What is Horlicks Malted Milk?
Horlick’s Malted Milk was one of Pal’s many advertising clients. The product was a “tonic” which would make the drinker “energetic.” This premise opened the door for some very entertaining Popeye-esque Puppetoons, in which someone drinks Horlick’s to overcome otherwise insurmountable odds. These aren’t like today’s advertisements, though. They were shown in movie theaters (no TV, remember!) before feature films, and they are about 7 minutes long… short subjects, like your average cartoon. The advertisements were very successful, because they used a “soft sell” approach… the product didn’t appear until late in the film, and even then was almost a parody of itself.
