Canned Feud

Canned Feud is a 1951 Looney Tunes short directed by I. Freleng.
== Title ==
The title is a pun on "canned food."
== Plot ==
Sylvester's family goes on vacation to California, but forgets to put him out. Sylvester abruptly notices this, finding that he is locked inside an empty house devoid of food with no milk being delivered for two weeks. Fortunately, he finds a cupboard full of canned tuna and cat food, but discovers that he also needs a can opener. He seemingly cannot find one, until he sees a mouse with one. He begs the mouse to give it, but the mouse throws it in his hole. Sylvester frantically tries and fails to retrieve it, and the mouse casually walks away. Furious, Sylvester gives chase to the mouse and crashes into the mouse's hole while trying to catch him.
Sylvester tries vainly to open the tuna by beating it against the floor and jumping on it. When this doesn't work he tries to chop it with an axe, but when he's about to swing, the blade flies off and goes out the mail slot. The mouse appears to be giving the can opener and when he tries to retrieve it the mouse grabs it and runs back into his hole causing Sylvester to crash into it again. Next he tries using a bent coat hanger to retrieve the can opener, however the mouse hooks it to a live wire and he receives an electric shock when the wire touches another. Sylvester then sets up a piano to drop on the can, just before the mouse offers the can opener, prompting Sylvester to release his hold on the rope attached to the piano, thereby crushing him. He then attempts to cut a larger hole in the wall to enter the mouse's home, but is foiled by the mouse simultaneously cutting the floor beneath Sylvester's feet.
His next attempt involves dynamite, which predictably backfires after the mouse inflates and pops a paper bag making him think the dynamite had already blown. His following attempt, involving a vacuum, results in Sylvester being sucked in, along with hot coals, and clumsily tumbling down into the basement while trying to hit the mouse with a golf club. However, the angrily persistent cat (thinking that that's the last straw) returns with an armful of dynamite and fireworks, but they blow prematurely while he's lighting the fuse, resulting in a tremendous explosion, but he does finally recover the can opener in the process. Going to the cupboard and yelling "I got it" along the way, he finds it locked, and the mouse now holds the key. Sylvester screams out in anguish and faints onto the floor, while the mouse merely shrugs and twirls the key on his finger.
== Censorship ==
* On CBS, the part where Sylvester uses a bent wire hanger to retrieve the can opener (only to get shocked when the hook of the hanger gets snagged on two bare electrical wires) was cut to remove Sylvester tugging harder and the predictable result of Sylvester getting shocked.http://www.intanibase.com/gac/looneytunes/censored-c.aspx
** The same scene that was cut on CBS was also removed on Nickelodeon (even though a similar scene in the Sylvester cartoon "Yankee Dood It" was left intact). Also cut was a scene where Sylvester uses an axe to open his can of cat food, only to have the blade fly off and go through the mail slot (even though a similar scene in the Daffy Duck/Speedy Gonzales short "Moby Duck" was left uncensored on Nickelodeon).
== Availability ==
24Karat-SylvesterAndTweety.jpg|(1985) VHS Sylvester and Tweety's Crazy Capers
lt stcc beta.jpg|(1985) Beta Sylvester and Tweety's Crazy Capers
SYLVESTER AND TWEETY'S BAD OL' PUTTY TAT BLUES.jpg|(1994) LaserDisc Sylvester and Tweety's Bad Ol' Putty Tat Blues
Lt bumper woolworths.jpg|(1995) VHS Bumper Edition (Woolworths Exclusive)
Gjhniulk.jpg|(1996) VHS Looney Tunes Collection - Sylvester and Tweety
Bumper2000.jpg|(2000) VHS Mil-Looney-Um 2000 - Bumper Collection
LT Golden Collection 1.jpg|(2003) DVD Looney Tunes Golden Collection: Volume 1, Disc Four (1998 THIS VERSION, without dubbed notice)
Looney Tunes Spotlight Collection 1.jpg|(2003) DVD Looney Tunes Spotlight Collection: Volume 1, Disc Two (1998 THIS VERSION, without dubbed notice)
A1L-oj097sL. AC SL1500 .jpg|(2003) VHS Tweety & Sylvester (2003)
lt cas2.jpg|(2004) DVD Looney Tunes Collection All Stars Volume 2
lt cas12.jpg|(2004) DVD Looney Tunes Collection All Stars Volumes 1 & 2, Disc 2
Saturday Morning Cartoons 1960s Volume 2.jpg|(2009) DVD Saturday Morning Cartoons: 1960s Volume 2, Disc 1 (part of The Bugs Bunny Show, without opening and closing titles)
LTPC VOL 2 Blu Ray.jpg|(2012) Blu-ray Looney Tunes Platinum Collection: Volume 2, Disc One (original opening color rings restored)
LTPC VOL 2 DVD.jpg|(2012) DVD Looney Tunes Platinum Collection: Volume 2, Disc One (original opening color rings restored)
LooneyTunes CenterStageV2.jpg|(2014) DVD Looney Tunes Center Stage Volume 2
lt spotlight v1-3.jpg|(2018) DVD Looney Tunes Spotlight Collection Volumes 1-3 Repack
=== Streaming ===
Lt boomerang.jpg|Boomerang (2017 - )
Lt hbo max.jpg|HBO Max (2020 - 2022 ) (original opening color rings restored)
Lt max.jpg|Max (2024 - ) (original opening color rings restored)
Lt itunes.jpg|iTunes (-) (original opening color rings restored)
== Analysis ==
"Canned Feud" is considered one of the more unusual Sylvester cartoons to have ever been produced. In this short, Sylvester is paired with the same unnamed mouse from "Rhapsody Rabbit" and "Stooge for a Mouse". In contrast to the mouse's sympathetic personality in those two shorts, here he is a sadistic nuisance to Sylvester, trying to starve him out of pure malice. Usually, Sylvester is the one who instigates conflict with other characters, such as his persistence to eating Tweety. But in this short, the mouse is the one who instigates the conflict with Sylvester by refusing to give the desperate feline a can-opener. 
Robert McKimson would later revisit the premise in the cartoon, "Moby Duck", featuring Daffy Duck and Speedy Gonzales. While Sylvester was the hero of "Canned Feud", Daffy was the villain of "Moby Duck" as he refuses to share a box of canned goods with Speedy, who in turn refuses to share him a can-opener despite offering it to him several times.
== Notes ==
* A gag involving a falling piano and piano key teeth was reused in both "The Super Snooper" and "Hook, Line and Stinker".
** Sylvester gets piano key teeth again in "Muzzle Tough", and one of the sound effects was reused.
**A similar piano key teeth gag is later re-enacted in one of the 2004-2011 Boomerang Europe character idents, except that the victim cat in question is Tom from Tom and Jerry instead of Sylvester. Co-incidentally, both Tom and Jerry and Looney Tunes are currently owned by Warner Bros. as of 1997 following the 1996 Time Warner-Turner Entertainment merger.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LWi9PYQ13U0&ab_channel=DainisN
*At once scene where one of Sylvester's owners leaves a note to the milkman to not deliver milk to the house for two weeks because they're on vacation, their last name is revealed to be Champin, which is a reference to animator Ken Champin.
*The various cans of cat food in the cupboard include Pawley's Salmon, a reference to layout artist Hawley Pratt, Fritzling Packed Sardines, a Friz Freleng reference, Ross Codfish after Virgil Ross, and Champin Tuna, another Ken Champin reference. Cans of Starkist Tuna are also present.
*Most of this cartoon was used in the Thanksgiving special Bugs Bunny's Thanksgiving Diet.
*The Looney Tunes Golden Collection: Volume 1, Disc 4 release uses the 1955-64 rendition of "The Merry-Go-Round Broke Down", sources have it that the original music did exist in the 1998 dubbed version and the unrestored transfers beforehand such as the LaserDisc print and the Golden Jubilee tape print.https://vk.com/search?c%5Bq%5D=canned%20feud&c%5Bsection%5D=video&z=video215159502_165540791
*Recent airings on Boomerang have the restored version with the original opening rings as well as the available streaming services.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gXvzO95pk0s
*This is the first Freleng cartoon written by Warren Foster.
* This is Manuel Perez's first short he animated for the Freleng unit since 1949's "Each Dawn I Crow".
==Gallery==
CannedFeudCredits1.png
CannedFeudCredits2.png
Canned feud-2.png|Cabinet full of cans of tuna, with joke names like "Hawley's Salmon" and "Champin Tuna"
Canned feud-4.png|Sylvester begging the mouse to hand over the can opener.
Canned feud-1.png|The mouse, blowing a brown bag to fool Sylvester into thinking that the dynamite exploded.
Canned Feud Lobby Card.jpg|Lobby card
File:Canned Feud Layout.jpg|Layout drawing
File:Canned Feud Layout 2.jpg|Layout drawing
File:Canned Feud Layout 3.jpg|Layout drawing
==See also==
*List of Sylvester Cartoons
==References==
==External links==
*"Canned Feud" on the SFX Resource
fr:Mise en boîte
Category:Cartoons directed by Friz Freleng
Category:Sylvester Cartoons
Category:1951
Category:Shorts
Category:Looney Tunes Shorts
Category:Blue Ribbon reissues
Category:Cartoons written by Warren Foster
Category:Cartoons written by Cal Howard
Category:Cartoons with layouts by Hawley Pratt
Category:Cartoons with music by Carl W. Stalling
Category:Cartoons with characters voiced by Mel Blanc
Category:Cartoons with characters voiced by Bea Benaderet
Category:Cartoons with orchestrations by Milt Franklyn
Category:Cartoons with film editing by Treg Brown
Category:Cartoons with sound effects edited by Treg Brown
Category:Cartoons produced by Eddie Selzer
Category:Cartoons with backgrounds by Paul Julian
Category:Re-released cartoons whose original titles are known to exist