Mad Monster Party?


Mad Monster Party? is a 1967 American stop-motion animated musical comedy film produced by Rankin/Bass Productions for Embassy Pictures. The film stars the voices of Boris Karloff, Allen Swift, Gale Garnett, and Phyllis Diller. Although less well-known than Rankin/Bass' holiday specials, it has become a cult film.

Plot

On the Isle of Evil, Baron Boris von Frankenstein achieves his ultimate ambition, the secret of total destruction. Having perfected and tested the formula, he sends out messenger bats to summon all monsters to the Isle of Evil in the Caribbean Sea. The Baron intends to inform them of his discovery and also to reveal his imminent retirement as head of the "Worldwide Organization of Monsters". Besides Frankenstein's Monster and the Monster's more intelligent mate who live in the isle's castle with Boris, the invites also include Count Dracula, the Mummy, Quasimodo, the Werewolf, The Invisible Man, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, and the Creature from the Black Lagoon.
The Baron's beautiful assistant Francesca enters the lab to confirm that all invitations have been delivered and inquires about one of the addressees named Felix Flanken. Frankenstein explains that Flanken is his nephew and successor in the monster business. This displeases Francesca, who covets the role for herself. Francesca even asks why there was not an invitation for "It". Boris replies that "It" was not invited since "It" can be a crushing bore, explaining that "It" even crushed the island's wild boars in his bare hands the last time "It" was invited.
Frankenstein has his zombie butler, Yetch, Chef Mafia Machiavelli, and the zombie bellhops and servants make preparations for the upcoming party while having some zombies patrol the Isle of Evil to make sure that "It" does not show up uninvited. The monsters begin to arrive on the freighter that Felix is also traveling on.
However, when Felix proves to be an incompetent, asthmatic human, the monsters plot to eliminate him and gain control of the secret formula. Over time, Francesca develops feelings for Felix after he unknowingly saves her multiple times. As Dracula, Frankenstein's Monster, and the Monster's Mate descend upon Francesca, she sends out a letter to an unknown recipient. When the monsters corner Felix upon capturing Francesca, they are frightened at the arrival of "It" who proceeds to go on a rampage since he was not invited. "It" snatches up the monsters and Francesca.
Felix rushes off to tell his Uncle Boris what happened and is instructed to head to the boat. Boris leads the zombies in rescuing Francesca from "It" using biplanes. Boris convinces "It" to let Francesca go and to take him instead. "It" complies, releasing Francesca. Felix and Francesca manage to get off the island as Boris and the remainder of the monsters remain in the clutches of "It". Displeased that the monsters tried to steal the secret of total destruction for themselves and attempted to kill Felix as well, Boris sacrifices his life by dropping the vial containing the formula. Thereby destroying the Isle of Evil and everything on it.
The destruction is witnessed offshore by Felix and Francesca. Francesca tearfully admits to Felix that she is not human, but is in fact a robot creation of Boris von Frankenstein. Felix answers that "none of us are perfect" , mechanically repeating the last two words over and over. Thereby indicating that he has also been a robot creation of his uncle, the entire time!

Cast

The film was created using Rankin/Bass' "Animagic" stop motion animation process, supervised by Tadahito Mochinaga at MOM Productions in Tokyo, Japan. The process involved photographing figurines a frame at a time, then re-positioning them, exposing another frame, and so forth. Known as stop-motion animation, it was the same approach used in RKO's King Kong, Art Clokey's Gumby and Davey and Goliath, and many other films, commercials and TV specials.
Classic monster films were enjoying a resurgence in popularity in the late 1960s, along with more comedy-centered examples, The Addams Family and The Munsters. This campy film is a spoof of horror themes, complete with musical numbers and inside jokes.
Mad Magazine creator Harvey Kurtzman penned the script and Mad artist Jack Davis designed many of the characters. Davis was a natural for the job, being famous both for his humor work and his monster stories in the pages of EC Comics. It has long been rumored that Forrest J. Ackerman had a hand in the script, but while the dialogue is rife with Famous Monsters of Filmland-like puns, Ackerman's involvement has never been confirmed and his name never appeared in the on-screen credits or in original promotion for the film at the time of its release. In fact, Rankin/Bass historian Rick Goldschmidt, in liner notes accompanying the Anchor Bay DVD release, denied Ackerman was ever involved, at the same time as the DVD packaging promoted Ackerman's name. Goldschmidt repeated his claims on this in a 2006 blog entry, based on his interviews with Korobkin, who claimed to have written the original screenplay, which then was revised by Kurtzman, but never worked with Ackerman.
In addition to the famous monsters seen in the film, Mad Monster Party? also features several celebrity likenesses. Karloff and Diller's characters are both designed to look like the actors portraying them, while Baron Frankenstein's lackey, Yetch, is a physical and vocal caricature of Peter Lorre. Swift also performs impersonations when voicing his characters, such as James Stewart when voicing Felix, Sydney Greenstreet as the Invisible Man and Charles Laughton as the Freighter Captain.
Mad Monster Party? was one of several family-friendly projects Karloff lent his voice to in his final years. It was his final involvement in a production connected to the Frankenstein mythos that had propelled him to stardom some three decades earlier.

Music

Although the opening credits identify Ethel Ennis as singing the opening theme song and, in the same frame, a soundtrack being available on RCA Victor, a commercially released soundtrack was never produced in any format. In September 1998, Percepto released a CD of the soundtrack for the film. "The Mummy" is allegedly performed by Dyke and the Blazers. Tracks without performer credits are instrumentals and contain no dialogue.
  1. "The Baron"
  2. "Mad Monster Party" – Ethel Ennis
  3. "Waltz for a Witch"
  4. "Cocktails"
  5. "The Bash"
  6. "You're Different" – The Monster's Mate
  7. "Jungle Madness"
  8. "Our Time to Shine" – Francesca
  9. "Mad Monster Party"
  10. "The Mummy" – Little Tibia and the Fibias
  11. "One Step Ahead" – Baron von Frankenstein and Company
  12. "The Baron Into Battle/Transylvania, All Hail/Pursuit/Requiem for a Loser"
  13. "Never Was a Love Like Mine" – Francesca
  14. "Finale"

    Reception

The film holds a 70% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes based on ten reviews. Howard Thompson of The New York Times wrote that "this party should make everybody chuckle".

Home media

The film has been available on video for years, first on original distributor Embassy Pictures' home entertainment unit, and then on other independent labels before StudioCanal acquired some rights to the film. Currently, Lionsgate distributes the film on video under license from StudioCanal.
Before Lionsgate's current video release of Mad Monster Party?, almost all video releases have been from 16 mm film and were of very poor color quality. The original film negative was water-damaged some years ago, but Sony Pictures Television eventually unearthed an original 35 mm pristine print. This print was digitally remastered, and is the source for the current DVD issue and all subsequent television showings. Anchor Bay released the previous DVD on August 19, 2003, then re-released it on August 23, 2005 with additional features. On September 8, 2009, it was released as a "Special Edition" DVD by Lionsgate. The special features include a documentary including interviews with Rick Goldschmidt, Arthur Rankin Jr., voice artist Allen Swift, storyboard artist Don Duga, musical director Maury Laws and others. The film was released on Blu-ray on September 4, 2012.

Comic book adaptation

Rankin/Bass produced a "prequel of sorts": a TV special called Mad, Mad, Mad Monsters from The ABC Saturday Superstar Movie series, which aired on September 23, 1972. This Halloween special featured many of the same monster characters. Bob McFadden did his imitation of Karloff when voicing Baron Henry von Frankenstein. The animation for the special is provided by Osamu Tezuka's Mushi Production with supervision by Steve Nakagawa, who was also known for his work with Iwao Takamoto at Hanna-Barbera Studios.