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40-415: This is the first of three comedy horror -themed cartoons that starred the duo, with the other two being Claws for Alarm (1954) and Jumpin' Jupiter (1955). They all had the running theme of Porky and Sylvester settling down for the night in a location that was dangerous, with Porky being oblivious and Sylvester being aware and trying to alert Porky, but only succeeding in annoying him. Porky purchases

80-409: A longcase clock , tall-case clock , grandfather's clock , hall clock or floor clock ) is a tall, freestanding, weight-driven pendulum clock , with the pendulum held inside the tower or waist of the case. Clocks of this style are commonly 1.8–2.4 metres (6–8 feet) tall with an enclosed pendulum and weights, suspended by either cables or chains, which have to be occasionally calibrated to keep

120-492: A "Royal" pendulum ) meaning that each swing (or half-period) takes one second. They are about 1 metre (3 ft 3 in) long (to the centre of the bob), requiring a long, narrow case. That case pre-dated the anchor clock by a few decades, appearing in clocks in 1660, to allow a long drop for the powering weights. However, once the seconds pendulum began to be used, the long case proved perfect for housing it as well. British clockmaker William Clement, who disputed credit for

160-407: A big lump on his head. At that moment, he sees that the mice are about to drop an anvil on Porky from a crawlspace above the bed. Sylvester grabs the anvil at the last moment. Porky awakes and sees Sylvester poised above him with it in his hands. Porky questions Sylvester's intentions before dropping it on the cat's head and leading the way back to the kitchen. Descending the staircase, Sylvester sees

200-421: A case, so most free-standing clocks had short pendulums. The anchor mechanism reduced the pendulum's swing to around 4 to 6 degrees, allowing clockmakers to use longer pendulums, which had slower "beats". They consumed less power, allowing clocks to run longer between windings, caused less friction and wear in the movement, and were more accurate. Almost all longcase clocks use a seconds pendulum (also called

240-695: A large wooden mallet . Seeing this, Porky warns Sylvester to look out, but the mouse clobbers Sylvester on the head, knocking him unconscious, much to Porky's shock. The mouse then yanks off his hood, revealing that he has transformed into a Lew Lehr caricature wearing a Napoleonic -era bicorne hat. The snaggletoothed rodent then chuckles and declares, "Pussycats is the cwaziest peoples!" In Jerry Beck 's 2020 compendium The 100 Greatest Looney Tunes Cartoons , animator Yvette Kaplan expresses her admiration for this short's script as well as for its pairing of Porky and Sylvester: The enormously amusing Scaredy Cat , from director Chuck Jones and writer Mike Maltese,

280-402: A more accurate variation of the anchor escapement called the deadbeat escapement . Traditionally, longcase clocks were made with two types of movement : eight-day and one-day (30-hour) movements. A clock with an eight-day movement required winding only once a week, while generally less-expensive 30-hour clocks had to be wound daily. Eight-day clocks are often driven by two weights – one driving

320-447: A new home from a real estate agent, which turns out to be an old Gothic -style house. His pet cat Sylvester is frightened by the creepy-looking place, but Porky finds it "quaint" and "peaceful" and looks forward to his first night there. Sylvester gets spooked by a bat and jumps inside Porky's coat, and Porky chastises him by pointing out that the bat is harmless before declaring that he is going upstairs to bed while Sylvester will sleep in

360-527: A style of longcase clock made in the French region Franche-Comté (hence their name). Features distinguishing this style are a curving "potbellied" case and a greater use of curved lines. A heavy, elongated, highly ornamented pendulum bob often extends up the case (see photo). Production of these clocks began in 1680 and continued for about 230 years. During the peak production years (1850–1890) over 60,000 clocks were made each year. These clocks were trendy across

400-430: A weapon, then decides to use the whole tree instead and races back into the mouse-infested house to fight. He sends the hundreds of murderous mice running for their lives, much to his conscience's delight. With the mice now all supposedly gone for good, Porky graciously apologizes to Sylvester and thanks him for saving his life. One leftover mouse (the executioner) pops out of the longcase clock behind Sylvester, wielding

440-413: A wizard's robe and carrying a star-tipped wand) appears with an easel. Using the easel to draw diagrams and charts, the conscience berates Sylvester for cowardly leaving Porky to save his own skin, reminding how Porky raised him as a kitten, showing him the "comparative sizes" of a cat to a mouse, and demanding that he return to the house to take action. Reinvigorated, Sylvester grabs a tree branch for use as

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480-541: Is a literary , television , and film genre that combines elements of comedy and horror fiction . Comedy horror has been described as having three types: " black comedy , parody and spoof." Comedy horror can also parody or subtly spoof horror clichés as its main source of humour or use those elements to take a story in a different direction. Examples of comedy horror films include Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein (1948), An American Werewolf in London (1981),

520-465: Is a common element. While comedy horror films provide scares for audiences, they also provide something that dramatic horror films do not: "the permission to laugh at your fears, to whistle past the cinematic graveyard and feel secure in the knowledge that the monsters can't get you". In the era of silent film , the source material for early comedy horror films came from stage performances instead of literature. One example, The Ghost Breaker (1914),

560-431: Is a near perfect cartoon. Porky and Sylvester are a clown-and-straight-man duo on par with any you can think of. And though it's Porky, the straight man, who gets top billing in the opening title card, the wordless clown, Sylvester, steals the show...The more obvious Sylvester's torment, in fact, the more oblivious Porky becomes—and the funnier the gags. Comedy horror Comedy horror (also called horror comedy )

600-591: Is fully operational, with chimes on each quarter hour. It was made by Svoboda Industries in 1976 as a Bicentennial project and is located in Kewaunee, Wisconsin . The advent of the longcase clock was due to the invention of the anchor escapement mechanism by Robert Hooke in about 1658. Before adopting the anchor mechanism, pendulum clock movements used an older verge escapement mechanism, which required very wide pendulum swings of about 80–100 degrees. Long pendulums with such wide swings could not be fitted within

640-467: Is nothing to fear. After a few seconds of silence, Sylvester looks in the kitchen and sees the mice parading as they did earlier with the other cat, only now it is Porky who bound and gagged and on his way to be decapitated. As the mice take him away, a weeping Porky holds up a sign that reads "YOU WERE RIGHT – SYLVESTER". Sylvester is horrified and immediately flees out of the house. As he rests to catch his breath, his conscience (a miniature Sylvester wearing

680-591: The Evil Dead franchise (1981–present), Gremlins (1984), Shaun of the Dead (2004), and The Cabin in the Woods (2011). Horror and comedy have been associated with each other since the early days of horror novels. Author Bruce G. Hallenbeck cites the 1820 short story " The Legend of Sleepy Hollow " by Washington Irving as "the first great comedy horror story". The story made readers "laugh one moment and scream

720-747: The What We Do in the Shadows (franchise) , Wellington Paranormal , comedies Todd and the Book of Pure Evil , Shining Vale and Santa Clarita Diet , and cartoons Beetlejuice , Courage the Cowardly Dog , School for Vampires , and Scooby-Doo . More recent examples include The Owl House , Wednesday , Don't Hug Me I'm Scared , Gravity Falls , Hazbin Hotel and Helluva Boss . Longcase clock A grandfather clock (also

760-410: The "ridiculous acting" and orders Sylvester back to the kitchen. Too frightened to comply, Sylvester pulls a gun from a dresser drawer and prepares to shoot himself in the head rather than face whatever fate the mice have in store for the pair. Horrified, Porky disarms Sylvester and is forced to let him share the bed in order to alleviate his trouble. As Porky and Sylvester are sleeping, four mice push

800-420: The anchor escapement with Robert Hooke, had made the first longcase clocks by 1680. Later the same year, Thomas Tompion , the most prominent British clockmaker, was making them too. Longcase clocks spread rapidly from England to other European countries and Asia. The first longcase clocks, like all clocks prior to the anchor escapement, had only one hand; an hour hand . The increased accuracy made possible by

840-531: The anchor motivated the addition of the minute hand to clock faces in the next few decades. Between 1680 and 1800, the average price of a grandfather clock in England remained steady at £1 10s. In 1680, that was the amount paid by an average working family for a year's rent, so the purchase of clocks was confined to the wealthy. But by 1800, wages had increased enough to allow many lower middle-class households to own grandfather clocks. Modern longcase clocks use

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880-431: The basket, is lowered below the floor just after 1:00 A.M. and is raised up again just before 4:00 A.M., without the basket and with the normally black portions of his fur having turned completely pale gray. Traumatized, he makes his way to Porky's room where he startles the pig awake with his gruesome appearance. Finally at his wits' end, Porky drags him downstairs, and goes into the kitchen by himself to show Sylvester there

920-419: The bed out of the window, and it sticks on a pole. Porky, half-asleep and thinking it is cold in the room, asks Sylvester to close the window. Sylvester proceeds to do so, himself barely awake and walking on thin air, as the pole springs the bed back into the room. Sylvester closes a tiny curtain on a birdhouse, gets back into the bed that is not there and falls to the ground. He comes through the bedroom door with

960-405: The chain hanging down next to the weight. To wind a chain-driven longcase clock, one pulls on the end of each chain , lifting the weights until they are just under the clock's face. In the early 20th century, quarter-hour chime sequences were added to longcase clocks. A full chime sequence sounds at the top of each hour, immediately followed by the hour strike. At 15 minutes after each hour, 1/4 of

1000-423: The chime sequence plays. Proceeding that, at the bottom of each hour, 1/2 of the chime sequence plays. Then finally, at 15 minutes before each hour, 3/4 of the chime sequence plays. The chime tune used in almost all longcase clocks is Westminster Quarters . Many also offer the option of Whittington chimes or St. Michael's chimes , selectable by a switch mounted on the right side of the dial, allowing one to silence

1040-437: The chimes if desired. As a result of adding chime sequences, all modern mechanical longcase clocks have three weights instead of only two. The left weight provides power for the hour strike, the middle-weight provides power for the clock's pendulum and general timekeeping functions, and the right weight provides power for the quarter-hour chime sequences. Comtoise clocks , also known as Morbier clocks or Morez clocks , are

1080-434: The clock became inaccurate, and when the second owner died, the clock stopped working altogether. The story inspired Henry to create the song. Grandfather clocks are of a certain height, usually at least 1.9 metres (6 ft 3 in). There are also so-called "grandmother" and "granddaughter" clocks, which are slightly shorter. The world's tallest grandfather clock is 35 feet 10 inches (10.92 m) tall and

1120-914: The first commercially successful comedy horror film. Its success legitimized the genre and established it as commercially viable. Some comedy horror movies, such as the Scary Movie series or A Haunted House also function as parodies of popular horror films. Well-known director Peter Jackson began his film career with the comedy horror classics Bad Taste , Meet the Feebles and Braindead . Stree2 , Roohi , Bhoot Police and bhool Bhulaiyaa are some popular horror comedy films in Bollywood . Examples of horror comedy on television date back to sitcoms The Munsters and The Addams Family and more recently include gruesome slapsticks Ash vs Evil Dead and Stan Against Evil , mockumentary

1160-814: The generations; they kept the time on farms throughout France. Many Comtoise clocks can be found in France but they are also frequently found in Spain, Germany, and other parts of Europe , less in the United States. Many Comtoise clocks were also exported to other countries in Europe and even farther, to the Ottoman Empire and as far as Thailand. A wooden sheath usually protected the metal mechanisms during transport. Bornholm clocks are Danish longcase clocks and were made on Bornholm from 1745 to 1900. In Sweden

1200-405: The genre and foresaw a cinematic translation. The film included comedic blackface performances and footage of a hurricane for a climactic storm. As an early experiment, the various genres were not well-balanced with horror and comedy, and later films improved the balance and took more sophisticated approaches. Charles Bramesco of Vulture.com identifies Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein as

1240-442: The hooded mouse roll a bowling ball down the banister, targeted directly at Porky, who has reached the bottom. Sylvester races down the stairs and shoves Porky out of the way so hard that the pig ends up in the kitchen headfirst in a laundry basket. Meanwhile, at the base of the staircase, Sylvester teeters and then falls to the floor unconscious after his head is flattened by the bowling ball intended for Porky. Porky storms back from

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1280-422: The kitchen (not noticing the basket being lowered below the floor) demanding to know why Sylvester pushed him. Seeing the cat knocked out, Porky suggests it is just a ploy to gain sympathy. Over the next few scenes, as he lifts Sylvester, carries him to the kitchen and puts him in the basket, an oblivious Porky barely escapes many attempts, via several tools and weapons, by the mice to kill him. Sylvester, out cold in

1320-654: The kitchen. Unknown to Porky, Sylvester clings to him all the way to the bedroom and into bed. When Porky discovers him in the bed, he kicks him down the stairs, telling him to stay in the kitchen. Suddenly, Sylvester sees that the house is overrun with murderous mice who are in the process of carting off the previous owners' cat to be decapitated by a mouse wearing a black hood and holding an executioner's ax. Terrified, Sylvester races upstairs and hides in Porky's nightshirt . Sylvester tries to explain to Porky by demonstrating (in mime) what occurred downstairs, but Porky criticizes

1360-443: The next" and its premise was based on mischief typically found during the holiday Halloween . Shortly after the publication of Mary Shelley 's Frankenstein , comedic parodies appeared. Edgar Allan Poe put humor and horror on the same continuum, and many nineteenth century authors used black humor in their horror stories. Author Robert Bloch called them "opposite sides of the same coin". In comedy horror film, gallows humor

1400-406: The pendulum and the other the striking mechanism , which usually consisted of a bell or chimes. Such movements usually have two keyholes, one on each side of the dial, to wind each weight. By contrast, 30-hour clocks often had a single weight to drive the timekeeping and striking mechanisms. Some 30-hour clocks were made with false keyholes for customers who wanted guests to think that the household

1440-594: The popular 1876 song My Grandfather's Clock is responsible for the common name "grandfather clock" being applied to the longcase clock. The song was composed by the American songwriter Henry Clay Work , who discovered a longcase clock in The George Hotel in Piercebridge , County Durham , England. When he asked about the clock, he was informed that it had had two owners. After the first owner died,

1480-629: The proper time. The case often features elaborately carved ornamentation on the hood (or bonnet), which surrounds and frames the dial, or clock face . The English clockmaker William Clement is credited with developing the form in 1670. Pendulum clocks were the world's most accurate timekeeping technology until the early 20th century, and longcase clocks, due to their superior accuracy, served as time standards for households and businesses. Today, they are kept mainly for their decorative and antique value, having been superseded by analog and digital timekeepers. The Oxford English Dictionary states that

1520-405: The top of each weight. The mechanical advantage of that arrangement also doubles the running time allowed by a given weight drop. Cable clocks are wound by inserting a special crank (called a "key") into holes in the clock's face and turning it. Others, however, are chain-driven, meaning that the weights are suspended by chains that wrap around gears in the clock's mechanism, with the other end of

1560-405: Was able to afford the more expensive eight-day clock. All modern striking longcase clocks have eight-day mechanical quarter chiming and full hour striking movements. Most longcase clocks are cable-driven, meaning that cables suspend the weights. If the cable was attached directly to the weight, the load would cause rotation and untwist the cable strands, so the cable wraps around a pulley mounted to

1600-410: Was based on a 1909 play, though the film's horror elements were more interesting to the audience than the comedy elements. In the United States following the trauma of World War I , film audiences sought to see horror on screen but tempered with humor. The "pioneering" comedy horror film was One Exciting Night (1922), written, directed and produced by D. W. Griffith , who noticed the stage success of

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