Jack Kinney and Jack Hannah | Father's Week-end / 1953

 

a moment of unexpected love

by Douglas Messerli

 

Dick Kinney and Brice Mack (story), Jack Kinney and Jack Hannah (directors) Father's Week-end / 1953

 

The animated cartoon Father’s Week-end features Goofy as Pete, the everyman 1950s father, trying to catch up from a busy week by sleeping in on Sunday morning. The film uses the standard family man tropes of the day to mildly satirize while reifying the standard notions of heterosexual normalcy.

     As Goofy attempts to sleep late, his son Junior sneaks into bed with him, eventually pushing him off the bed as Goofy’s wife screams out for the boy to leave his father alone since he likes to sleep on Sunday morning. She follows up her vocal intrusions by immediately vacuuming up the bedroom where he hasn’t even been able to rise up off the floor.

     A run to get the papers in his bathrobe follows, as suddenly all his neighbors seem to be up and already working in their yards to observe his state of undress. A mess of Sunday papers tossed about the living room and his own slovenly attire requires sudden spiffing up as Goofy spots what seem to be Sunday visitors on the way to his front door; in fact, they’re visiting the next-door neighbors. And despite his momentary ability to fit snugly into a hammock, his wife reminds him of his promise to take Junior to the beach for the day.

     The naughty Junior and their pet dog make his drive on the suddenly busy highway nearly impossible, but worse yet are the boy’s cries as his balloon floats off and he later loses the ice cream cone Goofy has bought him to quiet him down.

     A visit to the nearby Carnival follows, with a stomach-dropping roller-coaster ride; and before Goofy can even kiss level ground again, Junior is off behind the carney stands and taking a voyage

into the Tunnel of Love, Goofy racing after.

    Like so many cartoons of the period, the creators inexplicably introduce a gay scene here, as we see Goofy coming out of the tunnel in a boat with a sailor’s arm around him and his head on his shoulder—obviously a mix up in the dark bowels of the ride. When the sailor discovers Goofy as his lover, the bemused Goofy gets a thrashing, which ends up, as he is thrown in a tattoo parlor, with a memory of the event, a full ship emblazoned upon his chest.

      After a chase through the Fun House, Goofy finally grabs up Junior and attempts to escape the beach before the rush of the crowd home; but of course, his escape is synchronized perfectly with every other beach goer’s exit, as the highway ends in a bumper to bumper, stand-still trip back home. Exhausted, he arrives back in suburbia, the narrator noting that fortunately the next day is Monday with a whole week of 9-to-5 work following where Goofy and every other working male can rest up for the next busy week-end.

      Between the proprieties of suburban living, the requirements of family life, and the responsibilities and dangers of raising children, the most thrilling and quiet moment of Goofy’s week-end appears to be that for just an instant he found himself in the arms of another man declaring his love.

 

Los Angeles, May 9, 2023

Reprinted from World Cinema Review (May 2023).