Happy Birthday (of sorts) To "Bugs" Bunny

Today is the 70th anniversary of the first "official" Bugs Bunny short, A Wild Hare, which was released on this very day way the hell back in 1940 and went on to win an Oscar nomination. It's therefore something like Bugs Bunny's birthday today.



Ain't he a stinker? Like many "official" anythings, it's only part of the story. Bugs evolved through a few shorts before this. But this one is official.

What's your favorite Bugs Bunny cartoon? I mean besides What's Opera, Doc? (1957) which was weirdly NOT nominated for an Oscar. Bugs' Oscar record goes like so (click links to watch shorts).

• A Wild Hare (1940) nominee
• Hiawatha's Rabbit Hunt (1941) nominee
• Knighty Knight Bugs (1958) *winner*
  

Donald Duck is 76

Do you prefer "Daffy" or "Donald"? I can't say I've ever been much of a fan of either of the famous Ducks (maybe Howard, briefly, in the 80s). Maybe sea fowl just aren't my thing? I was, however, totally into Chip & Dale (and chipmunks) as a child. So here's seven minutes of funny Toy Tinkers (Best Animated Short Film Nominee, 1949) starring all three to start your morning:



Here's a list of the ten best Donald Duck cartoons from a real fan. And if you've never seen Donald's only Oscar-winning short, Der Fuehrer's Face (1942) you can watch it on YouTube.

The Disney and Warner Bros characters used to get Oscar nominated a lot in the Animated Short category. In the past couple of decades the closest thing we have to a perennial in that category is Wallace & Gromit or Pixar as a studio, if that counts, though their characters don't repeat.

You know what I think is a crying shame as animated short films go? That Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988) didn't really become a franchise. Disney made three short films with the characters after that blockbuster hit: Tummy Trouble, Rollercoaster Rabbit and Trail Mix-Up though none were nominated at the Oscars. They had the misfortune of arriving in that stretch of a dozen years or so when there were never more than 3 nominees in that category.
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Curio: Franky Panky

Alexa here. Nothing screams Easter week like a creepy doomsday rabbit! Yes, that's Frank from Donnie Darko, a movie I still love for all kinds of reasons. (Jake and Maggie playing sibs! Lost-esque tangential timelines! Swayze!) And while there's loads of Darko geekery out there, Missy over at Boopsie Daisy had the inspired idea to sprinkle Richard Kelly's dark universe with all kinds of sugar. The results are yummier than a Cadbury Creme Egg.

Frank is just one of the bunnies...

so why can't he find love, too?

See more of Missy's world of twisted whimsy here.
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Link Widow

Final Girl on the Sorority Row movie poster. Too funny
Noh Way on Away We Go by way of Auntie Mame. Good stuff (though I disagree that Maggie Gyllenhaal's scene is the best in the movie. If anything it's the worst scene in the movie -- though well portrayed by Gyllenhaal -- betraying the movies ridiculous and ugly superiority complex towards half of the lives it happens to glance at)
Times an article on Skin's problems finding distribution (Reminder: that's the movie wherein Sophie Okonedo is a black girl with white parents in Apartheid era South Africa)
Movies Kick Ass revisits Judy Holliday's controversial Oscar win for Born Yesterday


Forces of Geek and a zillion other blogs have posted the new Scarlett Johansson as Black Widow photos from Iron Man 2. Straight boys confuse me so much sometimes. This comment isn't about Forces of Geek (who don't comment themselves) but about the tone of the posts on a bajillion other blogs. Almost all the fanboy/moviegeek sites had previously complained that Scarjo was miscast and I very much agreed. Now, suddenly, everyone is on board because she's well... hot. How is this a revelation? Had they never seen Scarlett Johansson before?
Cinema Blend Russell Brand takes over for the Easter Bunny in I Hop? How bizarre. My first job ever was playing the Easter Bunny at the mall. And now I'm not joking. So I feel a special affinity.
Fin de Cinema more titles announced for Toronto including Kristin Scott Thomas and Sergi Lopez in Partir
Coming Soon Stephen Chow pulls out of Green Hornet. Is that movie ever going to get made?
The House Next Door has a great interview with one of the directors of Battlestar Galactica