Best Animation Movies of 1958

Daffy attempts to convince Porky, as Friar Tuck, that he really is Robin Hood.

King Arthur's kingdom and the knights of the Round Table are in the doldrums since the Dark Knight stole the Singing Sword and put it under the protection of a fire-breathing dragon. The king's jester, Bugs Bunny, says only a fool would try to steal it back, so the king orders him to try. The jester boldly enters the Dark Knight's castle, initially catching his adversaries napping, but when the Singing Sword wakes the knight and the dragon, can Bugs complete his mission? He's a clever fool. A moat, portcullis, and catapult all figure in the face off.

Hosted by Jiminy Cricket along with Mickey Mouse and Tinker Bell, this special combines newly produced animation with clips from vintage animated Disney shorts and feature films, presented to the viewer as «Christmas cards» from the various characters starring in each one. «From All of Us to All of You» is an animated television Christmas special, produced by Walt Disney Productions and first presented on December 19, 1958 on ABC as part of the Walt Disney Presents anthology series. The show has been shown infrequently in the US in recent years, but in the Nordic countries (Norway, Finland, Denmark, Sweden and Iceland) the show has been broadcast every year since 1959, and has become a holiday classic.

In this powerful abstract film with a soundtrack of African drum music, Lye scratched "white ziggle-zag-splutter scratches" on to black leader, using a variety of tools from saw teeth to arrow heads. The first version of the film won a major award at the International Experimental Film Festival Held in Brussels in 1958 in association with the World's Fair. Stan Brakhage described the film as "an almost unbelievably immense masterpiece".

When a penguin escapes from the zoo, another one must be captured. Will it be Chilly Willy? Don't bet on it.

Smedley (a dog), the hottest thing on television and the star of his own I Love Smedley show, achieved his present status quite by accident.

A scientist and a writer explain the various meteorological phenomena to Meteora, the goddess of weather, while giving an insight into the technology involved in predicting them and warning about the threat of global climate change.

Wile E. Coyote's plans for catching the Road Runner involve a giant elastic spring, a gun and trampoline, TNT sticks in a barrel, and tornado seeds. The last of these schemes results in the Coyote being swept up by a twister and carried into a mine field.

Depicts the dreams, ideas, and struggles of three men (representing "truth," "beauty," and "good") who settle on a tiny island.

Droopy is guarding his flock of sheep from the rebel wolf.

Wile E. Coyote hopes to catch the Road Runner using a mallet, a cooking pan, a TNT stick, a balloon, and a piano dropped from a precipice. The last of these results in Wile E. falling to the road below along with the piano and ending up with 88 teeth.

Wile E. Coyote is once again after the Road Runner, this time resorting to hand grenades, dynamite, falling rocks and a speed potion (which contains vitamins R, P and M).

Jerry and his little French mouse friend are raiding while the king sleeps. They awaken him and he calls for Tom to give him an ultimatum: One more sound from the mice and it's off with Tom's head. The mice hear this and team up to torment Tom.

The Easter bunny brings an egg for Tom and Jerry that hatches into the little duckling. He keeps getting into water he shouldn't: the aquarium, water cooler, bathtub, sink, as the boys keep rescuing it. They try to give the duck back to the Easter bunny - no go. They leave it in the pond at the park and think they're home free, until the duckling brings his friends home.

Big Bad Wolf and his little nephew try to trap Bugs Bunny by making like fairy tale characters.

A retelling of the classic Canadian / American tall tale of the enormous lumberjack and his loyal companion, an equally huge blue ox.

George gives Joan a baby duck for her birthday. While they are out celebrating, Tom goes after the duck but his plans are thwarted when the duck (and, later, Jerry) finds a jar of vanishing cream and uses it to well, vanish, and get even with Tom (for a while, at least).

Lye created a series of scratched images in the 1950s – more regular or geometric than his usual style – to accompany Rock ‘n’ Rye, a track by jazz guitarist Tal Farlow, but he did not get far with the editing. He returned to the material in 1980 but died before it was completed. His assistant Steven Jones finished the film under the supervision of Lye’s widow Ann, who had been closely involved with all of Lye’s American films. - Harvard Film Archive

An absent-minded wolf sets out to catch Bugs for dinner but keeps forgetting what he was heading out to shoot in the first place.

Jerry and a friend overhear that Robin Hood is imprisoned; they set off to free him, but first they have to contend with his guard, Tom.

Bulldog Marc Anthony is a guard at a construction site. He finds a kitten, Pussyfoot, to whom he affectionately gives a wiener for lunch. A hungry, grown cat sees the wiener and tries to take it from Pussyfoot. So, in defense of his kitten friend, Marc Anthony fights the cat on the steal beams of the partly constructed skeleton of a building.

Mighty Angelo the Flea takes a vacation on a dog in the country. The muscular insect becomes the little mutt's protector when he is bullied by Butcher the bulldog.

Woody Woodpecker is wandering around the wild west again seeking to find some buried gold and he tangles with a crook who wishes to find the gold for himself. Woody finally disposes of the villain by shooting him into outer space via a rocket, another favorite method used by Woody to rid himself of whatever he wanted rid of at the moment. The horse steals the film.

Amid a snowy barnyard, Foghorn Leghorn deflects the carniverous attentions of a lip-smacking weasel.

The Goofy Gophers are about to harvest the vegetables on the farm when the farmhands beat them to the punch. Worried that their food source is being "vandalized," they follow the truck to the barn so they can recover what they consider to be their food.

Instead of fishing for salmon in the stream Windy the bear tries to show his son Breezy a shortcut method...by looting a cannery. The guard makes this a difficult task.

Polish short animation that plays with the idea of lineless animation vs lined animation. A lined cat chases an lineless mouse.

A hungry crow intrudes on a party honoring Speedy Gonzales, Mexico's fastest mouse, and tries to catch and eat some of Speedy's friends. Speedy leads the crow on a frustrating and violent chase that demoralizes the crow into surrendering and joining in Speedy's party, as the center of a dart board, and the target of a ball-throw.

Farmer Elmer Fudd agrees to provide a duck to his wife for dinner. Daffy Duck has been a moocher on Elmer's farm and has therefore not endeared himself to Fudd or to Fudd's dog.

Droopy and Butch are competing race car drivers in a road race. While Butch has the faster car, his cockiness and the time he spends on unsuccessful schemes to stop Droopy work against him.

The lady of the house has gone out for a few hours, leaving her baby in the care of a stereotypical 1950s teenager, who immediately begins calling her friends. Tom and Jerry must call a truce to their constant chases as the baby, unsupervised, continually gets loose. When the baby escapes out the front door, Tom and Jerry chase it to a construction site, where they frantically try to keep it from harm.

The chase continues between Tweety Bird and that persistant puddy tat, Sylvester. Tweety hides in a millinery store (where Granny happens to be shopping) and hides on a hat.

Inspired by the song Tenderly Jack Lawrence and Walter Gross, a tender animation on a florist and a sweeper that she falls madly in love.

Woody takes a trip to an arboretum where all birds are welcome... except woodpeckers.

Droopy, on an Irish stopover of an international flight, buys a souvenir leprechaun hat, and is mistaken for a real leprechaun by Spike.

Woody is hungry and needs food. And to get food, you need money. And to get money, you need a job. So he applies to be an insurance salesman and attempts to sell insurance to Dooley.

Woody gets a job as an alligator bagger, but the alligator has similar plans for the woodpecker.

Woody Woodpecker lives in a slum, and is fed up with his bills, wishing aloud that he were rich. At that moment, a four-leaf clover appears in the floorboards, and transforms into a leprechaun woodpecker, which grants Woody three wishes. Woody immediately wishes for immense wealth, and he gets it-- by robbing a bank without realizing it. A police chase follows; will Woody escape, and what will his other two wishes be?

A stuffy king decides his jester Dooley is worthless and unfunny. He spots Woody pecking at a tree and singing, and decides he would make a great jester. Thusly, the king kicks Dooley's unfunny arse out of the castle and orders him to fetch Woody. Hilarity ensues.

Bugs discovers a Micronesian Film Documentary in "Cromagnonscope" showing Elmer Fuddstone and a sabertooth bunny in 10,000 BC.

Man's best friend is the subject of a series of blackout gags, climaxing with the bogus heroism of a dog who travels across the country for an unexpected purpose.

Another wet and wild Sylvester Cat-Tweety Bird chase, this time in the flooded areas of Venice, Italy, where Granny has taken Tweety on vacation.

Deep in the woods, a birdwatcher is studying the various bird species found there. First, he discovers "love birds" (a henpecked husband bird and his grumbling bird spouse), and a "humming bird" (who hums rock tunes). Then he discovers Woody who gives him all sorts of trouble such as attaching his stethoscope to a running faucet, stretching the lens on his camera and then snapping it back on him, and sending all manner of trees tumbling down onto him.

Boxing bantam Pepe Chickeeto is continually bested in the boxing ring and considers retiring. Fortunately, he and his wife are expecting a son who, Pepe hopes, will carry on his great boxing legacy. He is quite disappointed when the son, Pepito by name, much prefers playing bongo drums to any kind of pugilism.

Sidney the elephant is looking for a mother, even though he's 44. The hippo and giraffe turn him down.

Geriatrics Foghorn Leghorn and the barnyard dog recount their years of violent, mutual heckling, unaware that outside the window of their house their grandsons are behaving the same. The short is essentially a clip show, in that the majority of the footage is reused from earlier cartoons.

A boy named Junior, who treats his dog, Elvis, cruelly, is scolded by his mother and sent to his room to have a nap.

A Hubley stand-in instructs iconic trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie on scoring a short commercial for an instant rope ladder.

When Spooky learns that Casper has a date with Wendy to the beach instead of playing baseball, he plays tricks on them.