Popeye The Sailor Meets Sindbad The Sailor -193... -

Fleischer’s technical innovation shines here. The use of “stereoptical” depth (a 3D-like process using a moving background and a stationary camera on a rig) makes the final punch feel as though it has ruptured the screen itself. Popeye doesn’t defeat Sindbad through trickery or cleverness; he defeats him through an upgrade in mass. This is the brutalism of early animation, closer to the demolition derby logic of Tex Avery than the genteel magic of Disney.

No discussion of this short is complete without analyzing its climax. After being pummeled, flattened into an accordion, and literally rolled into a ball by the colossal Sindbad, Popeye is defeated. But he is not dead. He reaches into his shirt, pulls out a can of spinach, and—in a sequence that has become iconic—the can opens, the green contents slither into his mouth like a serpent, and his body inflates. Popeye The Sailor Meets Sindbad The Sailor -193...

The film opens not on Popeye, but on his antagonist. Sindbad (voiced with a stentorian, almost operatic glee by Jack Mercer’s father, William Pennell) is a figure of pure, unbridled id. He stands atop a craggy island, surrounded by giant vultures, a two-headed roc, and a harem of anthropomorphic bottled genies. He introduces himself with a boastful song, “I’m Sindbad the Sailor,” which is less a melody than a series of flexes. He is a collector of exotic threats—a lion rug that still roars, a giant snake he uses as a lasso. Sindbad represents the old world of myth: power derived from conquest, scale, and fear. Fleischer’s technical innovation shines here