Symphony in Slang
Symphony in Slang
| 16 June 1951 (USA)
Symphony in Slang Trailers

At the gates of Heaven, the admitting officials have a hard time understanding a newcomer's life story with all his contemporary slang.

Reviews
Linbeymusol Wonderful character development!
Stometer Save your money for something good and enjoyable
Twilightfa Watch something else. There are very few redeeming qualities to this film.
Catangro After playing with our expectations, this turns out to be a very different sort of film.
TheLittleSongbird Love animation, it was a big part of my life as a child, particularly Disney, Looney Tunes and Tom and Jerry, and still love it whether it's film, television or cartoons.Also have much admiration for Tex Avery, an animation genius whose best cartoons are animated masterpieces and some of the best he ever did. 'Symphony in Slang' to me is one of his best, certainly among his funniest and cleverest. The limitations in animation at the time shows at times in some lacking in finesse backgrounds, but Avery still makes the most of these limitations, with so much colour, a lot of visual imagination and characteristically unique character designs that it is easy to overlook. The entertainment value, creativity and clever construction are constant from start to finish.Characterisation is spot on and John Brown gives a bravura vocal performance.Typically, Avery does a wonderful job directing, with his unique, unlike-any-other visual and characteristic and incredibly distinctive wacky humour styles all over it as can be expected.Once again there is nothing sadistic or repetitious, instead it's imaginative, wonderfully wild and hilarious, as is characteristic of Avery on form. Am not a fan of slang usually, but it is used brilliantly and had me in hysterics, even the more clichéd ones.Some limited backgrounds aside, the animation is colourful with some inventive expressive moments. The music, courtesy of Scott Bradley, is lushly and cleverly orchestrated, with lively and energetic rhythms and fits very well indeed, a lot of the action is even enhanced by the music.Altogether, another Avery classic with the most inspired use of slang to be found anywhere. 10/10 Bethany Cox
MartinHafer This is a great Tex Avery cartoon that suffers slightly from its age. That's because the film creates literal representations of all the "hip slang" that the main character says--and I mean LITERAL! The problem is that this guy died and is trying to explain his life to the guys at the Pearly Gates but they have absolutely no idea what he's saying. Phrases such as "chew the rug" and "cat got your tongue" are completely beyond these heavenly beings. And these hip phrases (for the early 1950s) come one after another after another. So much that you barely have time to even think about them because the next one comes so quickly. A few modern kids might be stumped at what these phrases actually mean, so I advise kids to watch this with an old person to act as translator!
JohnnyJohnHildegaard Symphony in Slang is a clever MGM cartoon created by the surrealtic Tex Avery. Which also the short is also surrealistic. They find a dead guy on heaven tell his story to Noah Webster and they don't get his language (slang). Things like "I was with a silver spoon in my mouth" or "I was really in a pickle, the proprietor drew a gun on me, but I gave him the slip, and hid in the foot hills". It's very creative. Tex Avery has always been a great creator of animation.
PJS-5 A wonderfully hilarious short from the man who brought you the outrageously funny "Droppy series",the humor was incredibly well placed in as sight-gags,the animation I'd never really had any problem with classic Tex Avery shorts,& it's a clever parody to a semi-average lifetime (except for the shipwreck & such but they tried to place in a little bit of originality in),you may think I'm nuts but actually I think this whould make an awesome movie(get someone like Woody Harrelson or Harry Anderson for the part of the guy who tells the story),true the films humor might get a little too overused if you see it enough but I always found it enjoyable.