''The Castaway'' is a

Mickey Mouse Mickey Mouse is an animated cartoon Character (arts), character co-created in 1928 by Walt Disney and Ub Iwerks. The longtime mascot of The Walt Disney Company, Mickey is an Anthropomorphism, anthropomorphic mouse who typically wears red sho ...

animated short feature released on March 27, 1931, as part of the ''

'' film series. It was the twenty-seventh Mickey Mouse short to be produced, the third of that year. ''The Castaway'' was the first cartoon directed by

Wilfred Jackson Wilfred Jackson (January 24, 1906 – August 7, 1988) was an American animator, arranger, composer and director best known for his work on the ''Mickey Mouse'' and '' Silly Symphonies'' series of cartoons and the ''Night on Bald Mountain''/''Ave ...

, who would go on to direct many Disney feature films, including ''

Cinderella "Cinderella",; french: link=no, Cendrillon; german: link=no, Aschenputtel) or "The Little Glass Slipper", is a folk tale with thousands of variants throughout the world.Dundes, Alan. Cinderella, a Casebook. Madison, Wis: University of Wisconsi ...

'', ''

Alice in Wonderland ''Alice's Adventures in Wonderland'' (commonly ''Alice in Wonderland'') is an 1865 English novel by Lewis Carroll. It details the story of a young girl named Alice who falls through a rabbit hole into a fantasy world of anthropomorphic creatur ...

'', ''

Peter Pan Peter Pan is a fictional character created by Scottish novelist and playwright J. M. Barrie. A free-spirited and mischievous young boy who can fly and never grows up, Peter Pan spends his never-ending childhood having adventures on the mythi ...

'' and ''

Lady and the Tramp ''Lady and the Tramp'' is a 1955 American animated musical romance film produced by Walt Disney and released by Buena Vista Film Distribution. The 15th Disney animated feature film, it was directed by Clyde Geronimi, Wilfred Jackson, and ...

''. The circumstances were far from ideal: under pressure from distributors for another film and with little time to produce one, Disney tapped Jackson to produce a short made up of reused animation from other films. The short uses recycled footage of a dancing gorilla (from 1929's '' Jungle Rhythm''), a lion getting eaten by a crocodile (cut from ''Jungle Rhythm'') and dancing seal lions (from 1929's '' Wild Waves''). The short is also the first to be scored by

Frank Churchill Frank Edwin Churchill (October 20, 1901 – May 14, 1942) was an American film composer and songwriter. He wrote most of the music for films directed by Walt Disney, such as ''Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs'', ''Dumbo'', ''Bambi'', '' The Adve ...

, who went on to write the songs for ''

Three Little Pigs "The Three Little Pigs" is a fable about three pigs who build three houses of different materials. A Big Bad Wolf blows down the first two pigs' houses which made of straw and sticks respectively, but is unable to destroy the third pig's house t ...

'', ''

Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs" is a 19th-century German fairy tale that is today known widely across the Western world. The Brothers Grimm published it in 1812 in the first edition of their collection '' Grimms' Fairy Tales'' and numbered as ...

'', ''

Dumbo ''Dumbo'' is a 1941 American animated fantasy film produced by Walt Disney Productions and released by RKO Radio Pictures. The fourth Disney animated feature film, it is based upon the storyline written by Helen Aberson and Harold Pearl, ...

'', ''

Bambi ''Bambi'' is a 1942 American animated drama film directed by David Hand (supervising a team of sequence directors), produced by Walt Disney and based on the 1923 book ''Bambi, a Life in the Woods'' by Austrian author and hunter Felix Salten ...

'' and ''

The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad ''The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad'' is a 1949 American animated anthology film produced by Walt Disney Productions, released by RKO Radio Pictures and directed by Clyde Geronimi, Jack Kinney and James Algar with Ben Sharpsteen as producti ...

''.

Plot

Stranded on a lonely raft in the ocean, Mickey Mouse spies an island ahead. He reaches the island with the unwilling help of a local swordfish. Hungry, he shakes a banana tree, and down falls a banana. Then he gets frightened away by a spider. A waterlogged piano is washed up on the shore, and Mickey plays for a trio of dancing seals. A young tiger tries to help by banging on the keys, and Mickey tries to shoo him away. The pair are interrupted by a giant ape, who turns out to be an accomplished pianist himself, but ends up smashing the piano. Mickey tries to fight back, but is intimidated and dances away. He gets chased by a lion, who accidentally jumps into a crocodile's mouth. Mickey finds himself riding on a turtle, which swims away.

Voice cast

* Mickey Mouse:

Walt Disney Walter Elias Disney (; December 5, 1901December 15, 1966) was an American animator, film producer and entrepreneur. A pioneer of the American animation industry, he introduced several developments in the production of cartoons. As a film p ...

Reception

In ''Mickey's Movies: The Theatrical Films of Mickey Mouse'', Gijs Grob writes: "''The Castaway'' was a short built around reused, inferior material, and it shows: the cartoon is enjoyable, but Mickey's looks are wildly inconsistent, there's not even a hint of a story, and the whole film feels like a throwback to 1929." However, on the ''Disney Film Project'', Ryan Kilpatrick praises the short: "This is a very fun short, although there are not a ton of gags, and none nearly as good as ''

Traffic Troubles ''Traffic Troubles'' is a Mickey Mouse short animated film first released on March 7, 1931, as part of the '' Mickey Mouse'' film series. It was the twenty-sixth Mickey Mouse short to be produced, and the second of 1931. Plot Mickey is driving ...

'' or some of the other funny Mickey shorts. There is a tone of happiness that is set almost from the beginning, as Mickey is tossed by the waves on his little raft. Even though things are bleak, Mickey is smiling. It is this cheerful optimism that makes Mickey so appealing."

Home media

The short was released on December 7, 2004, on '' Walt Disney Treasures: Mickey Mouse in Black and White, Volume Two: 1929-1935''.

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Castaway 1931 short films 1931 animated films 1931 films 1930s Disney animated short films Mickey Mouse short films Films about castaways American black-and-white films Columbia Pictures short films Columbia Pictures animated short films Films directed by Wilfred Jackson Films set on islands 1930s American films