The Song of the Birds


The Song of the Birds is a 1935 Color Classics cartoon. It concerns a destructive little boy with an air rifle who shoots a baby bird and is mortified when the bird's parents, and all the other birds, go into mourning.

Plot

A flock of robins is teaching their young ones to fly. The sun is shining and all the birds are cheerfully singing. Meanwhile, a boy having much fun with an air rifle is shooting at everything in the house, destroying many of the items in the house; he then goes out into the garden and shoots at a nest, then shoots a chick out of the sky—only to realize shortly thereafter the gravity of what he has done. The chick's parents try to revive it, but to no avail.
The sky turns dark and stormy as the birds assemble and wail in mourning for the chick's funeral, complete with pallbearers and a grave digger. The boy is tormented by the birds' wailing; watching from the window, he too is brought to tears and gets on his knees to pray. As the birds prepare to lower the chick into its grave, it begins raining. The young chick miraculously comes back to life, the birds resume their cheerful singing, the sky clears, and the boy, having learned his lesson, breaks his gun into pieces and pulls out a box of bird seed for all the birds to enjoy. The chick and the boy share a seed as the film ends.

Cast

as Boy
Bill Thompson And Clarence Nash as Whistling