Gift Wrapped (film)

Gift Wrapped is a 1952 Warner Bros. Looney Tunes animated cartoon directed by Friz Freleng (credited as I. Freleng), originally released on February 16, 1952. Later reissued by Warner Bros. under the "Blue Ribbon" Merrie Melodies series, Gift Wrapped is available on DVD as a part of Looney Tunes Golden Collection: Volume 2.

Synopsis

Sylvester awakes on Christmas morning to find a present for him. To his disappointment, it is merely a rubber mouse ("Oh, why couldn't I get something practical? Like a real mouse!"). He hears his hated rival Tweety singing Jingle Bells in his cage, which has been gift wrapped and addressed to Granny. Just before she enters the room, he switches the cage's tag so it's addressed "To Kitty" instead. Granny innocently gives the cage to Sylvester and opens the box with the rubber mouse.

Believing there has been an innocent mix-up, she goes to give Sylvester the mouse and correct the mistake. Upon seeing a satisfied Sylvester hiccup Tweety's feathers, Granny realizes what has occurred and angrily forces Sylvester to regurgitate Tweety. After giving the wayward cat a scolding, Granny insists that Sylvester kiss Tweety under a sprig of mistletoe. Sylvester eats Tweety Bird again instead, and is once again scolded and forced to spit him out.

Granny places Tweety's cage up high where Sylvester shouldn't be able to reach him. Undaunted, the ever-resourceful feline retrieves a ladder, climbs up to Tweety's cage, and opens it with the intent to eat him. Tweety Bird manages to convince Sylvester that a huge present waiting under the Christmas tree is for Sylvester. Sylvester abandons Tweety in his greed, and opens the present with relish. It turns out to be Hector the Bulldog, who promptly eats Sylvester. Granny arrives and forces Hector to spit out Sylvester, and then throws the dog out of her house.

Sylvester then attempts to get to Tweety by using a toy steam crane. Instead, he catches an angry Granny, who chases and bashes Sylvester with a broom.

The feline then retreats to the second floor of the house and attempts to saw a hole in the floor so as to be able to descend upon Tweety from above ("That puddy tat sure doesn't get discouraged."). Tweety replaces himself in the cage with a stick of lit dynamite ("This oughta help discourage him!"), which goes off just as Sylvester pulls the cage up to his level. Sylvester then puts the wrecked cage back and stumbles down the stairs, blackened and torn up from the explosion.

He next attempts a Western-style showdown with Tweety; himself playing the part of Geronimo, with Tweety playing Hopalong Cassidy. After being shot by a pop-gun (which as would be expected, was revealed as a real gun), Sylvester gets the upper hand, but before he can consume his prize, Granny shoots a plunger over his mouth, and declares, "You didn't count on Pocahontas, did you, Geronimo?"

While Tweety plays on his new train set, Sylvester tries one last time to catch him. He takes some spare train tracks, sets them up to point towards his open mouth, and the puts the train in reverse. The train goes over the new tracks, and towards Sylvester who then devours Tweety, only to be devoured himself by Hector, who has somehow gotten back in the house. Granny whacks Hector until he coughs up Sylvester, and then does the same to Sylvester until he coughs up Tweety. Granny then announces she's had enough, and that she'll show Sylvester and Hector there will be peace in the house once and for all.

The cartoon ends with Granny and Tweety singing a variation of the Christmas carol "Hark The Herald Angels Sing". On Tweety's right and left are Sylvester and Hector, both with giant "Do Not Open Til Xmas" stamps over their mouths.

Censorship

• The ABC airing of this cartoon edited out the shot of Sylvester staggering down the stairs after getting blown up by the dynamite stick that Tweety substituted for himself in the cage. Also cut was the part during the "Hopalong Cassidy" sequence where Sylvester gets shot by Tweety's toy gun and falls down the Christmas tree (with an abrupt cut from traveling up the tree to Tweety being chased by Sylvester).
• Cartoon Network and the WB left the "dynamite in the cage" sequence intact, but edited out the entire next Hopalong Cassidy sequence from fade in to fade out (because of the American Indian stereotyping), fading out into the train sequence instead (though an identical scene was retained in the clip show cartoon entitled Tweet Dreams when that short aired on both channels).

Succession

External links

• Gift Wrapped at the Internet Movie Database