Yogi Bear - The Very First Yogi Bear Movie Review, and it Wasn't Awful. 1964

“HEY THERE, IT'S YOGI BEAR" is the new color cartoon feature that opened yesterday at neighborhood houses. And any parent who denies this thoroughly delightful treat to the children should be spanked.

Adroitly blending sass, wisdom and tunes, this adaptation of the popular television series for small fries is as friendly, frisky and disarming as all get-out. The kids should eat it up and any adult should walk out smiling.

For a bear, this Yogi is quite a guy. As any scholarly television viewer knows, our hero is a good-natured nonconformist and the bane of Jellystone Park, his home base, where he feuds with the forest rangers.

Don't feed the bears, indeed! Yogi's aggressive resistance to arbitrary rules and regulations sparks an adventure yarn leading all the way to New York, with the invincible Yogi trailed by his two furry chums, dainty Cindy Bear and perky little Boo Boo.

Perhaps the most winning aspect of this Columbia release, directed and produced by William Hanna and Joseph Barbera, is its lack of archness and sophistication, both in content and animated technique.

The backgrounds are equally pretty and un-stylized, the incidents are consistently amusing, the dubbed voices are excellent and some of the sideline characters are nifty. Take, for instance, a slow-drawlin' bear named Corn Pone, two crafty circus shysters, the Chizzling Brothers, and a round-up of hillbillies terrified by Yogi and his two cronies in one hilarious sequence.

Artistically, the film reaches its peak with Yogi, Cindy and Boo Boo eluding a posse. They are suddenly transported to, of all places, a musical Venice. The last reel, with the friendly, playful trio surrounded by a terrified Manhattan, is just plain dandy, as funny as it is ironic. Three of the tunes are bouncy and one, "Ven-e, Ven-o, Ven-a," is beautiful.