To Spring (1936)
Underground gnomes mine crystals and distill them into liquid rainbow colors to bring on the new season, racing to finish before a blustery winter wind can freeze their work solid.
To Spring is chiefly remembered today as the directorial debut of William “Bill” Hanna, then an uncredited MGM animator years away from co-founding Hanna-Barbera; the Harman-Ising “Happy Harmonies” series otherwise vanished into the studio’s abandoned-copyright vault, leaving this one of only a handful of MGM cartoons anyone can watch for free.
Background
To Spring belongs to the Happy Harmonies series, MGM’s answer to Disney’s Silly Symphonies, produced by veteran animators Hugh Harman and Rudolf Ising. It is most notable today as an early directorial credit for William Hanna, who was then a young, largely uncredited animator at MGM and would go on, many years later, to co-found Hanna-Barbera with Joseph Barbera, one of the most influential television animation studios of the twentieth century.
What to watch for
The film itself imagines gnomes working underground to distill the colors of the new season before a harsh winter wind can freeze their efforts solid, a simple premise typical of the series’ focus on music and mood over story. Watch for the animation quality, competitive with Disney’s contemporaneous work, and consider that most of the Happy Harmonies series has fallen out of easy circulation, which makes this one of relatively few surviving MGM cartoons from the period that can be watched for free.
