Showing posts with label Blake Edwards. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Blake Edwards. Show all posts

Friday, 10 June 2011

The Pink Panther

I'd like to introduce you to my friend Panter:


I bought Panter approximately one year and half ago. It was love at first sight. I saw him in a store in a German theme park and couldn't keep my eyes off him. When I saw that he wasn't even expensive, I bought him. Yes, I'm such a cheapskate. Anyway, I carried him around in a plastic sack the whole day, but I made sure he could see everything that happened by keeping his head outside of the sack. He is rather tall, so if he stood up in the sack, there was no problem for him at all. I named him "Panter", which is the Dutch word for "Panther". I admit I'm great when it comes to thinking of names.
As a child I loved the Pink Panther and after having bought Panther, this obsession returned immediately. Ever since, I've been collecting all kind of Panther parafernalia. I even have a Panther yoga set.

Panter practising his yoga together with the small bendable pink panther that came along with the yoga set.

My sister absolutely dislikes the Pink Panther cartoons, which I cannot understand. I believe they are all time classic, just like Donald Duck or Tom and Jerry.
The Pink Panther is younger than Donald or Tom and Jerry, though. He first appeared in 1963, in the opening and closing credit sequences of Blake Edwards' Pink Panther movies, the ones about the clumsy Inspector Clouseau. The actual Pink Panther was in fact a diamond, but the cartoon gained popularity.
I didn't even know these movies existed, until a few years ago and used to believe the Pink Panther was just the cartoon. But ever since I have seen a couple of Pink Panther movies, I love those too. My alltime favourite comedy actor, Peter Sellers is incredibly funny as inspector Clouseau and I can't keep myself from laughing when I watch one of these films.
I already have the cartoon DVD box, but I still want the movie box too. (Feel free to buy me this box.)

Back in the 1960s, pink panthers were still allowed to smoke cigarettes.

It was in 1964, the Pink Panther became a star on his own, in the cartoon The Pink Phink. He appeared to be a talented actor and his first movie was an instant hit. It even won an Oscar for Best Animated Short Film in the same year.
This film shows how the Little Man is trying to paint the walls of his house blue, but our pink friend thinks it would be a better idea to have them painted pink. The Little Man is alwas grumpy and that makes this cartoon film only funnier.
Feel free to watch:



The Pink Panther was a rising star and his cartoons appeared until the 1980s. Unfortunately, they're not often broadcast anymore, but I'm glad they were still shown on television when I was little.
Throughout these years, this famous panther always stayed dexterous and his fellow cartoon characters that appeared in his series too, were practically always annoyed by his behaviour, which we, as his fans enjoyed. Malicious pleasure is one of the best pleasures around, after all.
Yes, the Pink Panther certainly is a legend. - No matter what my sister says.