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the audience applauded

If you don't like this, we can't be friends.

This is a coming of age storyline that you've seen in one form or another for decades. It takes a truly unique voice to make yet another one worth watching.

It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

Bugs Bunny has always been one of animation's best, funniest, most interesting and most iconic characters. Bob Clampett is perhaps not as famous as the likes of Chuck Jones, Fritz Freleng or Tex Avery, but he was a very interesting and very good animation director in his own right with a quite unique visual style.'Hare Ribbin', to be honest, is not one of the best from either. It's interesting, it's amusing and it's very well made, but in the case of both Bugs and Clampett 'Hare Ribbin' is a contender for their strangest, and the weirdness did get in the way at times.There is definitely plenty to like. Clampett's visual style is immediately distinctive and is not just beautifully rendered but the imagination and wonderful exaggeration put into it makes it eye-popping. The colours are vibrant, the backgrounds very meticulous in detail and the drawing fluid and very smooth.Carl Stalling never disappoints and one of my favourite composers in cartoon history, 'Hare Ribbin' does nothing to change that perception. Anybody expecting luscious orchestration, characterful rhythms, clever use of instrumentation and sounds and the ability to elevate gags to a greater level rather than just adding to it will find all of those aplenty.Regarding the writing, it does have freshness and wit, more so from Bugs than with the Russian dog. Just don't look for logic and sense, they're cast to the wind here, not that you should expect that in cartoons but they are replaced by a bizarre weirdness that doesn't always feel right. Bugs' mermaid and French waiter disguises are especially a lot of fun though.As for the darker and more violent ending for a Looney Tunes cartoon, it is definitely not a bad thing to take risks (personally applaud risk-taking when done right, and tend to appreciate the effort if it doesn't quite come off, much less so if it badly fails at it), but the ending does feel like a cop out and is at odds with the rest of the cartoon.No complaints can be made with Bugs, he's still as funny and smartly likable as ever. Was less keen on the Russian dog, who is not one of our favourite rabbit's best foils, a bit dull and more dumb than funny. Mel Blanc does characteristically wonderfully as Bugs, Sam Wolfe however didn't do much for me due to an inconsistent accent that never seemed sure what it was meant to be.Overall, well-made and amusing but has a strangeness that doesn't quite work. 7/10 Bethany Cox

Directed by Robert Clampett, "Hare Ribbin'" is a wildly hilarious Bugs Bunny cartoon that mostly takes place underwater. The plot is one of the simplest: a red-haired dog (with a laughable accent) desires a rabbit sandwich and chooses Bugs for his target.Highlights: Bugs is a great dialectician with his disguises as a French waiter and then as Elmer Fudd. The dog sniffs Bugs and declares, "B.O.!" Bugs and the dog briefly play tag to the familiar accompaniment of Mendelssohn's Spring Song. Bugs bounces the dog like a basketball (to a wonderfully distorted musical accompaniment) before throwing him into a hole in the ground. And Bugs might be a little embarrassing in his mermaid disguise as he plays the harp and sings, but the dog seems to like it! "Hare Ribbin'" can be found on the Looney Tunes Golden Collection Volume 5 Disc 3. On the same disc is an alternate version of this cartoon, in which one particular gag might be a bit too painful to watch.

Some kind of dog: a combination French Poodle and Russian Hound, is out looking for a rabbit. Immediately, we see he is another dumb foil for Bugs Bunny. It seems Bugs always comes across the dumbest characters, which is a shame because few animated animals ever match wits with the clever BB. This dog is really stupid. After sniffing Bugs up and down his body, the only thing he knows is that Bugs has "B.O!" Thanks, we needed to know that!After two minutes the chase scene begins as the dumb pooch finally reaches that IS a rabbit. In one of the more bizarre sequences I've seen in a Bugs Bunny cartoon, Bugs dives underwater, hops away (on the sand at the bottom of the lake) and then is seen sitting there with a blonde wig, a mermaid's tale and playing a harp and singing. He's in drag, with lipstick, long lashes and the whole bit. Of course, the stupid dog thinks the "woman" is super hot.Bugs continues to do what he does best - tease this stupid idiot. All of it, including Bugs pretending to be a French waiter, is done underwater. How are these two animals breathing? I guess the writers didn't bother with that detail. They didn't bother with a lot of humor, either, or it's just too sappy for today's crowd. I love Bugs Bunny but you can't win them all. This was not one of his best.

This one just does not make any sense, not even by Bob Clampett standards. What is the deal with this hound with the red poodle quiff (split down the middle) and a Russian accent? He's looking for a little gray rabbit, that's what. And he can breathe underwater. But then again so can Bugs. I suppose most cartoon characters can as long as they don't think about it. The chase starts in the usual Warner Forrest, but soon takes a dive into the deep end of the river and neither sanity nor the two leads ever surface again (I seriously doubt if that redski ever got out of the river at all). If Bob and screenwriter Lou Lilly were so keen to try out their new underwater ripple effects, why not write it into the story?Now what would you do if you're trying to outsmart someone at the bottom of the pond? Use different disguises of course! The rabbit immediately dressed up as a mermaid while the dog turns himself into a torpedo. Bugs then pretends to be a french waiter speaking to a Japanese cook (I think). He even does an imitation of Elmer, who should have been here in a diving suit going after Daffy if you ask me. That must be it, Bugs and this immigrant were filling in while the others were renegotiating their contracts! The end is yet another version of that favourite Warner cop out: the attempted suicide (was that ever really funny?) Surprisingly, there is one last add lib after this that did make me laugh. That Clampett! He never gives up!??? out of 10