Mad Monster Party: The Rankin-Bass Halloween Special Time Forgot

It’s a Halloween themed hullabaloo with all your favourite monsters!

When I think about Halloween, it is a bittersweet feeling. As an Australian I got little candy for proselytising the pumpkin holiday because few outside the kids who saw American cartoons on TV knew what it was. The spooky season is upon us, and I have a substantial Blu-Ray collection of the classic Universal Monsters cycle to watch, but when I really want to celebrate I either choose Hocus Pocus or Mad Monster Party. I go to Starbucks down the road in Chatswood to drink a pumpkin spiced latte, and observe the attempts to make Halloween happen down at the local mall with latex masks and costume accessories on display. I’m not sure if COVID-19 will let Halloween happen this year as planned, but I sure see a lot of advertising trying to Australian-ise this holiday like one for Google Nest cameras showing children trick or treating. One of these days it’ll work, but Halloween always leaves me thinking “HOW DARE YOU COME TO ME NOW, WHEN I AM THIS?” like Molly Grue from The Last Unicorn.

Speaking of iconic Rankin-Bass productions, let’s talk about Mad Monster Party.

Released to theatres in 1967, this was Rankin-Bass taking on a Halloween themed project with some of the Universal Monsters branding filed off for copyright reasons, and what a film it is. This is made by the same people who brought you Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer, with the pedigree of inviting Boris Karloff, and Forest Ackerman of Famous Monsters of Filmland fame. I’m plenty familiar with Boris Karloff as an Aussie, but Forest Ackerman is a bit of an obscure cult figure to me, and my research shows he’s a big deal in the American horror community. They also got MAD Magazine’s Harvey Kurtzman to write the script, with several MAD cartoonists designing the characters plus the sets, and Frank Frazetta drawing the movie’s poster.

So how is the movie itself? Well, as a stop-motion animation project it will always be in the shadow of Disney’s The Nightmare Before Christmas, the Tim Burton and Henry Selick collaboration which captured the hearts of a generation of goths and Hot Topic shoppers. Mad Monster Party is unique, and its jazzy score is neat, but it doesn’t have the ear-wormy Danny Elfman songs that The Nightmare Before Christmas does. Other than that, it’s a pretty neat little gem which despite its flaws deserves attention as a Halloween treat.

Baron Boris Von Frankenstein in his sinister lab on the Isle of Evil.

Baron Boris Von Frankenstein gloats at his latest achievement, a WMD.

It starts out with Boris Karloff’s character Baron Boris Von Frankenstein experimenting with vials of liquid and the infusion of energy. He’s showered in sparks from the heavens as he attempts to perform some experiment. He tests his concoction on a black bird which explodes when it lands on a branch, looking out at the resulting atomic mushroom cloud as Baron Boris quotes Edgar Allan Poe: “Quoth the Raven, never more!”. He has invented the means to destroy matter, and sends out invitations via bats to the other monsters who we see receiving them in the opening credits montage. The gang’s all here, from the Mummy to the Invisible Man to Quasimodo, even the Creature from the Black Lagoon gets one.

I really like this image of Mr. Hyde, they did a good cartoony design job on him.

We then see the clumsy Felix Flanken in a pharmacy fumbling over some glass jars containing pills, and his character design is distracting because he looks like the spitting image of me in high school. He’s not getting paid well for his job as he keeps having his salary garnished to reimburse his employer for constant mistakes, but he gets a curious item of mail inviting him to the Isle of Evil to witness his uncle’s scientific discovery. He wrecks the pharmacy on the way out, and his boss insists that this is his vacation from Felix’s shenanigans. Felix is an annoying main character who subsists off a bad Jimmy Stewart impression for the entire film, and this is one of the main flaws Mad Monster Party has as a Halloween ensemble.

Felix Flanken, the nephew of Baron Boris, picking up yet another of his accidents.

Frankenstein’s Monster “Fang” and his Bride make an appearance, as the Bride chastises her husband for having a roving eye looking at the beautiful red-headed assistant Francesca, resulting in an old Hollywood style musical number called You’re Different. Phyllis Diller voices the Monster’s Mate, and although I’m unfamiliar with her body of work she’s got a bit of Mae West going on here. The invitations have received their RSVPs from the various monsters, though a creature called It is banned from the Worldwide Organisation of Monsters gathering for making a mess of the wild boars on the island. Baron Boris is retiring from being the head of the Worldwide Organisation of Monsters, hoping that Felix - his only surviving heir born from his younger sister, will take over the family monster business. This is the main plot of the movie, the succession of head monster, and it looks like Felix is going to inherit the lot despite being an annoying milquetoast fellow who ruins everything with his clumsiness.

An endearing dance sequence between the Monster’s Mate and “Fang”.

Francesca enjoys a spot of tea with Baron Boris.

The S.S. Herring docks into the harbour, ready to take the Monsters to the Isle of Evil.

Quasimodo is among the first monsters to arrive for boarding.

Count Dracula appears at the docks for boarding, but he’s a bit skint when it comes to his wallet for the fare, so he turns into a bat and opts for flying instead.

Felix runs into the Wolf-Man as he boards his vessel bound for the Isle of Evil.

The Mummy climbs out of its coffin, for a jolly good scare.

I love the expression Rankin-Bass gave to this crewman when he’s frightened.

Mad Monster Party, like most Rankin-Bass stop-motion productions, is reliant on cheesy joke puns about the monsters in question, and for the most part this is campy fun. None of this is meant to be taken too seriously, and the grand scope of its ambitions to assemble a team of monsters for one party in a movie is a noble goal even if the humour is a bit dated by today’s standards. There’s an bit about Felix dropping his glasses and running into the Invisible Man and saying he can’t see a thing, stuff like that. Anyway, they get to the Isle of Evil where Baron Boris is running the show. Baron Boris has a team of usher zombies working for him, as well as this Peter Lorre looking dude called Yetch (who gets a bit handsy with Francesca in a gag that hasn’t aged well). The zombie henchmen are called up for duty to patrol the island in case It comes back, and we see Yetch cajoling them for behaving like ghosts instead of air pilots.

The zombie ushers, all gathered in a row on the Isle of Evil.

Francesca not appreciating the bad touch from Yelch, somebody call Ronan Farrow.

One of the zombie henchmen ready to fly the aeroplanes to patrol the island.

Baron Boris is playing the organ all creepy yet funky, and Francesca soon joins him.

We get a lot of mentions of It in hushed tones, that It is capable of anything, building the hype about this beast which we haven’t seen in the film up to this point. Baron Boris’ retirement party hasn’t had much of the movie’s titular party yet, but that’s about to change. The pacing of this film is a bit old-fashioned, and takes a while to get going like many motion pictures of the late sixties, but it’s a lot of fun if you stick with it. Dracula makes a joke that Francesca is just his type… O Negative. Oh boy, I wonder if Peter Steele ever saw this movie on videotape. The Monster’s Mate makes a joke about pickled salmon that I don’t get, regarding the food available at this maddest of monster parties. There’s better food brewing in the kitchen of Chef Machiavelli, for the main course. The monster-jokes are sometimes bad enough that they give the Groovy Ghoulies a run for their money, and it takes a while before the main event of the Worldwide Organisation of Monsters rivalry actually happens.

The Monster’s Mate and “Fang” dress to impress for the occasion.

Count Dracula arrives in good form, transforming from a bat to his usual self.

The Wolf-Man makes his appearance, howling on the balcony.

The Invisible Man shows up after the Monster’s Mate questions “How can you tell?”.

Quasimodo brings the Mummy down the stairs to meet and greet the crew.

Dr. Jekyll makes an appearance at the party, saving a drink of Mr. Hyde for the main event.

Francesca is still having none of Yelch’s advances, somebody gonna get cancelled.

Finally the Creature from the Black Lagoon appears, with a rad Rankin-Bass design.

Chef Machiavelli is working with zombies to prepare all this food for the party.

Yelch gets strangled by the octopus soup, and Chef Machiavelli has to intervene.

Yelch says there’s something missing from Chef Machiavelli’s hyena casserole, and gets knifed for his culinary criticism.

The actual Worldwide Organisation of Monsters festivities are about to begin!

Baron Boris gathers all the monsters to announce the discovery of his WMD.

Mad Monster Party seldom has a plot, per se, but it does have themes of succession and science gone awry with this atomic bomb recipe Baron Boris has cooked up. This sequence at the table has the machinations of the different monsters laid bare as they struggle for supremacy, and although it’s no Game of Thrones or Dune, the political intrigue here for the formula is exciting. However, as soon as the rivalries get heated, we’re subjected to another song number by Little Tibia and the Fibias, which is definitely dated to the era when the film was first released. Next we get some quality scheming from Count Dracula and Francesca, who plans to get rid of Felix even though Dracula has no idea that Felix is Baron Boris’ rightful heir. See, down from Felix, Francesca is next in line because Baron Boris built her. And that complicates things, leading to another song, this time in ragtime. Like most of the songs in this movie, and with Rankin-Bass’ track record with songs in general, it’s pretty hit or miss. The ragtime number I believe is one of the better ones in this movie, It’s Our Time To Shine slaps but I cannot forgive the shot of Dracula drinking wine. He does not drink… wine.

Count Dracula and the Wolf-Man start scheming for the formula and succession to the top.

Of course there’s a skeleton band to provide the evening’s entertainment!

The Monster’s Mate and the Mummy dancing, because this movie needs to get a groove on.

Dracula and Francesca on the balcony ready to plot and scheme together.

Francesca finds the Monster’s Mate hiding behind the drapes, and they have a cat-fight complete with cat yowling sound effects, which is just as sexist as that implies.

Frankenstein’s Monster accosts Dracula, with the Wolf-Man nipping at his heels.

Mr. Hyde attacks Yelch, succeeding at ripping his head off from behind as Dracula crashes onto the table across the dining room cutlery.

The Creature gets a pie in the face and The Invisible Man pours liquid on him.

Yelch gets a pig’s head put on top of his neck instead of a real one in the food fight.

And Count Dracula ends up being drenched in the punch-bowl.

So this succession plot gets thicker as more monsters are clued into Felix being the successor, and up until now he’s been depicted as a wuss for most of the movie. This perception of his character isn’t about to change, and now he’s back to impact the plot some more. You’d think a human wouldn’t be put in charge of the Worldwide Organisation of Monsters, but apparently humans are the worst out of all of them, so that tracks. Anyway, this plot involves some more scheming once Felix makes it to dry land, which is always welcome when the narrative is a bit slow. There’s a lot more visual gags in this section of the film, which I will detail as follows:

After Dr. Jekyll fights with the Creature for spitting water on him whilst he was trying to sleep, we find out most of the monsters like the Wolf-Man and The Invisible Man are still napping.

The Mummy is snoring, so Quasimodo wraps his bandages around his head to block the noise.

Felix is back in the picture, after annoying us in the first act, he’s skating on thin ice.

Felix looks back at the ship and wonders why the captain acted funny the whole trip.

Baron Boris and Francesca wave Felix down on the shore, waiting to take him in.

Now they’re all bundled together in a dragon boat headed to the castle.

Francesca schemes some more with Dracula, who has to stealth away from prying eyes.

Francesca plans the ambush on her map with Dracula, who is in cahoots with her now.

Felix is being shown around the jungle by Francesca, hopefully to his doom.

All of a sudden, Wolf-Man attacks, but Felix is still trying to be friendly.

The Mummy tries to ambush Felix as well, but to no avail.

Now Dracula tries to go for the kill, but he’s defeated by insect repellant.

Felix tries to choose a sandwich for his picnic, but Dracula again leans in for the throat.

Dracula does the long distance run like an Olympic athlete…

Only to get his fangs embedded in the tree-bark when he lands…

Mad Monster Party has a pretty sedate pace to it, and it’s kind of relaxing compared to more frantic modern animated features with high-energy action scenes. Rankin-Bass were working with what they had, and they’re best and delivering atmospheric stories rather than big blockbusters. The scenes with Felix being shown around the airplane hangar by Baron Boris Von Frankenstein is an example of exposition with charm and subtlety. Baron Boris feeds the various creatures in his lab before revealing to his nephew that he is the head of the World Organisation of Monsters, and he intends for him to take over when he retires. Warlocks, witches, demons, werewolves, the whole shebang! This scene goes on for a while, so I’ll summarise all the visual elements below:

I like this bit where the backstory of the airplanes and Felix’s uncles gets delivered.

“Being a man of science, you can understand…” says Baron Boris to his dear nephew.

This thing looks like one of the soot creatures from Spirited Away.

Felix says he may have the blood for the job, but he sure doesn’t have the stomach for it.

And then there’s another song when all these yokai looking creatures show up.

Stay One Step Ahead isn’t necessarily what I’d call a banger, but it is a nice song.

“Remember, this is a family business” is pretty much “Join me, and we will rule the galaxy together!” in non-Star Wars lingo. Baron Boris is getting sinister now.

“There’s a tradition to uphold!” says Baron Boris, accompanying his sales pitch with creepy paintings on the wall. “You may not like it at first, but after you’ve worked at it a while, I’m sure you’re going to love it as I have!”

Felix has been offered the job opportunity of a lifetime, control over all the monsters in the world, but will he accept this nobleman’s fate or will he reject this familial obligation? At this point in the movie we don’t know, but we do see how the other monsters are reacting to this heir apparent. There’s a double cross against Francesca because Dracula is about as trustworthy as Scott Morrison buying nuclear submarines behind the French’s back, now Fang and the Monster’s Mate want to get rid of Francesca to get Baron Boris’ secrets for themselves. The game is afoot!

“Three chances! Three!” argues Francesca as she rouses on Dracula.

“Francesca! What’s she doing here! We had an appointment!” scolds the Monster’s Mate.

Francesca is backed into a corner by the other monsters, it’s a treacherous situation.

“We must stop her before she tells the Baron! He’ll turn us into erector sets!”

Francesca escapes through a convenient trap-door, and lives to fight another day.

Francesca writes a note which will reveal the truth to Baron Boris about the betrayal.

“Fly my lovely…” says Francesca as she delivers her note by bat freight.

Meanwhile Felix has gone fishing, thinking about turning down Uncle Boris’ offer, whilst the Creature from the Black Lagoon is behind him. Gasp!

Of course a mouthful of fish prevents the Creature from attacking poor Felix.

Felix shudders at the thought of taking over the family business, saying he could never face that Board of Directors, citing his allergies as a reason he can’t do it. As a main protagonist he’s beyond annoying, because his constant complaining gets on the viewer’s nerves. Meanwhile the other characters are freaking out because Francesca has turned against the monsters and is searching for the secret formula to destroy matter so she can rule over the others. Dracula, the Monster’s Mate and “Fang” all go down the trap door Francesca used to find her in the laboratory.

Count Dracula plans on packing his coffin to get out of this situation ASAP.

Francesca searches for the secret formula amongst Baron Boris’s papers.

The other monsters spring on her through the trap door, planning a coup.

Francesca’s not going down without a fight, and she’s got a torch to burn with.

There’s a struggle over the torch and the wolfsbane, and then Francesca jumps out the window, leaving Dracula, the Monster’s Mate and “Fang” to quip about the crocodiles in the lagoon finishing her off. This movie’s not great at building a sense of tension, but I did want to know how Francesca was going to get herself out of this one, and it turns out Felix is waiting in the boat he was fishing in to save her. The Monster’s Mate makes another terrible joke about how they’re going to make the ballet from Swamp Lake, which is par for the course for this movie.

Looking like a James Bond opening credits sequence, Francesca is.

Felix retrieves Francesca from the lagoon in his fishing boat.

Phyllis Diller looks like she’s having lots of fun as the Monster’s Mate, laughing it up.

Francesca starts crying that everything was fine until Felix came to the Isle of Evil and starts yelling “I HATE YOU I HATE YOU I HATE YOU!” but Felix slaps her for being hysterical and that turns her around to not being able to resist him. Then a lot of Freudian symbology happens with crashing waves and lightning and trees falling down, it’s not a bit subtle. The pair are surrounded by an aura of light as they kiss, I assume this means they’re in love from now on. There’s a sultry song number from Francesca as she declares “there never was a love like mine” in the moonlight, and it’s probably one of the least irritating songs in the movie. Francesca picks a flower and dances with her new allergy-prone lover, and it’s rather sweet if you forget this started with a slap.

Rankin-Bass has a certain aesthetic with their stop motion productions which is distinctive to say the least, everything’s hand-made from fabric and plastic.

The plot thickens with this new romance, as Francesca informs Felix that they have to leave the island before something terrible and destructive shows up. Felix asks why they can’t say goodbye, but Francesca already has a boat hidden away for the purposes of a quick escape. Then we cut to the World Organisation of Monsters having a meeting without Felix to stage a mutiny against him, with Dracula being the ringleader of the operation. Yelch remains loyal to Baron Boris, but Dracula and the others are fuming over a human like Felix inheriting control of the World Organisation of Monsters from Von Frankenstein. We’re sixteen minutes away from the climax of the movie, and we still haven’t seen It show up yet. But we will in good time. I don’t like how Dracula says Francesca should have been Yelch’s instead of Felix’s, pitting an incel grudge against the heroes of our story for political gain. Yelch has been harassing Francesca for half the run-time so that’s no good. Meanwhile Francesca and Felix are out of breath in the jungle, and Felix is gulping down his allergy pills. A Venus Fly trap attacks and Felix saves the day, leading to Francesca making out with him some more as they escape through the jungle. Dracula cuts through the greenery with a machete, searching for the couple of love-birds to destroy Von Frankenstein’s successor. All the other monsters follow suit through the foliage. Felix gets some vines to carry Francesca who is worn out and tired (I like her line that she’s no easy pick-up), and he fights the Wolf-Man who grabs her. Francesca is captured and Felix’s glasses are punched off, how will he save her and get to the boat? Well, he happens to have the formula to destroy matter, and the monsters recoil from the dangerous liquid. All of a sudden It rises from the water as the newest threat to everyone’s survival, which brings us closer to the climax of this movie.

Dracula bangs his gavel on a spare human skull as he calls the other monsters to a meeting.

This is getting to The Nutty Professor levels of sixties nerd cliche tropes, get it together Felix!

Now Francesca gets attacked by a carnivorous Venus Fly Trap, Felix throws pills at it.

Dracula is going full Vietnam running through the jungle, where’s the Creedence?

Felix resorts to fisticuffs with the Wolf-Man in the heart of the Isle of Evil jungle.

Felix has the formula to destroy matter in his hand, but will he prevail?

It looms behind Felix as It begins to run amok, and Felix continues to wuss out.

It makes its way towards the castle, in a very King Kong sort of way.

It falls in love with a picture of Francesca, which is going precisely where you think it’s going.

It’s feet get bitten by crocodiles in the lagoon, and when enraged starts wrecking the Von Frankenstein castle. Francesca has been captured by Yelch and the Wolf-Man, tied to a stake. However, It flicks Yelch into the stratosphere with a finger, and because Felix is the weakest male lead I’ve seen outside of a harem anime he threatens to kill himself because he can’t save Francesca on his own. Then Baron Boris shows up with his secret formula and we’re gearing up for the finale soon, because It has also grabbed the other monsters in the crew. Frankenstein’s Monster starts crying for a bit, and in comes the air force of zombie bellhops to complete this King Kong homage. Baron Von Frankenstein calls out the jealousies and hatreds of the monsters who wanted to kill his nephew for power, and then pulls out his WMD to nuke the island.

Yetch doesn’t understand no means no, and he’s got Francesca captive in the worst way.

Now It has Francesca in its clutches, resulting in the King Kong climax we expected.

Baron Boris returns with a vial of the formula to destroy matter, preventing Felix’s suicide.

Apparently It has grabbed not just Francesca, but several of the other monsters.

In comes the airforce of zombie bellhops, twas beauty that killed the beast?

Baron Boris Von Frankenstein leads the charge of the air cavalry, will he defeat It?

The sorrowful ape It expresses its emotions through felt and puppetry.

It puts Francesca down, and proceeds to fight the airmen.

Felix finds the motor boat to make an escape in this exciting climax!

Francesca swims to the safety of her weak male lead as they abandon the Isle of Evil.

The Baron flies across the sea to perform his final mission.

Baron Von Frankenstein has his WMD ready to use, and he sacrifices himself for his nephew.

The Isle of Evil is nuked by Baron Boris Von Frankenstein, and the film comes near to its close.

As you can see, the formula to destroy matter has disintegrated the entire island.

Felix proposes marriage, but Francesca just cries as she tells him the truth, she’s a robot.

The climax is a bit of a downer ending, with the Isle of Evil destroyed and presumably the monsters with it, Felix and Francesca escape via the ocean and off to get married. But Francesca weeps, because where other women have organs, she has springs and a battery which will need replacing, and arms that will rust. Felix reveals he himself is a robot, in a homage to the ending of Some Like It Hot. It’s a grim, dark conclusion to what was at first a fun story about Halloween monsters, and Mad Monster Party has a bit of tone whiplash unique to the period which it was made with questions about the atomic bomb intermingled with horror icon shenanigans. I like Mad Monster Party quite a bit, but it is quite slow in parts where it should be fluid in its animated hijinks, although modern Laika stop-motion projects owe a great debt to the pioneers at Rankin-Bass for kick-starting an art-form with unique charms and hand-crafted magic to it. Overall I reckon Mad Monster Party deserves a place within the very few Halloween specials that exist, especially with the horror genre pedigree it possesses with huge gets like Boris Karloff. It ends a bit sad, however tragedy is forever intertwined with the fate of monsters, as the gothic tradition demands a few tears of sympathy to be shed for the creatures of the night.