Mickey's Good Deed (also called Mickey's Lucky Break and Mickey Plays Santa in certain home media releases)[citation needed] is a 1932 animated short film produced by Walt Disney Productions and released by United Artists. Set during the Christmas season and the contemporary Great Depression, the cartoon centers on Mickey's act of charity to bring Christmas to a poor family. The film was directed by Burt Gillett and features the voices of Walt Disney as Mickey and Pinto Colvig as Pluto.[1] It was the 50th Mickey Mouse short, and the 14th of that year.[3]
| Mickey's Good Deed | |
|---|---|
 Theatrical release poster | |
| Directed by | Burt Gillett |
| Produced by | Walt Disney |
| Starring | Pinto Colvig Walt Disney Marcellite Garner |
| Music by | Bert Lewis |
| Animation by | Johnny Cannon Les Clark Frenchy Detremaudan Norm Ferguson Clyde Geronimi Hardie Gramatky Dick Lundy Tom Palmer Ben Sharpsteen[1] |
| Color process | Black-and-white |
Production company | |
| Distributed by | United Artists |
Release date |
|
Running time | 8 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
Mickey's Good Deed is the first "Mickey Mouse" titled cartoon to develop with RCA's Photophone synchronized early-in-film sound system.
Mickey's Good Deed was Mickey's second Christmas themed film after Mickey's Orphans (1931).
Plot
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At the start of the cartoon, special effects of falling snow were visible during the opening title sequence.
Mickey Mouse appears as a street performer playing "O Come, All Ye Faithful" on a cello while Pluto howls along. Several people appear to throw coins in Mickey's collection cup and Mickey wishes them a merry Christmas. But when Mickey goes to buy food, he discovers to his dismay that his cup is full of nails, nuts, and bolts.
Eventually, Mickey comes to the home of a rich pig family and begins to play his cello outside. Inside the home, a spoiled pig boy named Adelbert keeps refusing different toys that his father and butler show him. Adelbert then throws a tantrum after seeing Pluto outside, demanding that he wants him. On the father's orders, the butler goes outside and persistently offers Mickey money for Pluto, but Mickey refuses. While running away, Mickey drops his cello and a horse-drawn sleigh runs it over destroying it. The apparently oblivious party in the sleigh call out a cheerful "Merry Christmas!" to Mickey and Pluto.
Mickey and Pluto later come across the home of a poor cat family. A mother sits at the table crying and Mickey and Pluto see from a picture that the father is in jail and she has no money for food or toys. Emotionally moved by the scene, Mickey returns to the rich home and reluctantly sells Pluto on the condition that he gets treated well. However, Adelbert has no intention in treating Pluto well as he starts abusing the dog to amuse himself. With the money, Mickey buys toys and food for the cat family and their mother, who is now snoring as he makes it back to their house and he delivers the goods dressed as Santa Claus. He barely manages to keep it quiet until he has snuck out of the house, just in time to see the children wake up to find all the toys he left. Mickey leaves satisfied that he helped the cat family in having a happy Christmas, though he feels depressed of selling away Pluto.
Meanwhile, Adelbert starts making a mess in the house by throwing objects at a helpless Pluto; even doing the same to his father and butler, all just to continue amusing himself. The final straw was when Adelbert uses the Christmas tree as a slingshot to send Pluto flying in the air, causing the father to be struck in the butt by the star. Finally fed up with Adelbert's abusive and spoiled behavior, the father gets the butler to throw Pluto out and let him go before proceeding to punish Adelbert by spanking him. Freed from Adelbert's abuse, Pluto happily follows Mickey's tracks to where he finds the lonely mouse sitting in front of a fire along with a snow sculpture of Pluto. Pluto burrows through the snow and pops his head out the top of the sculpture, surprising Mickey. The two friends happily share the pig family's roasted chicken for a Christmas dinner upon reuniting.
Voice cast
edit- Mickey Mouse, Adelbert: Walt Disney
- Pluto, Adelbert's father, toy effects: Pinto Colvig
- Weeping mother, kittens: Marcellite Garner
Home media
editThe short was released on December 7, 2004, on Walt Disney Treasures: Mickey Mouse in Black and White, Volume Two: 1929-1935.[4]
Additional releases include:
- 1986 - "Jiminy Cricket's Christmas" (VHS)[5]
- 2005 - "Holiday Celebration with Mickey & Pals" (colorized, DVD)[6]
See also
editReferences
edit- ^ a b Mickey's Good Deed at The Encyclopedia of Disney Animated Shorts
- ^ Kaufman, J.B.; Gerstein, David (2018). Walt Disney's Mickey Mouse: The Ultimate History. Cologne: Taschen. ISBN 978-3-8365-5284-4.
- ^ Lenburg, Jeff (1999). The Encyclopedia of Animated Cartoons. Checkmark Books. pp. 108–109. ISBN 0-8160-3831-7. Retrieved June 6, 2020.
- ^ "Mickey Mouse in Black & White Volume 2 DVD Review". DVD Dizzy. Retrieved February 19, 2021.
- ^ Jiminy Cricket's Christmas at The Encyclopedia of Disney Animated Shorts
- ^ Holiday Celebration with Mickey & Pals at The Encyclopedia of Animated Disney Shorts
External links
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- Mickey's Good Deed at IMDb
- Mickey's Good Deed at the Disney Film Project
- Mickey's Good Deed at Animation Backgrounds
- Mickey's Good Deed reviewed by Dennis Grunes
- Mickey's Good Deed on YouTube