The Worm Turns

1937
6.8| 0h8m| NR| en
Details

Mad scientist Mickey has just brewed up a potion; to test it out, he squirts it on a fly that's been trapped by a spider, a (regular) mouse being harassed by a cat, then the cat when Pluto goes after it, and Pluto when dogcatcher Pegleg Pete goes after him. Each of the underdogs turns against his tormentor.

Director

Producted By

Walt Disney Productions

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Reviews

Nonureva Really Surprised!
Doomtomylo a film so unique, intoxicating and bizarre that it not only demands another viewing, but is also forgivable as a satirical comedy where the jokes eventually take the back seat.
filippaberry84 I think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.
Bessie Smyth Great story, amazing characters, superb action, enthralling cinematography. Yes, this is something I am glad I spent money on.
TheLittleSongbird I do have many favourites from the Disney shorts, and The Worm Turns is almost certainly among them. Here is some of the most inventive animation of any Disney short from the late 30s. It is colourful and fluid, and I loved most of all the facial expressions(cat's faces splitting in two, eyes bulging out until longer than body and heads getting squashed into the neck) and reactions of the characters especially with Pete when he is attacked by Pluto. The setting change from the barnyard is interesting too. The music, as I've said so many times that I'm starting to sound like a broken record, has always been a large part of the success of these shorts, and the music is really excellent in The Worm Turns. The gags are simply great, some are the same gag but done in clever variations right from what happens between the fly and spider, the cat and Pluto and Pluto and Pete(which is classic). The gag is simple, but not overly-so, and always involving. The characters are wonderful and each and every one of them show their comedic chops in some way or another. Mickey is more the bystander than the hero, but due to the fact that he is made into a mad scientist sort of character he is far from bland either. Pluto is the hero here strictly speaking and he is still the cute and energetic dog that we know and love and he also provides the funniest moments. Pete is as ever the antagonist, and the part where he got his well-deserved comeuppance from Pluto is the highlight of The Worm Turns. All in all, fantastic, though for a while I wasn't sure about the meaning of the title. 10/10 Bethany Cox
Shawn Watson Mickey brews up potion, in his mad scientist lab, to give super-courage and strength (the secret ingredient is Bravo Pronto) to it's consumer. He tests it on a fly, which soon beats up the spider who's web it is caught in. To make sure the potion is a complete success Mickey gives it to a mouse to in turn beats up a cat (they look soooo much like Tom and Jerry btw, odd since they weren't invented yet), the cat beats up the dog (Pluto) who then beats up the Dog Warden.With such an inventive and imaginative plot I would have expected more laughs and more complexity. I'm sorry to say that the cartoon is only mildly amusing and has an abrupt and rather senseless ending.
Ron Oliver A Walt Disney MICKEY MOUSE Cartoon.THE WORM TURNS as Mickey's magic potion helps smaller creatures gain the aggressive advantage over their tormentors.Lots of fun in this very well made little film, which begins as a spoof of the old mad scientist movies. The excellent animation bounces the swift moving story right along to its crescendo - a confrontation between Pluto and dogcatcher Pete. For the record, the ingredients necessary for the Courage Builder formula are Tigerus Marrow, Spiritu Bravado, Stimuli Valorus & Lionus Tonicio. Walt Disney provided Mickey with his voice.Walt Disney (1901-1966) was always intrigued by drawings. As a lad in Marceline, Missouri, he sketched farm animals on scraps of paper; later, as an ambulance driver in France during the First World War, he drew figures on the sides of his vehicle. Back in Kansas City, along with artist Ub Iwerks, Walt developed a primitive animation studio that provided animated commercials and tiny cartoons for the local movie theaters. Always the innovator, his ALICE IN CARTOONLAND series broke ground in placing a live figure in a cartoon universe. Business reversals sent Disney & Iwerks to Hollywood in 1923, where Walt's older brother Roy became his lifelong business manager & counselor. When a mildly successful series with Oswald The Lucky Rabbit was snatched away by the distributor, the character of Mickey Mouse sprung into Walt's imagination, ensuring Disney's immortality. The happy arrival of sound technology made Mickey's screen debut, STEAMBOAT WILLIE (1928), a tremendous audience success with its use of synchronized music. The SILLY SYMPHONIES soon appeared, and Walt's growing crew of marvelously talented animators were quickly conquering new territory with full color, illusions of depth and radical advancements in personality development, an arena in which Walt's genius was unbeatable. Mickey's feisty, naughty behavior had captured millions of fans, but he was soon to be joined by other animated companions: temperamental Donald Duck, intellectually-challenged Goofy and energetic Pluto. All this was in preparation for Walt's grandest dream - feature length animated films. Against a blizzard of doomsayers, Walt persevered and over the next decades delighted children of all ages with the adventures of Snow White, Pinocchio, Dumbo, Bambi & Peter Pan. Walt never forgot that his fortunes were all started by a mouse, or that simplicity of message and lots of hard work will always pay off.
Spleen Look at the effects animation. Mickey pours just a drop of "bravo pronto" into his test tube, and it fizzes, bubbles, explodes, sputters, changes from one vivid colour to another - with each drop of the potion separately drawn and travelling in a convincing arc. Or look at the scenes in which the background moves and (in effect) EVERYTHING within the frame is animated - all without computers or even, in this case, rotoscoping.Mickey plays a small part in this cartoon: he's just the brewer of a courage potion, which enables a fly to turn the tables on a spider, a mouse on a cat, the cat on Pluto, and Pluto on a dog catcher. His lack of screen time might strike the uninformed as good news. It IS, for this particular story, good news, since it means that Disney was quite content to assign his star character a supporting role without artificially expanding it - but remember that this cartoon dates from the days when Mickey was vital and energetic, rather than insipid.The charm of this cartoons others like it is hard to explain. It's amusing at times, but certainly not laugh-out-loud hilarious; it's cute, but not particularly sentimental or deeply moving; the art direction is detailed and convincing, but shaky here and there; the story has a pleasing shape ... but it's not THAT great, is it? Yet the overall result is undeniably the equal of later cartoons that ARE hilarious, moving, exquisitely designed, brilliantly plotted. What does this have that so many other cartoons (including a number of Disney cartoons from the 1930s, although if you search you'll also find many that are just as inspired as this one) lack? Thoroughness? Sincerity? Something else I'm missing? Probably all three.