| The Year of the Mouse | |
|---|---|
| Tom and Jerry series | |
Title card |
|
| Directed by | Chuck Jones Maurice Noble |
| Produced by | Chuck Jones Les Goldman |
| Story by | Michael Maltese |
| Voices by | Mel Blanc June Foray |
| Music by | Eugene Poddany |
| Animation by | Ben Washam Ken Harris Don Towsley Dick Thompson |
| Distributed by | Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer |
| Release date(s) | May 17, 1965 |
| Color process | Metrocolor |
| Running time | 6' |
| Language | English |
| Preceded by | Of Feline Bondage |
| Followed by | The Cat's Me-Ouch! |
The Year of the Mouse is a Tom and Jerry cartoon released in 1965, directed and produced by Chuck Jones, with animation by Dick Thompson, Ben Washam, Don Towsley, and Ken Harris.
Whilst Tom is sleeping, Jerry and an unnamed grey mouse are on the top of a chimney. The grey mouse uses a fishing line to lower Jerry to the bottom of the chimney. Jerry hits Tom with a fly swatter, leaving it in Tom's hand, and the grey mouse quickly reels him back up the chimney, making Tom believe that he attacked himself in his sleep, similar to the plot of Gas Light.
Four more gags are used before they are discovered:
GAG 1: Jerry gets a gun, puts it in Tom's hands, and pulls the trigger with a second string; then the grey mouse pulls him up. Tom wakes up startled, panics and the gun fires a second time, burning the top of his head. Jerry mimics the exact appearance of Tom's head such that his partner can see.
GAG 2: Tom is worryingly pondering how he could have shot himself and goes to sleep, troubled immensely. Jerry drills a hole in the ceiling and drops a rope with a noose in it. Tom hears the noise and wakes up. He turns his head and gets it caught in the rope. A second, straight section of rope comes down and Tom grabs it while trying to go back to sleep. Tom wakes up, puzzled, and notices he's trying to hang himself. He pulls on the rope and then screams, pushing the rope away from himself. Because of this, the chandelier falls on top of him and knocks him out. Jerry mimes the fall to his buddy.
GAG 3: Jerry gets a knife from his buddy and places it in Tom's hands. Jerry splatters ketchup on Tom's chest and on the knife and tugs on the rope in order to be reeled in. Tom wakes up, screams and runs backwards into a wall, thinking that he has stabbed himself. He grabs his chest and some of the ketchup is on his hand. Thinking that it is blood, Tom screams again, inflates himself and lets himself float through the house. As Tom bounces on the ceiling, he spots the ketchup bottle. He tastes the "blood" and finds it is ketchup. He laughs, but lets go of the pressure that keeps him inflated and he bounces through the house and falls onto his pillow again. He gets up, giggles, and falls to sleep. Jerry mimes this last gesture and the mouse titters.
GAG 4: While he is laughing his head off about the last gag, the grey mouse spots an archery bow. Jerry positions it on both ends of Tom and tugs on the string. Tom wakes up and stretches, but this activates the bow. Tom sits up, confused, and is then shot into the plumbing, and into the furnace. Tom yells and launches himself out of the furnace, up the water pipe, and down the chimney as the two mice look on. However, Tom spotted them and points a gun at Jerry and the grey mouse.
Later, Jerry and the grey mouse are trapped in a bottle. If the two remove the cork, they will be shot by a gun, with the trigger pulled by a yarn. The two just sit angrily as Tom takes a quiet nap, using his tail to use a fan.