Edgar Allan Pooh . . . of the creepy white female cat shown in full body only from 1:26 through 1:31 of the six-minute Warner Bros. animated short THE HEP CAT, but few people will be able to Unsee those perverse five seconds of film. Adeline sports a human female face and butt, along with four slender womanly legs wearing four stiletto high-heeled shoes! Otherwise, she is a fairly ordinary feline. Pursued by the Black title character (whose singing and tap-dancing seem to fall upon her deaf ears), this milky dream pus--ah, cat gives her Dark Stalker a literal Cold Shoulder. Apparently, the "leans and the fats" THE HEP CAT croons about comprising his 103 previous conquests were 100% feline and 0% Fraulein. I remember that one of my Great Uncles made a joke at a family gathering about an "X-Rated" cartoon character of the 1900s called FRITZ THE CAT or something. The way I recall it, he was immediately exiled outside for a "smoke break" (even though it was Winter) for bringing up such an unsavory subject with children present. Too bad Warner cartoon producer Leon Schlesinger failed to send his animators for a smoke break when they pipe-dreamed up Adeline!

ccthemovieman-1 I love to hear the slang of the day, whatever decade, and this one has a lot of it of the '40s beginning with the title. For those you don't know, "hep" used to mean "hip" or "cool" or whatever. Here, it's cat who struts his stuff in words, song and dance. He spots this hot female feline and is smitten. The trouble is this stupid dog - and he is portrayed as really stupid at times, clever at other times - keeps interfering. Getting back to the slang: just read the note the Hep Cat receives one day: "Dear Gorgeous Hunk, If you would like to pitch some woo - come back to the fence for a rendezvous!" I love it! Words like "hunk," come back around every other generation but "woo" has been out of our vocabulary since about 1950.Unfortunately, this was the only funny thing in the cartoon. I enjoyed the artwork and the direction the humor was not much. There seems to be a big difference in a lot of these Looney Tunes, depending on the decade. The early '50s still hold up well today, but some of these '40s are too dated to be funny.

Lee Eisenberg I can't claim to be a connoisseur of Bob Clampett's work, but I've liked most of the classic Looney Tunes cartoons. A previous reviewer said that "The Hep Cat" falls short of Clampett's usual quality. I, on the other hand, think that this cartoon is actually quite neat, as a cool feline tries to woo a woman, but a dog keeps interfering. I assume that the title referred to the sort of person who would soon be a beatnik. Even if it doesn't, I still have often noticed that the Looney Tunes cartoons had a way with jazz (the ultimate kind of beatnik music).All in all, not a masterpiece, but worth seeing.

slymusic "The Hep Cat," a musically energetic cartoon directed by Bob Clampett, showcases a singing & dancing male cat who is fascinated by show business.Here are some of my favorite highlights from this cartoon (if you have not seen it yet, watch it first and THEN read my commentary). The cat is certainly in a good mood at the opening of this short as he hoofs to the tune of "The Five O'Clock Whistle," which is heard throughout the short, and he sings a neat, swinging tune about how he loves the gals and the gals love him. (Mel Blanc's voice is unmistakable and really adds to the character.) The cute little white lady cat with the built-in high heels is rather funny with her bop-stepping in time to the music! Later on, Rosebud the dog places a female cat puppet on his arm and adopts a lady's voice as he calls "Yoo-hoo!" to the male cat, but one "yoo-hoo" is mistakenly done with Rosebud's normal, dopey male voice! When the male cat rushes over to his new "girlfriend," "she" actually grabs him and stupefies him with a big smooch. And finally, as a testament to the musical genius of Carl Stalling, several adaptations of Felix Mendelssohn's "Spring Song" are heard throughout the short, but the best version is the brief swinging big band arrangement as the male cat prepares for his "rendezvous."Overall, "The Hep Cat" is an enjoyable Bob Clampett cartoon with a great deal of energy (characteristic of Clampett). The characters may be unfamiliar and not quite as elastic as in some of the other Clampett cartoons, but don't let that stop you from enjoying this cartoon, made in 1942 during the heyday of the Swing Era!