Popeye the Sailor Meets Ali Baba's Forty Thieves
Popeye the Sailor Meets Ali Baba's Forty Thieves is a 1937 two-reel animated short in Technicolor, produced by Max Fleischer for Fleischer Studios and released by Paramount Pictures on November 26, 1937.1 Directed by Dave Fleischer, it is the second of the three Popeye Color Specials, double-length Technicolor films the studio made between 1936 and 1939 alongside Popeye the Sailor Meets Sindbad the Sailor (1936) and Aladdin and His Wonderful Lamp (1939).2 All Fleischer Popeye cartoons were otherwise black-and-white one-reelers of 6 to 10 minutes; the Color Specials ran roughly 16 to 21 minutes and shared an Arabian Nights theme.3 • 4
| Key fact | Detail |
|---|---|
| Release | November 26, 1937, through Paramount Pictures; Popeye series no. 541 |
| Format | Two reels, Technicolor, running time 17 minutes (IAD lists 17:13); 35 mm, 465 m print5 • 6 |
| Key credits | Director Dave Fleischer; producer Max Fleischer; animation Willard Bowsky, Orestes Calpini, George Germanetti; music Sammy Timberg, Sammy Lerner, Tot Seymour, Vee Lawnhurst6 • 5 |
| Voices | Jack Mercer (Popeye), Mae Questel (Olive Oyl), Gus Wickie (Abu Hassan), Lou Fleischer (Wimpy)7 |
| Special technique | Fleischer's patented three-dimensional "Stereoptical Process" tabletop miniatures used as backgrounds7 |
| Villain | Abu Hassan, Popeye's usual nemesis Bluto in an Arabian-bandit role7 |
| Availability | In the public domain; a print restored in 2003 with a 2005 edition8 • 6 |
Spoilers
Story
The dreaded desert bandit Abu Hassan, voiced by Gus Wickie in the place of Popeye's regular nemesis Bluto, rides through the desert with his forty thieves singing about his exploits. From a Coast Guard station, Popeye, Olive Oyl, and Wimpy listen to a warning broadcast over the radio, and Popeye then departs aboard a gunship, which takes to the air only to crash in the desert. The trio treks for miles to a nearly deserted village, where the thieves strip the town clean and carry off Olive, hiding in a pot, and Wimpy, hiding in a stove.7 Popeye pursues on camel and must get into the thieves' hidden cave without knowing the magic words "Open Sesame!"; he solves the problem on his own spinach can with "Open Sez Me!"7 In the climax, Popeye defeats Abu Hassan, and the finale shows Popeye, Olive, and Wimpy riding atop a treasure-laden wagon dragged back to town by all forty thieves and Abu in chains as beasts of burden while the town cheers.7 • 9
The film trades on wordplay throughout. Popeye, confronted with Arab inscriptions, mumbles "This Chinese is Greek to me," and when he rolls like a bowling ball into ten of Hassan's men he asks "How does that strike you?"6 Facing Abu Hassan's curved scimitar, he remarks "Hey, your pen-knife's bent" and obligingly straightens it.7
Production and technique
The Stereoptical background. The short opens with the striking sight of a live-action desert landscape rolling past the camera. It was one of several tabletop miniatures built by the Fleischer studio as a three-dimensional background substitute, billed in the credits as the "Stereoptical Process."7 The rig combined 2D animation with three-dimensional sets, giving a strong impression of depth.10 Because the numerous miniature backgrounds for the production, including desertscapes, village streets, and the interior of the thieves' treasure-strewn cave, had to match the traditional painted backgrounds, careful attention was paid to color design.7
Context in the Popeye series. Fleischer Studios produced 109 Popeye films between 1933 and 1943, nearly all black-and-white one-reelers; the three Color Specials were the exceptions.3 Popeye, created by E. C. Segar for the comic strip Thimble Theatre in 1929, had been a hit on screen since a 1933 Fleischer Betty Boop cartoon, and in 1935 a poll of school children ranked him above Mickey Mouse as their favorite cartoon character.7 This popularity underwrote the expensive double-length productions, which the Fleischers billed in theaters as "A Popeye Feature," about three times a normal cartoon's length.2
Reception and later history
The short was released one month before Walt Disney's feature Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937), and the filmgoing public was evidently ready for long-format cartoons. It was enormously successful at the box office, and like Sindbad the year before it was advertised by many theater owners as the main attraction of the evening's bill.7 Film notes by animation historian Mark Langer, editor of Imaginaria (Arsenale Cooperativa, 1980), call it a significant improvement on the first two-reel Popeye film: the long musical introduction of Sindbad was replaced by Abu Hassan's much briefer one, and the one-liners and visual wit are sharper.6
All three Color Specials are now in the public domain and circulate widely on home video and online; a restoration was completed in 2003 and issued in 2005.2 • 6 The short has appeared on authorized collections including Popeye the Sailor, Volume 1 on DVD and Popeye Original Classics in Technicolor and Fleischer Cartoons: Greatest Hits, Volume 1 on Blu-ray.5
References
- Popeye the Sailor Meets Ali Baba's Forty Thieves, Popeye the Sailorpedia (Fandom)
- The Fleischer Popeye Color Specials (1936-1939), Neatorama
- Popeye, The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction
- Popeye Color Specials note, mk2 films catalog
- Popeye the Sailor Meets Ali Baba's Forty Thieves (1937), The Internet Animation Database
- Popeye the Sailor Meets Ali Baba's Forty Thieves, Il Cinema Ritrovato film notes
- Popeye the Sailor Meets Ali Baba's Forty Thieves, by John M. Miller, Turner Classic Movies
- Desert Island Films complete public domain list
- Go East, Young Toon (Part 5), Cartoon Research
- Alex Film Society program notes (2011)
Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 15, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026
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