The Vanishing Private

The Vanishing Private is a 1942 animated cartoon short by the Walt Disney Studios, starring Donald Duck in the World War II years.
==Synopsis==
Donald Duck is doing some camouflage painting on a cannon with yellow, green, and red stripes and black dots. Sergeant Pete sees it and scolds Donald, claiming that anyone could recognize it. Peter demands Donald to re-paint the gun to make it "hard to see". Obliging to the sergeant's orders, Donald walks off to the "Experimental Laboratory: Camouflage Corps" disregarding the 'keep out' sign ("It didn't say 'positively'," says Donald) and walks in. He finds some "invisible paint", which he dips his finger into and is shocked to see it gone. He then places his entire hand over the invisible finger, and the friction makes it visible again ("there you are!"). Figuring this will be ideal, Donald proceeds to repaint the cannon.
When Pete arrives, he is shocked to see that the cannon is gone, and shouts that Donald has stolen the cannon. But it is not stolen as the sergeant finds out the hard way by bonking his head in the underside of the cannon and discovering Donald inside. Angered that Donald painted the cannon too invisible to look, Pete blows hard into one end of the barrel, sending Donald into the bucket of invisible paint. When Donald runs away from Pete, the latter finds out Donald has become invisible seeing Donald's footprints on the ground. Donald swims across a lake and the invisible paint doesn't come off.
Pete continues to chase Donald through a field of flowers, searching through the flowers, until he accidentally throws the flowers on Donald revealing his outline. Pete spots Donald and tries to catch him but Donald gets away again. The flowers give Pete an idea to find Donald. When the General drives up, Pete's antics, including jumping around a tree while singing "Here We Go Round the Mulberry Bush" and throwing flowers, convinces the General that he is acting odd, especially after Pete asks the General "did you see a little guy that you can't see?" and the invisible Donald puts a cactus down Pete's pants, making Pete screaming in pain and jump around like a madman and the General wonders what is up with Pete.
Donald goes to the mess hall and sees some pies in the window and Donald takes a pie and eats it. Pete then notices this and Donald throws the pie in Pete's face. Donald is skipping a rope, angering Pete, so he chases Donald around a tank. Donald then trips Pete, sending him literally under the grass, under some soldiers, and out again into the arsenal facility, where he gets hold of several grenades and begins blowing things up to stop Donald, literally on the warpath, starting with a pine tree that literally flies into the air and floats down. The General seeing this gets scared when Pete runs towards him and the frightened General hides behind a nearby power pole. The General tries to reassure Pete and stop his rampage, but when Donald pokes Pete in the rear with the General's sword, the startled sergeant jumps into the air and onto the General releasing all of the grenades that land on Pete and the General, injuring them in the explosion.
Later, Pete is locked up in a padded cell, wearing a straitjacket and shackled to a leg iron, as he has been declared insane by the army for his bad actions, much to his insistent protests that he isn't. He pleads to Donald (who is no longer invisible and now on guard duty) to "Go tell the General that I ain't crazy" but Donald refuses, asking Pete "Do you think I'm crazy?" before resuming his duties and begins to whistle The Army's Not the Army Anymore.
==Characters==
*Donald Duck (voiced by Clarence Nash)
*Pete (voiced by Billy Bletcher)
*The General (voiced by Don Brodie)
==Releases==
=== Television ===
*Disneyland, episode #2.18: "A Day in the Life of Donald Duck"
=== Home Video ===
VHS
* Walt Disney Cartoon Classics: Limited Gold Editions: An Officer and a Duck
LaserDisc
* Walt Disney Cartoon Classics: Limited Gold Editions: An Officer and a Duck
DVD
* Bedknobs and Bromsticks (30th Anniversary; Gold Classic Collection)
* Walt Disney Treasures: On the Front Lines
* Walt Disney Treasures: The Chronological Donald, Volume 2
==Trivia==
* This is one of the few cartoons in which Donald doesn't lose his temper.
* Donald's singing of Here We Go 'Round the Mulberry Bush is based on the 1933 Universal horror film The Invisible Man, where at one point in the film, Dr. Griffin, the titular Invisible Man (played by Claude Raines), terrorizes various villagers from Sussex and at one point is shown skipping and singing Here We Go Gathering Nuts in May, which uses the same tune.
* In the end, it is unknown how Donald was visible again or what happened to the General.
==Gallery==
TheVanishingPrivatetitlecard.png|Title card
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35211.jpg|"Hmm, what this?"
VANISHING PRIVATE.png|The whole cherry pie was thrown at Pete's face by the invisible Donald.
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Aust db vanishing private WC17710 B.jpg|Poster from a release in Australia
Category:Animated shorts
Category:Donald Duck shorts
Category:World War II films
Category:1942 shorts
Category:Pete Shorts