Private Snafu vs. Malaria Mike
About Private Snafu vs. Malaria Mike
Malaria Mike, a mosquito, admires his wanted poster in a swamp and then spots Private Snafu bathing. Mike's chart rates a soldier's backside as filet mignon, and Snafu's dog tags say blood type A, which Mike likes. Clothes and movement keep the bite off until Snafu sits up in bed, naked, to kiss a photo of his girl. Mike hits. Later Mike tells his son about the war from an easy chair, under a mounted trophy of Snafu's head. A tag has Snafu thanking the Army for repellent, nets, atabrine, and horse sense, and wishing he had used them.
Cast & crew
More about Private Snafu vs. Malaria Mike
Chuck Jones directed. Leon Schlesinger produced. Carl W. Stalling wrote the music. Mel Blanc voices Snafu. Billy Bletcher is also billed. A series list gives 27 March 1944 and 4 minutes 53 seconds. The air-raid climax reuses animation from The Fighting 69th ½ (1941). The short was part of the Army's malaria teaching.
Themes
Background
In 1943 the Army began a malaria-education push. This March 1944 short is the Snafu entry about nets, repellent, and atabrine.
Making
Jones stages Mike as a gourmet with a chart of cuts of soldier. The lesson is the list Snafu recites only after the trophy shot.
Technique
The air-raid climax reuses animation from Jones's The Fighting 69th ½ (1941).
Music
Carl W. Stalling wrote the music. Mel Blanc voices Snafu. Billy Bletcher is also billed.
Preservation
A print survives, running 4 minutes 53 seconds.
Notes
- Mike misses once and infects a tree. The tree shrivels and dies.
- Only female mosquitoes bite. A later Jones Snafu short, It's Murder She Says, makes the mosquito female.
- Soldiers were avoiding atabrine because the side effects were worse than quinine. The cartoon is aimed at that refusal.
- The trophy over Mike's fireplace is Snafu's head.
- Snafu's postscript names insect repellent, mosquito nets, atabrine tablets, and horse sense.
Scenes
- Mike consults a chart that labels a soldier's backside filet mignon.
- He bites while Snafu kisses a photograph, sitting up with the net unused.
- Mike's son looks at Snafu's head mounted over the fireplace.
Influenced
- It's Murder She Says
