Groovie Goolies: Saturday Mourning Collection
by Hal Sutherland
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DVD Cover Information
Actor: Dal McKennon, Don Messick, Howard Morris, John Erwin, Larry StorchDirector: Hal Sutherland
Brand: BCI ECLIPSE LLC
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Unknown), Dolby Digital 2.0; English (Original Language), Dolby Digital 2.0
Format: Box set, Color, DVD, NTSC
Picture Format: 1.33:1
Running Time: 60 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2006-10-24
Audience Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Studio: Bci / Eclipse
Movie Reviews of Groovie Goolies: Saturday Mourning Collection
Movie Review: Welcome Back To Horrible Hall!
Summary: 5 Stars
The episodes always began in the same fashion: On a stormy night, a disembodied voice welcomes us to an obviously haunted yet strangely colorful castle called Horrible Hall. A vampire bat flies across a full moon and attempts to enter a window, which inexplicably moves, causing the bat to crash into the stone wall, revert to vampire form, and fall to the ground. The vampire looks at the viewer and gripes, "This place is driving me BATTY!"
The vampire, of course, was Count Drac, one of the hosts of Filmation's GROOVIE GOOLIES, a 1970's favorite which is the latest new release under BCI's Ink & Paint brand. This cartoon, a spin-off of the then-popular THE ARCHIE SHOW and originally paired with the adventures of SABRINA THE TEENAGE WITCH, is a long-awaited release that has finally come to DVD in a package featuring the complete series on 3 discs.
An exponent of the classic Universal Monsters craze that began in the 1960's (and was still going strong in the '70's), GROOVIE GOOLIES was a gang of friendly, rock-and-roll-playing monsters whose adventures acted as a sort of monsterized kids' version of ROWAN AND MARTIN'S LAUGH-IN, following almost the same format right down to the wall of windows (here christened "Weird Window Time") where the characters told jokes and one-liners. In addition to Drac, the other Goolies were Frankie (the friendly, sweetly goofy Frankenstein's Monster), Wolfie (a hip, surfing, hot-rod-driving, practical-joking Werewolf), Mummy, Boneapart (a skeleton who fell apart as often as not), the sexy Vampira-inspired Bella LaGhostley, wacky witch-cook Hagatha, and a host of others. Sabrina makes appearances as well, along with some of the other characters from her show (which deserves its own release as a companion to this set, as the Goolies originated on SABRINA). The pacing of each episode is frenetic, which helps with some of the humor; many of the jokes are enormously corny, but the delivery and speed with which they are told makes them funny, and the character voices are top-notch talent, featuring Howard Morris and Larry Storch doing most of the characters.
Each episode also featured fun, cute and funky soft-rock songs that were usually somehow related to the show (two per episode), and the Goolies actually scored a Top Ten hit during the '70's with "Chick-A-Boom," which is also here. The episodes have been well restored, with vibrant color, and the artwork, which Filmation has usually excelled at, really stands out.
Extras include commentary for two episodes, featuring Lou Schemier (head of Filmation during its run),historian Darrel McNeil, monster expert Bob Burns and GOOLIES head writer Jack Mendelsohn, hosted by voice-over artist Wally Wingert. Wingert also appears as one of the stars of a "docu-comedy" called GOOLIANS, which combines documentary material with a sitcom format. In this feature (which runs almost like a GOOLIES episode) Wingert and fellow Goolian Daniel Roebuck (of LOST), both self-confessed monster freaks, are sent on a mission to gather information about the Groovie Goolies to cure their classic monster fixation. From my point of view, there isn't anything wrong with a classic monster fixation, but along the way we hear from Mendelsohn, Schemier, Alice Cooper (who originated the monsters/rock music connection), Ron Chaney (grandson of Lon Jr.), Forrest J. Ackerman (ex-FAMOUS MONSTERS OF FILMLAND publisher) and more, so maybe it's a good thing.
If you're looking for a way to introduce your kids to the idea that sometimes scary can be fun, grab this set; it's a great Halloween treat and a wonderful return visit from some old fiends. To quote Frankie, "We NEEDED that!"
Summary of Groovie Goolies: Saturday Mourning Collection
A spinoff of the Archie comic book and television series the 1970s Saturday morning cartoon GROOVIE GOOLIES followed the musical adventures of a hipster rock band that also happened to be classic horror-movie monsters like Frankenstein Wolfman Mummy and Dracula. This collection presents 16 of the quirky charming series' best episodes. Format: DVD MOVIE Genre: CHILDREN/FAMILY Rating: NR UPC: 787364721597Groovie Goolies: Saturday Mourning Collection is a sprightly anthology of episodes from Filmation?s 1970 Groovie Goolie cartoon series, a kind of kooky-spooky cousin to Filmation?s other hit program, The Archies. A fascinating reflection of different strains in pop entertainment at the time, Groovie Goolies is thick with rapid-fire puns and blackout gags akin to Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In, sugary tunes a la The Archies, and nostalgia for those monster team-up films once made by Universal (House of Frankenstein, House of Dracula). The basic idea is that relatively friendly variations on the best-known film fiends?Frankenstein?s monster, the Wolfman, Dracula, Vampira, the Mummy, etc.?all hang out together in Horrible Hall, getting into wacky scrapes and banging out happy hits as a band. Tall, green, stooped, and ominous, Frankie is a lovable klutz with a voice like Boris Karloff and a thing for birdwatching and exercise. Hirsute Wolfie is a beatnik werewolf, Count Drac is a somewhat cranky vampire with a gift for wordplay ("This place is driving me batty!"), and Bella La Ghostly is a scary siren in a tight, tight dress. Somehow, in the middle of all this, a familiar face from another cartoon (and comic book) appears on occasion: the comely Sabrina, the teenage witch. Episodes include "When I Grow Up," in which Drac, Wolfie, and Frankie visit Drac?s "game room" (actually an old-fashioned dungeon); "Feed the Ghost Some Garlic," about a baseball game that dissolves (like a lot of athletic endeavors on this show) into pure nuttiness; "Darlin' Darlin'," in which Frankie and Wolfie try (with wacky results) to help Drac when he?s having trouble turning into a bat; and "Goolie Swing," which introduces viewers to Drac's art collection (including the "Moaning Lisa" and a self-portrait by Vincent Van Gool). Shamelessly silly. --Tom Keogh
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