SKELETON FROLIC - Ub Iwerks - "A Color Rhapsody" (1937)

As we ease closer to that fateful day, the undead become friskier! Tonight's Columbia short from 1937 features dancing skeletons and skeleton musicians, and it's rightfully called, "Skeleton Frolic!"

Where else could a tale like this begin than in a creepy olde graveyard?

What fantastic imagery from the legendary Ub Iwerks!

 How's that for an iconically classic Halloween black cat?

The sun has gone down and The Skeleton Orchestra is all ready to play!

This cartoon is all about the skeletons, but there was a brief appearance by some bats just to soup it up a bit!

This part actually looks kind of scary!

The trumpet and the bass player get into a bit of a tussle over whose skull is whose!

Then the dance number starts in earnest. Those clouds give you just a feel for how talented Ub really was!! He probably did that in like five minutes!

The frolicking skeletons go through a bunch of different moves somewhat like what's going to be happening to me in the next couple of hours!!

We used to call this The Shimmy, now they call it "Wobble Baby!"

Five A.M starts coming around, and the morning sun just barely starts showing it's light!

When the rooster crows, all the skeletons know they have to head to lower ground! The technicolor in this cartoon is pretty amazing for 1937 in my humble opinion! Wouldn't this make a cool painting?

The party's over until next Wednesday!

Just like nothing ever happened!!

 

 Frolicking skeletons isn't something that just started happening in 1937, there's a long and varied history of these kinds of activities that people have devoted entire books to on the subject! Just as a couple of extra added reference points, here's Michael Wolgemut's "Orchestra Of The Dead (Liber Chronicarum)" from 1493!

From the Richard Harris Collection, here's an example of frolicking skeletons from Kawanabe Kyosai who lived from 1831 to 1889!

And of course, our friends from South of the border have a long tradition and fascination with the Day of the Dead like in this print by Mexican National Hero Jose Guadalupe Posada who lived from 1852 to 1913 entitled "Jarabe Tapatio Dance!"

If you want to see the whole cartoon, there are many postings of it on YouTube and here's a link to just one of them!  SKELETON FROLIC (1937)

THE X FROM OUTER SPACE / Shôchiku Eiga - 1967

Things are finally straight in the still capture department, so, time to put The Tabonga Train back on the tracks, here at The Dungeon!.. We gots another giant rubber monster from Japan the same year I got my great 1967 Volkswagen. This is the same studio that also brought us GAPPA, THE TRIPHIBIAN MONSTER.

Eegah!! sent over a fun little sound clip from this flick for our earjoyment, sooooo, you can push the big red 'GO' button over by our atomic ? from inner space, NOW, Rufus The Gnat!.. Here's a taste of... THE X FROM OUTER SPACE!

The story starts with a trip to the Moon by a small group of Japanese Astronuts in their famous spaceship, AAB-Gamma.

There's fun to be had on the Moon, like, bouncing up and down on the surface in 1/6th gravity!

There's even more fun watching Peggy (THE TERROR BENEATH THE SEA) Neal as Lisa take a shower!

Then, it's time to dance to some Moon Music, as heard in the sound clip.

They take off in AAB-Gamma for a space expedition where they encounter a glowing UFO!

After the UFO buzzes them, they discover some residue on the exhaust shield, Lisa snags a small glowing nodule and takes it back to the ship.

Back at the Earth lab, they find that the specimen has melted through the metal floor, like in ALIEN, and, has disappeared!

Now a giant rubber monster, The X sticks its weird looking head out of a crater and is immediately attacked by tanks and missiles.

I really dig this shot as it tears the crap out of some puny power towers!

The X even has the power to turn into a big glowing heat ball, then, plows into a dam!

A radio active element is found to have a debilitating effect on The X so they feed it to the thing from another world!

Then, they just sit back and watch as the monster starts dissolving back to its original form.

Lisa recaptures the nodule, but, this time they shoot it into outer space from which it came! Tune in tomorrow as we continue our special Halloween Countdown!

BIMBO'S INITIATION - Fleischer Studios - "Members Only" (1931)

 Personally, I don't think anything says Halloween better than old scary cartoons, so without further delay, let's get this Countdown To Halloween 2014 underway with a fantastical release from 1931 called "Bimbo's Initiation!"

When Bimbo make any sounds, it's Billy Murray doing the talking! Billy was the voice of Bimbo in 9 other cartoons too! So here's Bimbo the dog, innocently walking down the street, minding his own business!

Bimbo falls into a hole, and after a long descent, the adventure begins!

Down at the bottom of the chute is this group of things, and they want Bimbo to join their "Do It Or Die" organization, hence the title, "Bimbo's Initiation!"

Bimbo's not a team player, and he doesn't want to become a member!

"Wanna Be A Member, Wanna Be A Member?"     

"NO!"

"Bimbo's Initiation" starts and it's nothing but one long bad dream that he can't wake up from!

There's the Topsy-Turvy room and a giant knife with a mind and an appetite of it's own!

Luckily, another trap door opens and allows Bimbo to escape this fiendish nightmare!

Needless to say, it doesn't get any better for Bimbo!

There's a rope with a candle burning through it connected to this big smasher thing that's suspended over Bimbo's head!

Groggy from all the action, Bimbo must now make a choice! I love this shot! 

Those crazy Fleischer Brothers seem to have an endless supply of wacky Rube Goldberg devices at their mental disposal like this bike to nowhere that spanks him as he goes, or...............

....................These endless doors of misfortune!!

Down another chute! Rule one in these cartoons, you can't have too many sliding down a chute scenes!

It's like a giant boardwalk fun house of death and dispair!

Betty Boop shows up and makes it all better, and Bimbo then decides it's finally okay to say "YES" to "Do You Wanna Be A Member?" "Bimbo's Initiation" is one of the last cartoons where Betty Boop still had her dog ears, and you can see it for yourself right here among other places for free on YouTube!