The Last Hungry Cat (1961)

The Last Hungry Cat Review

The Last Hungry Cat is a 1961 animated short film from the Merry Melodies series. It is a very authentic short.

Sylvester mistakenly thinks that he killed Tweety, so his guilty conscience starts playing with him. This is one of the darkest entries in the series and one of the most original. Basically what we have here is a movie inspired by German Expressionism in its visual style and atmosphere. It is very horror-like while also being surprisingly psychological.

For this type of dramatic storytelling, clearly the humor is going to suffer as a result, and it did here. The ending was hilarious with the Hitchcockian cat finally getting his due in an amusing manner, but the rest of the cartoon is concerned more with drama than with comedy. Still, the movie’s sheer audacity is to be admired as it’s highly artistic in its animation, very well scored and featuring some of the best character development that Sylvester has ever received.

The Last Hungry Cat isn’t all that funny, but it’s incredibly unique in its premise that was superbly and artistically executed, leading to one of the best Warner Bros. shorts released during this period.

My Rating – 4.3