tavm Review of Gertie the Dinosaur

Gertie the Dinosaur (1914)

Winsor McCay's Gertie the Dinosaur is essential viewing for animation buffs

[10/10 · 19 October 2006]

One of the earliest and certainly most important of animated cartoons is Winsor McCay's Gertie the Dinosaur. Surrounded by a live action recreation of McCay with fellow cartoonist George McManus (Bringing Up Father) making a bet of making a dinosaur come to life, the animated footage can still charm any animation buff with scenes of Gertie lifting a foot, crying, throwing Jumbo the elephant to the water, eating a tree, drinking the water, or carrying McCay himself out of frame. The cartoonist drew about a thousand feet of cartoons in six months without cels or backgrounds to put cels over. Just entire drawings with slight differences on sheets of paper. Certainly worth seeing for anyone who wants to study animation from the beginning.