Cat City contains four-and-one-half minutes of pure brilliance. The depiction of the crime bosses is silly, comical and imaginative.

One of the rewards of animation fandom is to be taken suddenly by surprise, hit full in the face and wowed for days by a piece of work that resonates to the very roots of your love for the art. It might be a short. It might be an entire film, or even a snippet seen within the context of that larger piece. The effect, however, is the same: Awe, delight, and the uncanny sense that everything in the piece is right, that this is what animation is supposed to do. The feeling is immediate and visceral. Only later, do you reflect upon the technical details or the specifics involved in production. When you do, you realize that this piece is a highlight for a class on animation appreciation. Not to analyze said details and specifics, as instructive as that may be, but simply because it exemplifies the way animation truly works.

I have been stunned several times of late, and each time the shock came at unexpected times from unexpected places. Out of curiosity, I recently purchased a DVD of Pannonia Studios’ 1987 animated film Cat City. This movie, made in Budapest, is so bizarre that several reliable animation histories do not get the synopsis right. Neither, for that matter, does the DVD cover. Not that you might care — this film is unwatchable dross from virtually beginning to end, an exercise in shoddy animation, bad timing, sloppy editing and grotesque character design. Except — except for one incredible four-and-a-half-minute sequence.

It seems that a feline crime boss wants the mouse hero of the film murdered. He gives the contract to a fat black cat representing the “4 Gangsters,” a quartet of nasty hit rats (two male and two female) who are so modern that they have their own demo tape. The fat cat proceeds to play the tape for the crime boss and the film, for a few moments, is elevated into brilliance. The Gangsters are voiced by a vocal group called Guild and sing of their exploits in a rapid jazz-scat style a la the Manhattan Transfer. These rats, alone and as a gang, gaily bebop to a colorful montage of themselves committing murder, extortion, blackmail, seduction, theft and sundry other crimes. The depictions, however, are so silly and imaginative that the effect is comical. Rapid cuts keep perfect pace with the offbeat singing (which, incidentally, is excellent).

There are more spirited ideas in this brief vignette than exist in the rest of the picture, and, after the Gangsters demo tape ends, the movie instantly descends back into unrelenting drivel. Even so, Cat City illustrates the joys of being an animation fan. In the midst of the most pedestrian productions there is always the possibility that a jewel will jump from the trash pile directly into your unbelieving eyes and ears.

Channel surfing brings the unexpected surprise of a dazzling feat of layout during a fast-moving battle on Teen Titans. Courtesy of Cartoon Network.

Not long ago while tapping through the remote, I caught the opening minutes of a Teen Titans episode; I believe the title was “Birthmark.” In this sequence, the Titans face off against their old foe Dr. Light in a frenetic tour-de-force of action. Dr. Light, spindly as a spider and every bit as agile, commences a fast-moving battle against individual Titans and the entire ensemble in one of the most dazzling feats of layout I have seen in a mainstream cartoon. Movement and placements are flawlessly coordinated between multiple characters. To make things more difficult, the scene brims with special effects such as light blasts, power rays and explosions for almost the entire three-minute duration of the fight. Perspectives change constantly and the fight seems to speed up as it progresses; one can imagine the complexity of the storyboards.