The Milky Way (1940)

The Milky Way is a one-reel animated cartoon short subject, produced in Technicolor and released to theatres with the movie The Captain Is a Lady in 1940 by Metro-Goldwyn Mayer. The short, produced and directed by Rudolf Ising with musical supervision by Scott Bradley, explores the adventures of the "three little kittens who lost their mittens", as they explore a dreamland where space is made up entirely of dairy products (for example, the Milky Way is made of milk and the moon is made of cheese). Mars is depicted as a planet where shooting stars are made. The short won the 1940 Academy Award for Animated Short Film, and was the first non-Disney film to do so. Other shorts nominated in 1940 included A Wild Hare by Warner Bros., introducing Bugs Bunny, and the other MGM cartoon Puss Gets the Boot, with Jasper & Jinx, the prototype for Tom and Jerry. It was added as a bonus feature in the Marx Bros. DVD release of Go West (1940).

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