Scrub Me Mama with a Boogie Beat

Ordinarilly, cartoons from this vintage that contain these minstrel-show derived caricatures don't really offend me that much, as all the studios at that time did them (Fleisher, Warner, heck, Van Beuren even had an "Amos 'n' Andy" series)...But "Scrub Me Mama With a Boogie Beat"...

That one hurt.

I've never, in all my life, seen a film which literally REVELS in its xenophobia...all the men are depicted as sub-human apes with black animal-type noses and huge, floppy lips (or, more accurately, a simianesque muzzle), and the women are variations of the old "Mammy" stereotype (with the exception of the High-yalla Sista from Harlem and the trio of shapely washerwomen with the see-thru skirts...one of the few good things about this cartoon.) The only true positive in this cartoon (aside from the shapely washerwomen triplets) is Darrell Calker's driving musical score, proving once and for all the adage about music and the "savage" breast. The instrumental portion of the film alone makes up for its hurtful images...but not by much.

Walter Lantz has often said that his musical films "never offended or degraded the (sic) colored race", and, indeed, most of the films he produced following this one (particularly "Boogie-Woogie Bugel Boy of Company B") are pretty decent in terms of music and character design (no better or worse than Warner's concurrent "Coal Black and de Sebben Drawfs"), but "Scrub me Mama With A Boogie Beat" undermines its vibrant musicality (and, admittedly, its very funny gags...the cat and dog sequence is a hoot!) with its hateful and hurtful depictions of African Americans.

Created by the same artist who brought us Woody Woodpecker, this short film is something that has given us a lot to talk about due to the mentality that was had in the past about the African-American community. What can be saved a lot is the fluid animation and the great song, both being the most positive thing that this short film offers like many others of the time. The bad thing lies in the character design for obvious reasons. What is reflected is a caricature of many elements that used to be associated with African Americans. For those years it was normal, but as the decades passed, people realized the kind of image that was being portrayed. Some will think that this is something that should disappear, but this short film in the end serves as a record of the mentality that society had in the past to prevent something like this from happening again. Sometimes it is necessary for this type of ancient material to continue to exist so that in the future people see the erroneous view that society had of the past and not repeat it. Deleting this type of material will not improve things tomorrow and that is why today there are not so many restrictions with many works that were questionable at the time. Society and culture has evolved over time and sometimes it is necessary to know the background to make better updates. Scrub Me Mama With A Boogie Beat is not an entirely good short film in a symbolic sense, but it can be enjoyed as a piece of music. My final rating for this short film is a 4/10.

Scrub Me Mama with a Boogie Beat (1941)

*** (out of 4)

Welcome to Lazy Town, home of various lazy black people who sit around sleeping and drawing flies all day or if they do work they work so slowly that nothing gets done. All of this is about to change when a sexy, big breasted woman from Harlem shows up to teach everyone what rhythm is. As you can tell, there's certainly a reason this cartoon, from the same man who would later bring us Woody Woodpecker, has been taken out of circulation. Once again it's rather shocking at how over the top this thing is in its stereotypes of black people. A lot of movies from this era feature negative portraits of black but this thing here is just so incredibly over the top that it comes off rather shocking. We have big lips, watermelon and that's just the start. The one thing that stuck out to me, like Warner's Coal Black and De Sebbin Dwarfs, is the sexuality behind the main female character. She's constantly swinging herself in a sexual way and her breasts are always shaking. Due to the Hayes Code this type of sexuality was never seen except in these racial shorts. What makes this film worth watching outside the history lesson is the music, which is downright terrific. The movie is certainly going back to the swinging jazz of the 20's and makes it worth watching.

Scrub Me Mama With a Boogie Beat has enough redeeming merits that stop it from being terrible or unwatchable, but it is actually very easy to see why many object to it and find it difficult to defend.

Getting onto the good things, the best thing about Scrub Me Mama With a Boogie Beat(and most other Lantz cartoons) is the music which throughout is fantastic, it's so lively and catchy and there isn't one second in the cartoon where you're not tapping your feet or trying to sing along. Also much enjoyable was most of the animation, the backgrounds are smooth-looking and rich in detail while the colours are warm and vivid. Especially good in this regard was the opening with the lush colours, the vivid setting and the way the camera moved. One character engaged and that was the lady reminiscent of Lena Horne, a very sexy and charming character. The cat and dog sequence was hilariously brilliant and there were a few other amusing touches. The voice characterisations are right on point, Mel Blanc voices the most characters but Vivian Dandridge is the real star, she brings such big sultry personality to her singing.

On the other hand, none of the other characters are engaging and are just shallow stereotypes. Stereotypes are not always a bad thing but when they're clichés or done in a negative fashion, like the stereotypes here are, it is. It was a huge turn-off and brought down the cartoon, for all its fine qualities, by quite some degree. It is not just the way they're drawn, which to put it politely is hideously exaggerated(i.e. the big lips) but also, and more so, the way they look, act and are portrayed as lazy and lethargic. It was cartoon racism at its worst and because the funny moments came in spades rather than consistently it was not so easy to excuse it. Speaking as a white person but knows plenty of African-Americans, things like with the pigs tails and watermelons were distastefully offensive. Sure it may have been of the time and Lantz probably did have no intention of offending anybody, but taking that into account and also that the cartoon caused controversy at the time as well when the stereotypes are exaggerated this much that's when it becomes harder to defend. As said previously Scrub Me Mama with a Boogie Beat had some funny moments but despite the lively pace and such the laughs didn't come consistently, and the character designs apart from the lady are done in a rather ugly way, which was a shame after seeing so much care for the rest of the animation.

All in all, didn't really work personally but at the same cannot bring myself to hate it with such vehemence as others have done. Because there were a lot of fine qualities and one big thing that brought things down significantly, so it rates a 5/10, a rating usually meaning average but there have been times where I've used it for stuff "difficult to rate" and that was the case with Scrub Me Mama with a Boogie Beat. Bethany Cox

Very! This was the most offensive cartoon short I have ever viewed. Nearly every racial stereotype of Blacks described by Donald Bogle (Uncle Tom, Mammy, Coon, Pickaninny and High Yellow Vixen) were characterized here. It's disgusting that anyone would take the time to animate such boarish and unattractive caricatures of people.