He's not exactly in the household word category anymore, but to fans of comic strip art Winsor McCay is a legendary figure, a pioneer visionary who created amazing vistas for the Sunday papers. For film buffs, McCay was a key figure in the history of animation, the man who almost single-handedly devised and drew the first real cartoons. He devoted four years of work to his initial effort, Little Nemo (completed in 1911), and hand-colored the results. And although he employed an assistant McCay is said to have personally inked some ten-thousand drawings for his best-known film, Gertie the Dinosaur, completed in 1914. That's a level of dedication approaching madness, especially when you consider that McCay was simultaneously producing daily comic strips and full-page color works for the Sunday papers -- and works of top quality, too.
By the early 1920s, for reasons unknown, McCay seemed to lose interest in the production of animated cartoons. Perhaps he was just getting older and slowing down. Among the last known films he worked on were three episodes of a series based on his popular comic strip "Dreams of the Rarebit Fiend," a strip which had inspired director Edwin S. Porter to a produce a famous (and still extant) trick film back in 1906. Within the rigidly unchanging format of this series McCay could let his imagination run wild: at the beginning of every installment a gentleman would eat too much rarebit (or some other rich food) and then have a wildly surreal dream; the dreams could involve space travel, time travel, inanimate objects coming to life, or -- a favorite motif -- humans, animals or objects changing size, either becoming enormous or miniaturized. McCay was never much for dialog, but his draftsmanship was extraordinary and his work had a genuinely dream-like vividness.
This series entry, The Pet, begins on a deceptively slow and quiet note, once the middle-aged married couple at the center of events fall asleep. The rarebit-eating husband dreams that a strange little dog-like creature has appeared on their lawn and that his wife has adopted it. The creature varies somewhat in size and appearance from scene to scene; its eyes are blank and the only sound it utters is "Meow," but it looks more like a cross between a calf and a dog than anything feline. Dad is increasingly unhappy as the Pet invades the conjugal bed and glides about under the covers. He moves to the sofa. Meanwhile, the Pet grows at an alarming rate. The tone of the film changes sharply when, almost as an aside, the Pet devours the family cat and then eats everything on the breakfast table, including the plates and the coffee maker. Dad goes straight to a drug store to buy a barrel full of rat poison. The Pet, who is now as big as a horse, eats all the furniture in the house as well as a pile of coal, sucks water out of the garden hose and spews it on his hosts.
By this point it's clear that what we're watching is no cute little cartoon comedy: this is a nightmare, one that some pet owners can understand. McCay is playing on that fleeting fear many of us may have experienced at one time or another that a family pet has taken over our lives, or (in more extreme cases) is genuinely malevolent or even monstrous. Animals, like humans, can turn ornery despite the best treatment. McCay takes this scenario and spins it into an impossible yet strangely familiar horror story. The most disturbing scene in the film comes when the Pet eats the entire barrel of 'Rough on Rats' poison and goes all trembly, then breaks out in disgusting-looking boils. The boils fester, but the Pet survives his ordeal and only grows larger and more powerful. He lumbers away in a trance-like state, eats a garden wall, a tree, and a car, then advances on the downtown area, now as big as a battleship. In the end, it takes the mobilization of the air force to put a stop to the rampage.
The final scenes will remind movie buffs of The Lost World, the various adventures of King Kong and Godzilla, Tex Avery's King-Size Canary, and countless sci-fi flicks in which giant creatures attack cities, but it's worth pointing out that McCay was well ahead of them all. In its 20-minute running time The Pet looks like a condensed preview of these movies, but it has an eerie, nightmarish quality all its own. I only wish this film had marked the beginning of a new phase of Winsor McCay's cinematic career; instead, it was the end of the line for this quirky, brilliant and innovative film pioneer.
By the early 1920s, for reasons unknown, McCay seemed to lose interest in the production of animated cartoons. Perhaps he was just getting older and slowing down. Among the last known films he worked on were three episodes of a series based on his popular comic strip "Dreams of the Rarebit Fiend," a strip which had inspired director Edwin S. Porter to a produce a famous (and still extant) trick film back in 1906. Within the rigidly unchanging format of this series McCay could let his imagination run wild: at the beginning of every installment a gentleman would eat too much rarebit (or some other rich food) and then have a wildly surreal dream; the dreams could involve space travel, time travel, inanimate objects coming to life, or -- a favorite motif -- humans, animals or objects changing size, either becoming enormous or miniaturized. McCay was never much for dialog, but his draftsmanship was extraordinary and his work had a genuinely dream-like vividness.
This series entry, The Pet, begins on a deceptively slow and quiet note, once the middle-aged married couple at the center of events fall asleep. The rarebit-eating husband dreams that a strange little dog-like creature has appeared on their lawn and that his wife has adopted it. The creature varies somewhat in size and appearance from scene to scene; its eyes are blank and the only sound it utters is "Meow," but it looks more like a cross between a calf and a dog than anything feline. Dad is increasingly unhappy as the Pet invades the conjugal bed and glides about under the covers. He moves to the sofa. Meanwhile, the Pet grows at an alarming rate. The tone of the film changes sharply when, almost as an aside, the Pet devours the family cat and then eats everything on the breakfast table, including the plates and the coffee maker. Dad goes straight to a drug store to buy a barrel full of rat poison. The Pet, who is now as big as a horse, eats all the furniture in the house as well as a pile of coal, sucks water out of the garden hose and spews it on his hosts.
By this point it's clear that what we're watching is no cute little cartoon comedy: this is a nightmare, one that some pet owners can understand. McCay is playing on that fleeting fear many of us may have experienced at one time or another that a family pet has taken over our lives, or (in more extreme cases) is genuinely malevolent or even monstrous. Animals, like humans, can turn ornery despite the best treatment. McCay takes this scenario and spins it into an impossible yet strangely familiar horror story. The most disturbing scene in the film comes when the Pet eats the entire barrel of 'Rough on Rats' poison and goes all trembly, then breaks out in disgusting-looking boils. The boils fester, but the Pet survives his ordeal and only grows larger and more powerful. He lumbers away in a trance-like state, eats a garden wall, a tree, and a car, then advances on the downtown area, now as big as a battleship. In the end, it takes the mobilization of the air force to put a stop to the rampage.
The final scenes will remind movie buffs of The Lost World, the various adventures of King Kong and Godzilla, Tex Avery's King-Size Canary, and countless sci-fi flicks in which giant creatures attack cities, but it's worth pointing out that McCay was well ahead of them all. In its 20-minute running time The Pet looks like a condensed preview of these movies, but it has an eerie, nightmarish quality all its own. I only wish this film had marked the beginning of a new phase of Winsor McCay's cinematic career; instead, it was the end of the line for this quirky, brilliant and innovative film pioneer.
