Catch as Cats Can 1947

In this lively cartoon, a frail canary named Frankie, Dave Barry who belts out tunes like Frank Sinatra, captivates the other birds with his bold, showy singing. His bright performance draws admiring glances from the flock, but it also irritates a pipe-puffing parrot who imitates Bing Crosby. The parrot, a scheming and boisterous companion, keeps a wary eye on the showy canary as Frankie flits about in the yard and trash-strewn corners of the scene. The parrot spots Sylvester, Mel Blanc foraging through the trash, and immediately hatches a plan to snare the canary. The moment Sylvester enters the frame, the dynamics shift from simple chase to a more calculated trap, as the parrot maneuvers to turn Sylvester’s hunger into an opportunity to capture Frankie.

The parrot’s bold, direct approach proves ineffective at first, and Sylvester’s own persistence keeps him in the spotlight. In a miscalculated moment, the startled cat lashes out and strikes the parrot, sending a violet hue across the parrot’s eye and leaving both birds with a tense wager between cunning and appetite. Encouraged by the parrot’s own encouragement, the plan escalates: the parrot and Sylvester try a ruse involving a soap-made chick to lure Frankie closer. The two birds coordinate a sequence that has them sliding along a greased counter, slipping into the sink, and finally slipping down the drain. Only the soap effigy makes the trip through the pipe, and it ends up inside Sylvester’s mouth, creating a chaotic moment that heightens the chase and the humor.

A clever trail of birdseed drawn into the garage seems to work as a distraction, but Frankie makes a sharp counter move by jamming the cat’s mouth open and disrupting the trap. Undeterred, Sylvester attempts to intensify the deception by lacing the vitamins he has been hoarding with buckshot, turning a hopeful disguise into a tense warning. The plan backfires in an unexpected way when a magnet suddenly grabs every metal object in sight—everything except the target of the pursuit. In another twist, the canary turns Sylvester’s vacuum cleaner against him, a moment that crashes into the fireplace and leaves Sylvester with a sore, hot stomach. As Sylvester buckles, the canary adds Foamo-Seltzer to the water, prompting a chaotic blast that sends the cat reeling and the living room into disarray.

The sequence builds even further as the parrot’s ruse appears to be the most reliable option for getting Frankie out of reach; yet the one who ends up presenting a more appetizing target for Sylvester is the portly parrot himself. The chase culminates in a final, satisfying realization for the hungry cat: the parrot, with all his swagger and singsong speech, becomes the tastier meal. In the closing moment, Sylvester is shown perched on the parrot’s own perch, imitating the parrot’s mannerisms with a relaxed certainty, suggesting that the cat’s appetite has found a new, possibly more enduring comfort in a perch that once belonged to a rival.

Overall, the short blends slapstick misadventure with dialogue-like rhythms and rapid visual gags that keep the momentum brisk from start to finish. The interplay between Frankie’s swaggering vocal performances and Sylvester’s increasingly frantic attempts to outwit the canary underpins the humor, while the parrot’s scheming adds a persistent, mischievous counterpoint. The result is a compact, zany snapshot of classic cartoon dynamics, where cleverness, luck, and a little bit of luckless chaos determine who ends up on top, and where the final tableau leaves viewers with a playful sense of irony as Sylvester imitates his rival in a perch-bound pose.