Popeye the Sailor Meets Ali Baba Forty Thieves (1937) is a colorful Technicolor adventure set in Arabia featuring Popeye, Olive Oyl, and Wimpy boarding an airplane, crashing in the desert, and fighting off the famous Abu Hassan and forty thieves who are marauding a town in the desert. Full-length Dazzling Popeye the Sailor Meets Ali Baba the Forty Thieves is a classic free movie and a paper domain movie of Fleischer studios with its innovative animation effects and spinach-powered action.
Popeye the Sailor Meets Ali Baba’s Forty Thieves (1937)
Popeye the Sailor Meets Forty Thieves of Ali Baba (1937). Popeye the Sailor Meets Ali Baba Forty Thieves (1937) is a two-reel Technicolor animated short in the series of Popeye the Sailor, “Color Specials,” and issued by Paramount Pictures. At 17 minutes, it is a reworking of the Arabian Nights story with Popeye as the protagonist featuring the innovative multiplane camera and tabletop 3D backgrounds at the studio before the release of the Snow White by Disney. Any copyrights renewal keeps it in the public domain.
Movie Background
| Aspect | Details |
|---|---|
| Directors | Dave Fleischer (supervising), Willard Bowsky |
| Producer | Max Fleischer |
| Studio | Fleischer Studios |
| Distributor | Paramount Pictures |
| Release Date | November 26, 1937 (USA) |
| Running Time | 17 minutes (two reels) |
| Color Process | Technicolor |
| Animation Leads | Willard Bowsky, George Germanetti, Orestes Calpini |
| Music | Sammy Timberg |
| Status | Public domain (no renewal) |
It was produced in the competition of Disney and it brought attention to the 3D effects by Fleischer, and it also signaled the Coast Guard days of Popeye prior to his Navy time.
Movie Cast Table
| Voice Actor | Role |
|---|---|
| Jack Mercer | Popeye (uncredited) |
| Mae Questel | Olive Oyl (uncredited) |
| Lou Fleischer | J. Wellington Wimpy (uncredited) |
| Gus Wickie | Abu Hassan (uncredited) |
These were the fundamental voices that made the characters who stood out as highlights with Popeye growls by Mercer and squeaky Olive by Questel.
Full Plot Summary
Popeye the Sailor Meets Ali Baba Forty Thieves (1937 film) begins when Popeye and Olive Oyl are on a U.S. Coast Guard post when an Arabian town besieged sends out a distress signal. They use their seaplane and fly to the desert and a sand storm causes a crash landing miles before their target.
Drying and falling in a desert of never-ending dunes, the three men see the town being attacked by the forty thieves of Abu Hassan riding in on horses and scaring off merchants with plundering all they can find. Bandits steal Olive and Wimpy, and lash them up as a reward, as Popeye makes his escape by swinging on a chandelier, having outwitted Abu Hassan in a contest of wits and loots the thief of his long underwear in a time-tested joke (Abu Hassn’t got them anymore!).
Popeye escapes, steals a camel and follows the gang to their treasure cave. Instead of saying Open Sesame, he uses his pipe as a blowtorch and vaporizes the doorway, wonders at heaps of jewels in backgrounds of 3D layers. Guards notice him and attempt to liberate his friends and Abu Hassan throws Popey into a shark tank (in some prints, there is a killer whale).
The shark jumps, Popeye knots the jaws, and drives him away. Being in a corner, bruised, Popeye reaches his emergency spinach and tears the can with the words Open sez me! Superpower punches: he throws Abu Hassan down, then punches all the forty thieves one after another, as he does this, he counts on his fingers, as he hits each man one after another. Two! … Forty!”).
Popeye beats back the bandits, chaining them to a cart with stolen riches. They take it home to town and Popeye sings to Olive: I may be a shorty, but I licked the forty. I’m Popeye the Sailor Man!” (toot-toot). Go away, on victory and spinach crown.
Genre and Key Themes
Popeye the sailor meets Ali baba forty Thieves (1937) is a fast-paced adventure cartoon that amalgamates the Arabian Nights fantasy with the typical Popeye formula. Being a special of color, it intensifies the spectacle with exotic backgrounds, technical marvel.
Key themes include:
- Underdog heroism: Brain, grit, spinach Scrawny Popeye overcomes impossible odds.
- Buddhism Friendship and rescue: Popeye will risk everything to rescue Olive and Wimpy, and he will not betray his friends.
- Righteousness to the oppressed: Rapists plunder the poor; Popeye brings sanity and takes away wealth.
- Comedy in anarchy: Slapstick and puns combine in jokes such as stealing an underwear and shark-jaw knots.
- American intervention: Popeye, a Coast Guard, rescues a foreign town, which represented 1930s patriotism.
These render Popeye the Sailor Meets Ali Baba the Forty Thieves the entire film a delight of Fleischer.
Popeye the Sailor Meets Ali Baba Forty Thieves (1937) Full Movie Watch and Download
Watch Popeye the Sailor Meets Ali Baba Forty Thieves (1937) on Internet Archive:
🏛️ See Also
Woody Woodpecker in Pantry Panic (1941) – Classic Winter Survival Cartoon Full Movie
Popeye for President (1956) – Classic Election-Day Cartoon Full Movie
Betty Boop: Minnie the Moocher (1932) – Jazz-Fueled Ghostly Cartoon Full Movie
Inner Sanctum (1948) – A Suspenseful Noir Thriller
Movie Review
Popeye the Sailor Meets Ali Baba Forty Thieves (1937) is one of the greatest Color Specials ever made by Fleischer with a combination of eye-popping imagery and close-action.
- Voices and characters: Jack Mercer gravelly Popeys his growls and asides and Mae Questel whines Olive and Lou Fleischer mumbles Wimpy create the ideal comic foil. Gus Wickie booming Abu Hassan is a typical villain.
- Animation and direction: The team of Dave Fleischer is glowing with its fluid motion, deep- Technicolor and new tabletop 3D cave sequences that are competing with Disney. Pacing does dragless gags and fights.
- Plot: Crash, capture, smackdown with spinach, a stumbling block of the Arabian tradition, with witty touches, such as the pipe blowtorch, make it a novel. There are some dated stereotypes, which are characteristic of the era cartoons.
- Music and sounds: The score by Sammy Timberg is full of energy and it perfectly matches as the punches and chases.
On the whole, the film Popeye the Sailor Meets Ali Baba 1937 is an escapist movie. It is a public domain movie as a free classic movie, and it is the best watch when it comes to animation lovers.
Movie Tags
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