''Beach Picnic'' is a 1939

Donald Duck Donald Fauntleroy Duck is a cartoon character created by The Walt Disney Company. Donald is an anthropomorphic white duck with a yellow-orange bill, legs, and feet. He typically wears a sailor shirt and cap with a bow tie. Donald is known fo ...

animated Animation is a method by which still figures are manipulated to appear as moving images. In traditional animation, images are drawn or painted by hand on transparent celluloid sheets to be photographed and exhibited on film. Today, most anim ...

short film A short film is any motion picture that is short enough in running time not to be considered a feature film. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences defines a short film as "an original motion picture that has a running time of 40 minutes ...

which was originally released on June 9, 1939, featuring

and

Pluto Pluto (minor-planet designation: 134340 Pluto) is a dwarf planet in the Kuiper belt, a ring of trans-Neptunian object, bodies beyond the orbit of Neptune. It is the ninth-largest and tenth-most-massive known object to directly orbit the S ...

and produced by

Walt Disney Productions The Walt Disney Company, commonly known as Disney (), is an American multinational mass media and entertainment conglomerate headquartered at the Walt Disney Studios complex in Burbank, California. Disney was originally founded on October ...

Technicolor Technicolor is a series of Color motion picture film, color motion picture processes, the first version dating back to 1916, and followed by improved versions over several decades. Definitive Technicolor movies using three black and white films ...

and distributed by

RKO Radio Pictures RKO Radio Pictures Inc., commonly known as RKO Pictures or simply RKO, was an American film production and distribution company, one of the "Big Five" film studios of Hollywood's Golden Age. The business was formed after the Keith-Albee-Orphe ...

. This cartoon featured Donald and Pluto at the

beach A beach is a landform alongside a body of water which consists of loose particles. The particles composing a beach are typically made from rock, such as sand, gravel, shingle, pebbles, etc., or biological sources, such as mollusc shel ...

. It was the first cartoon in the ''

'' series to feature Pluto (although he had previously appeared with Donald in ''

Donald and Pluto ''Donald and Pluto'' is a 1936 animated short film produced by Walt Disney Productions and distributed by United Artists. The film stars Donald Duck, employed as a plumber, and Mickey's dog Pluto as his assistant. The film was directed by Ben Sha ...

'').

Plot

is having a

picnic A picnic is a meal taken outdoors ( ''al fresco'') as part of an excursion, especially in scenic surroundings, such as a park, lakeside, or other place affording an interesting view, or else in conjunction with a public event such as preceding ...

at the

, singing happily. After preparing the food, he tries to ride on an inflatable horse named Seabiscuit, but gets repeatedly bounced off of it, annoying him. Donald then spots

sleeping soundly on the shore, and decides to prank him by pushing Seabiscuit near him and mimicking a horse's whinnying. The mesmerized Pluto tries to chase Seabiscuit around some rocky reefs, but gets repeatedly frightened by the horse bumping him from behind. Pluto then frantically tries to drown Seabiscuit into the water, to no avail. Getting angry, Pluto bites on the rubber horse's air valve accidentally causing it to pop open, causing him to inflate like a

balloon A balloon is a flexible bag that can be inflated with a gas, such as helium, hydrogen, nitrous oxide, oxygen, and air. For special tasks, balloons can be filled with smoke, liquid water, granular media (e.g. sand, flour or rice), or light so ...

. As the rubber horse goes completely flat, Pluto is sent flying in the air and crashes into a shipwreck on the shore. The scene cuts to an

ant Ants are eusocial insects of the family Formicidae and, along with the related wasps and bees, belong to the order Hymenoptera. Ants evolved from vespoid wasp ancestors in the Cretaceous period. More than 13,800 of an estimated total of 22 ...

, who pokes its head out of the grass and looks around, until it spots Donald's food. It calls for the other ants to come and help steal the food. The ants swarm toward the picnic food and start carrying it away. Donald catches the ants and frantically chases them away. Donald angrily rants at the ants, and then notices some

flypaper Flypaper (also known as a fly ribbon, fly strip, fly capture tape, or fly catcher) is a fly-killing device made of paper coated with a sweetly fragrant, but extremely sticky and sometimes poisonous substance that traps flies and other flying inse ...

and decides to use it on the ants to get rid of them. An ant secretly tries carrying away a piece of

cake Cake is a flour confection made from flour, sugar, and other ingredients, and is usually baked. In their oldest forms, cakes were modifications of bread, but cakes now cover a wide range of preparations that can be simple or elaborate, ...

. Pluto spots the ant and curiously starts sniffing at it as it runs away. While Pluto follows the ant, Donald has finished setting up his flypaper trap, and sees the ant approaching. He puts down a flypaper, hoping for the ant to get stuck on it. The ant wisely crawls under it, but Pluto gets the flypaper stuck on his nose. After a long struggle, Pluto flies backward and bumps into Donald, causing the flypaper to get stuck on their bottoms. Donald angrily rants at Pluto as they struggle to free themselves, until Pluto, having enough of Donald's ranting, runs around in circles, tossing Donald into his flypaper trap, causing his body to get wrapped in all of the flypapers like a mummy. As Donald angrily tries to free himself, Pluto runs over to him and starts licking him, ending the cartoon.

Cast

Clarence Nash Clarence Charles "Ducky" Nash (December 7, 1904 – February 20, 1985) was an American voice actor. He was best known as the original voice of the Disney cartoon character Donald Duck. He was born in the rural community of Watonga, Oklahoma, and ...

as Donald Duck *

Lee Millar Lee may refer to: Name Given name * Lee (given name), a given name in English Surname * Chinese surnames romanized as Li or Lee: ** Li (surname 李) or Lee (Hanzi ), a common Chinese surname ** Li (surname 利) or Lee (Hanzi ), a Chinese s ...

as Pluto

Home media

The short was released on May 18, 2004, on '' Walt Disney Treasures: The Chronological Donald, Volume One: 1934-1941''. The short was also released on ''The Complete Pluto Volume 1''.

Notes

The running gag of Pluto getting stuck in the flypaper from ''

Playful Pluto ''Playful Pluto'' (1934) is a Walt Disney cartoon, directed by Burt Gillett. It was the first cartoon to showcase Pluto as a major character. It was the 65th Mickey Mouse short film, and the third of that year. Plot While Mickey Mouse is working ...

'' is reused in this short. The other running gag of Pluto licking Donald from ''

'' was also reused in this short. The relation of Donald and Pluto is unknown for they rarely get paired on screen.

References

External links

* * * {{Clyde Geronimi 1930s color films Donald Duck short films 1939 animated films 1939 short films 1930s Disney animated short films Films directed by Clyde Geronimi Films produced by Walt Disney Films set on beaches Animated films about dogs Pluto (Disney) short films RKO Pictures short films RKO Pictures animated short films 1930s American films Picnic films