I have a limited number of Mel-o-toons in my collection. There are over 100 in the original series. They're cute, maybe teach a lesson, and many of them were based on certain music scores or children's 45s (ancient nomenclature for plater style records). The animation is less than appealing but workable. The music seemed to be the primary focus, and not animation quality. Produced in the late 1950s and early 1960s they fit in that time frame well enough. In 1960 I'm sure they'ed have been entertaining for a 10 year old. By todays standard a 3 year old might get a laugh out of them. Based mostly on music and well known tales, legends, and the like they can still be mildly entertaining. But don't look for great artistic expression here. That'll drive you Looney Tunes.
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KennethEagleSpirit5 May 2007
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webhead-975532 December 2023Poorly, cheaply, minimally animated. Less than one frame per second. More like 3-5 seconds per frame. Most of the movement is just moving the camera. The art is very flat, like shadow puppets. Maybe educational, but not entertaining. Good luck getting a kid to sit through them. The 'education' is questionable. For instance it says Christopher Columbus was a mapmaker. Crude animation even by 1960 standards. In the public domain, because they are not worth owning. It is doubtful you will remember seeing them when you were a child because they are un-memorable. Good luck getting a kid to sit through them.
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josephbrando9 January 2008These charming little 5-minute cartoons used previously existing, wonderfully produced children's records as their narrative and added cute but limited animation. The stories I have seen are more than entertaining, especially if you grew up listening to those book and record story sets that used to be so popular. Unfortunately, there seems to be only a handful that are in circulation out of the over 100 that were produced. They used to show up frequently as filler on those public domain cartoon VHS/DVD sets and seem to have found a new life on Youtube. Included were Fairy Tales, Folklore, Adventure, Biblical, Musical and Educational Stories such as Cinderella, HANSEL AND GRETEL, SLEEPING BEAUTY, RUMPELSTILTSKIN, PINOCCHIO, CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS, David & GOLIATH, NOAH'S ARK, ALADDIN, TREASURE ISLAND, PAUL BUNYAN, LITTLE HAWK, THE ENCHANTED HORSE, ALI BABA, DIANA & THE GOLDEN APPLES, TOM SAWYER, ROBIN HOOD, PANCHITO, THE KINGS TRUMPET, THE MAGIC CLOCK and many others. It would be nice if someone would release all of them in a complete collection.
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Matthew_Capitano11 December 2014Innocently animated renditions of classic stories of American folklore.
I have the 'Paul Bunyan' episode and it's sweetly told, albeit a bit generic as far as the drawings go, though concomitantly charming for the same reason. IMDb reviewer Mr. Joseph Brando is correct in his positive comments concerning these 1960-produced delights. There are a plethora of episodes to collect and well-worth the effort to do so. These animated tales from yesteryear are still very endearing and remain a fine source of entertainment for the entire family.
Highly recommended viewing for aficionados of animation as well as lovers of cute cartoons. -
Alexyz25 August 2017The messages in Mel-O-Toons may have screwed my life up, but probably in a good way. At the tender age of 4 and 5 years I was exposed to messages of how working together could bring back missing sound to the barnyard animals, how the one who starts fastest does not not always win the race, how a small band of soldiers and a gift could defeat a much larger army, and then there was the explosive classical music to contend with. I pity the youngster like myself that were exposed to Mel-O-Toons but not Disney because if one took to heart the philosophically powerful messages of Mel-O-Toons at a tender age but were unaware of Disney's much larger influence on childhood cartoons it could lead to the mistaken belief that others of their age had been Mel-O-Tooned when they had actually been Disnified.