Tom's Photo Finish

Tom's Photo Finish is a 1957 one reel animated Tom and Jerry short directed and produced by William Hanna and Joseph Barbera with music by Scott Bradley. The cartoon was animated by Kenneth Muse, Bill Schipek, Lewis Marshall, Jack Carr, Herman Cohen and Ken Southworth, with backgrounds by Robert Gentle and layouts by Richard Bickenbach. It was released on November 1, 1957 by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer

Plot
Tom sneaks into the kitchen to the fridge. He grabs a whole chicken and takes a couple of bites out of it before he hears George coming his way. Tom hurriedly shoves the chicken back into the refrigerator and hides. George, upon discovering the half-eaten chicken, concludes that either Tom or Spike is guilty and is determined to figure out which, even if it means X-raying them. Panicked, Tom frames Spike; he creates phony cat tracks leading from the sleeping dog to the refrigerator. As Tom moves to plant the chicken on Spike, a bright light flashes, and Jerry, holding a camera, runs off. Joan and George see the "evidence" implicating a guilty Spike and kick him out of the house for good. Spike laments that he is being framed as he watches George and Joan allowing Tom to gobble down the remainder of the chicken.

Meanwhile, Jerry happily emerges from his darkroom, having made numerous copies of his photo of Tom framing Spike. He plants copies of the photos in places where George or Joan are likely to see them. Realizing that Jerry knows the truth about him framing Spike, Tom is forced to use the guise of being a recklessly playful cat as he swoops in to destroy the photos before George and/or Joan see them: he tears up George's newspaper, steals Joan's new dress and covers George's eyes to stop them seeing the photos, resulting in him nearly getting kicked out of the house when George mistakes him for Joan and kisses him (causing him to flip out upon realising just who it was). When Jerry slips a photo inside a cake Joan is finishing, Tom reaches inside to grab it but is stopped by Joan, who asks if he wants to taste it. When he nods, she holds out the knife she had been using to ice the cake, only for the cat to somehow eat the whole thing in one bite and then swallow it with some difficulty. He then flees the kitchen as Joan hurls dishes, buckets and a rolling pin after him for eating her cake. To make matters worse, Tom taunts Spike from inside, leading George to think that the cat has gone crazy.

Jerry begins folding the photos into paper airplanes and tosses them towards Joan in the kitchen and George in the den. Tom swallows the airplane meant for Joan and begins frantically chasing the airplane headed towards George with a pair of scissors. Tom's efforts to stop the plane result in cutting up George's newspaper into a paper chain and his trousers instead. George intercepts him right before the cat nearly cuts his head off and he grabs Tom's tail with one hand after he has had enough of his crazy behavior. He prays for mercy as George catches the paper plane with his other hand and unfolds it. Upon learning about a guilty Tom's deception in framing Spike, he has given him the very last straw that finally breaks the proverbial camel's back: he decides to kick him out of the house forever as his punishment for breaking the rules and framing Spike. As George kicks Tom out of the house, Jerry has his camera out again and photographs the moment. Joan and George let Spike back into the house and ask for forgiveness, which the dog gladly grants. Then Jerry calls Spike over and gives him something that he laughs heartily over: a photo of Tom being kicked out the house by an angry George in his boxers.

Availability
DVD
 * Tom and Jerry's Greatest Chases, Vol. 5
 * Tom and Jerry Spotlight Collection Vol. 3, Disc Two