET BONE is a seminal work of American Art . . .

[oscaralbert · 8/10 · 28 October 2017]

. . . serving as sort of a Rosetta Stone from Warner Bros. Movie Studio to many of the travails facing We Americans of the 21st Century. The main character of BONE SWEET BONE is a small dog named "Shep," based on the Evil Killer of Kentucky songwriter Red Foley's Real Life Best Friend, a German Shepherd who answered to "Hoover." As BONE SWEET BONE shows, to anyone with the least familiarity with the science of interpreting Looney Tunes (aka, "Warnology"), this whistle-blowing animated short documents a teenage Fred Trump (portrayed by the small white dog called "Shep" here) making a secret trip to Kentucky to be officially installed as the Ku Klux Klan Boy Wizard in charge of New York City's Bronx Zone. Young master Trump took offense that the family dog of his Kentucky hosts--Hoover--was named after a Repug Party politico, so he poisoned it to death on Nov. 11, 1918. (You can verify all of these True Facts on Wikipedia.) The Looney Tuners depict Hoover as a bull dog pushing up daisies when last seen in BONE SWEET BONE. This brief cartoon then ends with "Shep" speaking to the camera (for the first time), and doing some very Un-Dog-Like motions. Coupled with the specifics of Shep's foray into the so-called Bluegrass State, all the key elements comprising the formation of Today's Trump\Kushner International Money-Laundering Crime Cartel are deftly predicted during the course of BONE SWEET BONE. (Warner cleverly disguised this cartoon for its contemporary audiences as a spoof of RKO Studio's 1938 feature film with Cary Grant and Katharine Hepburn--BRINGING UP BABY--so that prints would survive until such time--i.e., Today--that the Truth could be told.)

Shep's not a great character but the jokes are solid fare

[bob the moo · 27 February 2004]

A palaeontologist is putting together a dinosaur from the basic bones, despite his dog Shep's habit of trying to eat the bones. When the final vertebra is missing and a bulldog is seen leaving the area with a bone, Shep's owner sends him off to recover the bone - a task that is actually not as easy as he maybe thought.

Cartoon characters trying to get past or get something from a massive bulldog is not a new plot device but it is generally still pretty funny. Here the plot sees a small dog trying to get a big bone from a big dog, with all the usual obstacles. It may not be startlingly imaginative but it is still pretty funny; the jokes are the usual fare but they have a fresh feel with a bit of imagination.

The character of the bulldog does what it always does, which is to just be big, imposing and mean; he does just what he is expected to do. Shep is a weak little character who doesn't really succeed even though he has some nice little traits. He does the work well though and is pretty funny to watch.

Overall this short is not really anything new or imaginative but it is still quite funny and worth watching as it does have it's own style despite borrowing jokes from numerous other shorts.

Warner's answer to Pluto

[Chip_douglas · 29 February 2004]

At the Museum of Natural History a archaeologist (who by the looks of him simply has to be related to Elmer Fudd) is putting the skeleton of a brontosaurus together. Missing a piece of the vertebra, his dog Shep is the obvious suspect. But the bone that Shep just buried has already been dug up and nicked by a big bulldog, so Shep has to find a way to get it back from him. A moment later the curator finds the missing bone in his pocket, but decides to let his pet go after that dangerous big bully anyway.

This cartoon has the same basic plot as most of Pluto's cartoons over at Disney, but as usual the Warner characters get up to a lot more crazy stuff. Shep proves himself to be a master of stealth, knows how to walk the tightrope and is also an accomplished mine-worker (complete with pick ax and helmet). The bulldog on the other hand is a jock who enjoys rugby, bowling, baseball and basketball. In all of these sports, Shep is used as the ball. When Shep lands near a construction site, he decides to make a booby trap bone.

Finally back at the museum , Shep has to mime the whole story all over again only to find out all his troubles were for naught. This affects him so much that he does another thing Pluto would never do: he starts to speak.

6 out of 10