Release Date:

November 25, 1944

Main Character(s):

Daffy Duck, Elmer Fudd

Summary:

Elmer Fudd is a chuckling Cupid who creates relationships through his arrows. Angry at what happened to him the previous year because of this, Daffy Duck sends him away. Elmer gets back at Daffy by shooting him with a large arrow, causing him to fall head over heels for a married hen, much to the displeasure of her beefy husband.

That’s Not All, Folks:

The production number is 12-14, the 12th Looney Tune in the 14th release season.

The cartoon was given a Blue Ribbon reissue. “Don’t Sweetheart Me” (which Daffy sings when he is first seen in this one) played under the opening credits:

Direction: Frank Tashlin

Story: Warren Foster

Animation: Art Davis

Musical Direction: Carl W. Stalling

The cartoon is rather infamous for its ending where Daffy gets shot by one of Elmer’s arrows again and he zooms right in between the rooster and hen’s smooching. The hen silently taps the rooster on the shoulder to show him he’s kissing the back of Daffy’s head instead of her and he just looks in shock as the cartoon fades to black and abruptly ends. The cartoon was originally supposed to end with Daffy saying, “If you haven’t tried it, don’t knock it!” Whether this was seen in the original release or not is unknown.

Since Elmer doesn’t have any dialogue apart from laughing, his laughs were provided by actor Frank Graham instead of Arthur Q. Bryan. The only other times someone other than Bryan voiced Elmer during Bryan’s lifetime were in Jones’ “The Scarlet Pumpernickel” where Elmer is voiced by Mel Blanc due to having only a cameo appearance with one line of dialogue and also in Robert McKimson’s “Pre Hysterical Hare” (1958) where Dave Barry voices Elmer due to Bryan being ill during that cartoon’s production.

This is one of three times where Tashlin uses Elmer. The other two were in his two Bugs Bunny cartoons, “The Unruly Hare” (1945) and “Hare Remover” (1946), the latter of which was Tashlin’s last cartoon.

Daffy’s pursuit of the hen foreshadowes Pepe Le Pew who would debut less than two months later (spoiler alert: Pepe’s first appearance will be the post for this coming Monday).

The cartoon is in the 100 Greatest Looney Tunes Cartoons book.

“Dinner Music for a Pack of Hungry Cannibals” plays during the cat and bulldog chase up to the point where their fight is interrupted when the bulldog gets shot by one of Elmer’s arrows.

This is the first Tashlin cartoon to have animation by Richard Bickenbach, who was still in Freleng’s unit at the time before he transferred over to Tashlin’s unit until Tashlin left cartoons for good to become a live-action director.

Elmer would be Cupid again in the 1979 TV special “Bugs Bunny’s Valentine” aka “Bugs Bunny’s Cupid Capers”.

I’ve actually seen a few Instagram stories where there was a Valentine’s Day-like sorority event called “Stupid Cupid”. Either whoever first came up with that event must have really liked this cartoon or it was just a coincidence.

What I Like About This One:

Elmer’s first victims include a bird who zooms like a plane to his lover (animated by Cal Dalton) and quickly builds a honeymoon cottage for them, a horse who zooms lip first to a female horse and is driven so wild that he happily dances around (animated by Arthur Davis), and a chase and fight between a cat and a bulldog is stopped when Elmer shoots the bulldog with one of his arrows. The bulldog starts doing a Charles Boyer lover routine which astonishes the cat who says, “NOW, I’ve seen everything!” and shoots his nine lives (animated by George Cannata). The rendition of “Dinner Music for a Pack of Hungry Cannibals” in the latter scene is also fantastic.

Daffy’s rendition of “Don’t Sweetheart Me” as he’s taking a bath in the barnyard’s water trough (animated by Izzy Ellis).

Before Elmer can shoot him in the behind with an arrow, Daffy suddenly puts his beak under his chin and rants: “Say! Keep your arrows out of other peoples’ businesses!” He briefly takes his beak out from under Elmer’s chin before putting it back and finishing: “Buster!” After he makes Elmer fall to the ground, Daffy angrily pulls out his photo album: “You shot me last year and look what happened!”- he was at the mercy of a shotgun wedding and had several kids including one with two heads. “Now look at me, a has-been! A henpecked duck! A canvasbacked Casanova! And it’s your fault, you bare-backed bandit!”, Daffy rants as he snaps Elmer’s arrows in half before compressing him into his derby and shoots Elmer like an arrow. “So beat it, bub. Take a powder. SCRAM!” Elmer hits a tree and after getting himself out of his hat, chuckles to the audience with a fiendish expression (animated by Davis).

In the next scene, Elmer brings out a very large Cupid arrow that shoots Daffy through several sheds, the barn, the gate to the barn, the windmill, and into a tree (animated by Ellis).

Daffy falling down with a large piece of bark still stuck to his beak. His fingers stagger for a few seconds before he does the “running finger across lips” bit (animated by Davis).

Getting an eyeful of the sleeping hen, Daffy zooms up to her as his valentine-shaped heart thumps in rhythm to a Conga beat. Locking the barn doors, Daffy’s call of “Come, my love! Fly with me!” wakes up the hen and causes her to flee in terror (animated by Davis).

The hen hiding in a barrel only to discover Daffy preparing a bottle of champagne under there (animated by Dalton).

The hen then hides in a dark room in the barn only to find Daffy already there (animated by Dalton).

The rooster arrives and is not pleased to see Daffy smooching his wife (animated by Dalton). The rooster knocking Daffy off the hen and causing him to hit the barn wall has Daffy come back to his senses and plead for the rooster not to beat him up (animated by Cannata), and tells him “something came over me like a flash! It was that Stupid Cupid! I’m not a wolf, I’m a family man myself!” He drives up with his family in a car for a blink and you’ll miss it second to prove it (animated by Richard Bickenbach).

“I sincerely apologize to you and your charming wife”, who is putting on lipstick and is so freaked out by Daffy at this point that she screams and runs off (animated by Bickenbach). Daffy then begs for forgiveness even further by kissing the rooster’s feet (animated by Ellis).

Agreeing that this might have been a mistake, the rooster politely lets Daffy go. As a relieved Daffy talks about how swell of a fella the rooster is while walking out of the barn, Elmer shoots him with another arrow (animated by Davis), causing Daffy to zoom back in between the rooster and hen’s romance (animated by Dalton).

Where Can I Watch It?

At archive.org!

Carrot Rating:

🥕🥕🥕🥕🥕