User Reviews

Turner Classic Movies has a Saturday Morning "Cartoon" Alley hosted by Josh Mankiewicz. I happened to turn it on between 12:00 P.M. and 12:30 P.M. yesterday. They showed three Warner Brother Cartoons that were done for the morale of home audiences respecting the war effort in World War II. This was the first one.

I have to admit that I first saw this in the 1960s, when it was shown fairly frequently. Of course some of the humor did not make much sense to me - except that it was destructive. The business of Von Falcon, the Nazi Commandant, cleaning his eye which looked like the sort of monocle that Conrad Veidt wore in ESCAPE was funny, but I could not see the reference. Nor did I understand "Oh is that you Mert?" when Von Falcon tries to use the payphone (the rate of a nickel for the phone call is rather upsetting in 2007 - if one uses a pay phone now it usually is $ .25 for a local call). The reference to Fibber McGee would be a dead loss in 1963, even though Bob Sweeney would be in a drab television version of the Jordans' successful radio comedy.

The plot of this ten minute cartoon is simple. Von Falcon is assigned to keep American commandos out of his area - or else! He spots Daffy Duck parachuting in*, and with the aid of Private Schultz he tries to capture Daffy. Instead Daffy manages to blow up Schultz (with a bomb meant for Von Falcon, and to cause four Messerschmidts to destroy each other trying to hit his plane ("A mess of Messerschmidts", Daffy chortles triumphantly). Finally, however, the German bird momentarily gets the better of Daffy and shoots him out of a cannon. But Daffy remains clever enough to use this to advantage - he is fired towards Berlin, and ends on the platform with Hitler (who is giving a speech), whom he hits on the head with a mallet. All along Von Falcon has called for the loyal Private Schultz, who shows up just to be hit on the head with a mallet. Now it is Der Fuhrer who calls for Schultz, as the cartoon ends.

*Oddly he is singing the old British music hall song, "It's the same the whole world over" as he descends.

It has been pointed out that the hapless Private Schultz in the cartoon may be the origin for the John Banner character in HOGAN'S HEROES. Possibly that may be right. But actually, the character and the constant calling of his name by his superior officer is taken from the movie TO BE OR NOT TO BE by Ernst Lubitsch, and starring Carole Lombard, Jack Benny, Robert Stack, and Sig Ruman. Ruman's character, Col. "concentration camp" Erhardt has an assistant named Schultz, whom he calls whenever he needs a flunky to blame things on. When, at the end of that movie, Erhardt thinks he is in disgrace with Hitler over Lombard, Erhardt pulls out his revolver. We watch behind a closed door and hear the gun fire. There is a pause, and suddenly we hear Ruman yell "SCHULTZ!!" That was probably where the idea of the Private Schultz who is blamed for everything came from.

I should also add that Private Schultz's appearance may have had a later, more lasting version. With him being all helmet, eyes (wide behind glasses) and feet, he is the model for the later immortal Martin the Martian - Daffy Duck Dodgers' evenly fallible rival in the future.

Daffy – the Commando is one of those rare World War II cartoons that rarely see the light of day now. However, for some reason, this cartoon shows up on two videos I had when I was a kid. I enjoyed this cartoon when I was little, but I really had no clue what was really going on. Daffy does his usual hijinks but flustering a couple of odd-looking birds and smashing Hitler on the head with a mallet. It's just so weird to see a scene like that with Hitler speaking in front of his followers. We've seen footage of that dozens of times, and it's just horrifying, but throw in Daffy Duck, a mallet, and you have some good physical comedy!

Now truth be told, I'm not the biggest Daffy fan, especially the early version of Daffy, but this cartoon does provide some good laughs and is an interesting piece of animation history. With Daffy Duck on our side, the enemy doesn't have a chance!

My IMDb Rating: 7/10

I was nine when I saw this. Granted it was 1987 and WWII was long over, but the magic was still there, no question about it. This is the essential World War II cartoon. I am a WWII buff today, and I think it's in a large part due to this cartoon. It has some great moments: Daffy putting on a hand/puppet show in the spotlight, the fight over a nickel in the phone booth, and a climax of Daffy wacking Hitler over the head with a mallet. A must-see! And if you look carefully, you can see a nude pinup in the Nazi bunker!

. . . World War Two Era Looney Tune, DAFFY--THE COMMANDO finds himself surrounded in the sky by Racist Nazi enemy planes, whereupon he delivers perhaps the most memorable line in his career as a Warner Bros. Headliner: "Messerschmitts! A whole mess of Messerschmitts!" At the time COMMANDO was released, Nazi Air Marshal Hermann "Fatso" Goering's Lufftwaffe had been terrorizing Europe for half a decade, relying largely on the aircraft designed by Nazi Baptist War Criminal Willy Messerschmitt. Willy's slave laborers produced 33,984 of the Bf109-model fighter planes surrounding Daffy, mostly at the Mauthausen, KZ Gusen I and Gusen II Death Camps. While Dutch diarist Anne Frank did not herself construct any of these war planes and was murdered in an unrelated incident, 40,000 of the slaves overseen by Willy were rubbed out during the War (mostly for missing a rivet on Willy's Death Machines). For his "collaboration" with the Nazi's, Willy spent two years in prison (or about 29 minutes per slaying) after VE-Day, and sullied this Earth with his presence well into 1978.

Historically speaking, this is a pretty important film, as it helped solidify the public in the war effort against the Nazis. However, from a purely aesthetic point of view, it's not one of the better made or entertaining Daffy Duck films ever made.

Daffy appears behind German lines and spends most of the film annoying a Nazi officer and his flunky, Schultz. Again and again, Daffy outwits them until the end, when he is shot by a howitzer and he lands in the middle of one of Hitler's speeches. Oddly, while it was a cartoon, Hitler looked very realistic. The film ends with Daffy bashing Hitler over the head with a mallet.

On Google videos, this cartoon short appears under the heading "banned cartoons" and whether or not Warner Brothers actually banned or at least pulled it from circulation in unknown, though considering most of the public have no interest in WWII propaganda cartoons, I wouldn't be surprised if they did.

Many wartime cartoons ended up being pretty racist, due to how they portrayed the Japanese, but when they portrayed only Nazis, they were quite funny. In "Daffy - The Commando", Daffy Duck parachutes into enemy territory and makes life a living hell for Nazi Kommandant Von Vulture. Finally at the end, Von Vulture shoots Daffy out of a cannon, and Daffy lands next to Hitler, who is making a speech. He promptly conks the Fuhrer on the head with a mallet.

Some people may object to using Nazism for comedy, but remember, Charlie Chaplin did it masterfully in "The Great Dictator". Admittedly, this cartoon isn't on the same level, but it's good for a few laughs.

One of the 'looney tunes go to war' shorts, as Daffy lands somewhere in Europe to kick some nazi ass. There's a funny scene introducing him, as he's landing with his parachute and he is spotted by a huge searchlight. So Daffy screams: 'Hey, turn off the light!' and obviously, the dumb German guy (or animal, as you wish) does at his command.

Story then gets into a chase that leads nowhere (something with a phone booth, I didn't really get it) and Daffy also takes out half a dozen nazi aeroplanes, before finally getting caught in a huge cannon. But Daffy makes the most of it as he uses a couple of American flags as wings to fly him towards (a real looking) Hitler, he can hit on the head with a huge hammer.

By far not the best in it's genre, but Daffy's never really been my favorite Looney Tune anyway...

5/10.

This is by far, one of the best cartoons in all Looney Tunes cartoon history.

Sadly, it has been banned in most places for poking fun at Nazis and Hitler (both of which were very deserving targets for jokes at the time. And still are, in some cases.)

Daffy outsmarts a couple Nazi birds, but eventually gets caught by the head vulture, who shoots him out of a cannon. Daffy soars into the sky, showing off his American pride, and then smacks Hitler on the head with a mallet. Truly classic.

Great cartoon, made during one of the worst times in history. 10/10

"Daffy - The Commando" is a terrific Daffy Duck cartoon made during the Second World War, so you can bet money on the fact that this film lampoons Hitler and his army of fascists, and it does so quite nicely.

Here are, in my opinion, the funniest scenes in "Daffy - The Commando" (don't read any further if you haven't yet seen this cartoon). When Schultz makes his first appearance, he goose-steps into Nazi headquarters, gets malleted on the cranium, and is forced to listen to a bunch of mock German from his superior. Daffy is wonderfully hilarious when he rushes into the telephone booth, then he sticks his head out as he indignantly asks the Nazi commander to wait his turn, and then Daffy politely asks him for a nickel (all in the worst mock German, with English subtitles). And Daffy bouncing wildly in the fuselage of his airplane, after the "mess of Messerschmitts" destroys each other, is a sight to behold.

Directed by the great Friz Freleng, "Daffy - The Commando" is surely a cartoon to laugh at, or laugh WITH, whichever is more appropriate.