Red Hot Riding Hood

Plot synopsis:
The story begins with the standard version of Little Red Riding Hood (with the wolf from Dumb-Hounded, the cartoon which saw the debut of Avery's Droopy). The characters rebel at this stale and derivative staging of the story and demand a fresh approach. The annoyed narrator accedes to their demands and starts the story again in a dramatically different arrangement.
The story begins again, now told in a contemporary urban setting. The narrator explains that Little Red Riding Hood (now portrayed as an adult) is an attractive performer in a Hollywood nightclub under the stage name "Red Hot Riding Hood," and the Big Bad Wolf, now a Hollywood swinger, follows Red to the club where she's performing. Red performs onstage (a rendition of the 1941 classic hit song "Daddy" by Bobby Troup) and the wolf goes mad with desire. He brings her to his table and tries wooing her, but she wants nothing to do with him. Red escapes the Wolf, saying she's going to her Grandma's place, but nevertheless the Wolf manages to get there first. Grandma's place is a penthouse at the top of a skyscraper. Red's grandma is an oversexed man-chaser who falls head over heels for the Wolf (upon seeing him, she whistles and says, "At last a wolf! Yahoo!").
The Wolf tries to escape, but Grandma blocks the exit and asks him, "What's your hurry, hairy?" She locks the door, drops the key down the front of her evening gown, and poses provocatively for him. She dons a bright red shade of lipstick and a chase scene ensues. Whenever the Wolf attempts an exit, Grandma waits behind the door with puckered lips. He finally makes his escape by jumping out a window, severely injuring himself on the pavement many floors below. He makes his way back to the nightclub, covered with bandages and bruises, swearing, "I'm through with women. Why, I'll kill myself before I'd even look at another babe." Immediately Red takes the stage and begins another performance. The Wolf pulls out two guns and commits suicide, but his ghost rises from his dead body and howls and whistles at Red as he did earlier.

Tags: psychedelic

Review:
The king of cartoons sends the 1943 censors a message..when the armed forces actually bypassed the Hays office to get an uncensored version of this one off to our troops overseas, they preserved one of the greatest works of art ever committed to celluloid..and allowed resonances to echo into such disparate results as Jessica Rabbit, Cool World, and Ren and Stimpy.
For the record, the plot is simple..the old fairy tale is worn out, and needs some new blood..the wolf is now really a wolf, and Red has more than goodies in her basket..now, go and watch this one three hundred times, and you'll see almost all the little jokes lovingly crafted into it...
But modern-day animators working on pixillated mega-productions owe Tex Avery and his "Termite Terrace" co-workers a large debt.
Rather than retell The Avery story (there are several books around that will do that), just look out for his classic MGM cartoons of the '40s and '50s, and marvel at the genius on show.
This time he uses the fairy tale of 'Little Red Riding Hood'.
The wolf is a rich character who falls in love with Red. She doesn't want him because she has to go to her grandma.
Of course hilarious moments is what we get.This short has a nice story and the usual Tex Avery humor, including written messages.
Tex Avery's first excursion into animated sexual frenzy is his best, ranking as one of his three greatest cartoons (the other two, in case you're wondering, are "Who Killed Who?," also 1943, and "King-Size Canary," 1947).
It's too bad Avery didn't complete the opening misdirection by having the FIRST title card read "Little Red Riding Hood," but it goes by so quickly, and is drawn so conservatively that it doesn't really hurt.
Actually, my comment for this should truly be a simple verbal genuflection, but that wouldn't be of acceptable minimum length here, so I'll actually say something.This is Tex Avery's masterpiece in terms of the relation of his work to animation in general and the short form in specific.
Got to be the funniest and fastest Avery cartoon there is, the best "modern" slant on the red riding hood story, with the wolf lusting after Red Hot at every opportunity.
Here is the short (besides her last cartoon Little Rural Riding Hood), that got me to love to the first overtly erotic cartoon character ever created - Red. Now this short Red Hot Riding Hood is one of Avery's most popular cartoons and some consider the cartoon to be Avery's magnum opus.The story begins with the standard version of the Little Red Riding Hood story; until the characters suddenly rebel at this done-to-death staging and stated "every cartoon studio in Hollywood has done it this way", which is kind of the truth.
Grandma is an oversexed man-chaser who falls head over heels over Wolf, and locks him in her apartment, puts on a bright red shade of lipstick and tries to kiss him several times during his stay.
He tries to escape but the lovelorn granny chases after him, and every door Wolf opens Grandma is there waiting with puckered lips.In contrast to my favorite cartoon character Betty Boop, who was a character who exuded a sweetly innocent style, Red was pure sex, existing almost exclusively to whip the Wolf (a metaphor for males in general) into a carnal frenzy.
With this short as her introduction, Red was the sexy distraction for the oversexed, lusting "Wolf" character that was introduced earlier in the 1942 short "Blitz Wolf." She drove the sex-crazed wolf do all the things that were to become trademarks of Avery's cartoons: the eye-popping, the jaw dropping, and the gravity defiying pratfalls.
She was so popular that she was brought back for 3 more cartoons - "Swing Shift Cinderella," "Uncle Tom's Cabana" and "Little Rural Riding Hood." Her cartoons were originally made for the benefit of U.S. GI's, and were banned from television for years for being considered to racy..
Ever since I found out about "Red Hot Riding Hood", I had been wanting to see it, but I never did.That is, until I found it on YouTube.....Tex Avery made me very, very happy that day, hence my comment title.It starts off like a normal sugar coated fairy tail (the narrator even uses a sappy voice!) until the Wolf, Red and Grandma all start complaining that every studio in Hollywood has done this over and over again.
This is the low down on what happens: The Wolf is a wealthy playboy, Grandma is also filthy rich (and horny as hell) and Red is a flaming hot and sexy nightclub singer/dancer.
Red appears on the stage again and, true to the Wolf's words, he shoots himself and his ghost goes nuts over Red.This is most definitely one of the greatest cartoons of all time.
Avery had previously satired the Red Riding Hood story at WB with LITTLE RED WALKING HOOD (1937).
After they protest reenacting the tiresome story, we are treated to a retelling of the story: Red Hot Riding Hood (something new has been added).
The humor, which became a standard that Avery had perfected from his days at WB, is the wolfs over-the-top reactions to Red's dance number; Nicely animated by Ed Love and Preston Blair respectively.
Love animation, it was a big part of my life as a child, particularly Disney, Looney Tunes and Tom and Jerry, and still love it whether it's film, television or cartoons.Also have much admiration for Tex Avery, an animation genius whose best cartoons are animated masterpieces and some of the best he ever did.
'Red Hot Riding Hood' is one of his most famous cartoons, a distinction that is so richly deserved because it is not one of Avery's very finest (in a filmography where a vast majority of his output was good to masterpiece standard) but to me and many others one of the best cartoons ever made.
It was very ahead of its time, with the hottest and sexiest Red Riding Hood ever and characters in animation and its very racy humour, and to this day it's still the complete opposite of tame.The story 'Little Red Riding Hood' is one of the most famous stories ever and has been parodied in countless cartoons, of which no other cartoon based on the story is this imaginative, daring or unique as 'Red Hot Riding Hood'.
All the characters are great, especially the smoking hot Red and the hilarious wolf.
'Little Red Riding Hood' has never had a Grandma this feisty either.Can't say anything bad about Avery's direction.
He does a wonderful job directing, with his unique, unlike-any-other visual and characteristic and incredibly distinctive wacky humour style all over it as can be expected.Once again there is nothing sadistic or repetitious, instead it's imaginative, wonderfully wild, deliciously deranged, violent but imaginatively so, shockingly racy, red hot sexy and hilarious throughout from start to finish.
The music, courtesy of Scott Bradley, is lushly and cleverly orchestrated, with lively and energetic rhythms and fits very well indeed.'Red Hot Riding Hood' is a tour-De-force when it comes to the voice acting.
The all-famous tale needs some new blood (as demanded by it's three main characters), so now the wolf is some hot shot rich...
wolf, grandma is a crazed sexy old lady with her own penthouse and red a nightclub dancer (watch out for Jessica Rabbit in Roger Rabbit, she must be based on red).
Red Hot Riding Hood begins with what seems to be yet another Red Riding Hood story (we saw this with Disney before, remember), but less than a minute in, both Red and the Wolf turn to face the audience frustrated that they have to go through what is, essentially, a dated telling of this tale.
Every shot there is something to look at, the sense of propulsive movement is delirious and the gags make one think that all totally bonkers slapstick comedy should have started here (when the wolf comes back to the apartment building for example anf the old lady is there waiting for him...
In this Tex Avery offering, he is a playboy who finds himself totally taken with a night club singer named Red Riding Hood.
If you thought that 'Little Red Riding Rabbit (1944)' was an offbeat adaptation of the fairy-tale, then you haven't seen nothing yet.
Tex Avery's 'Red Hot Riding Hood (1943)' opens in the usual fashion, but, after that, any resemblance to any known fairy-tale character, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
The Wolf baulks at having to play the one-dimensional bad guy for the hundredth time, and threatens to quit if the animators can't come up with anything original; Red Riding Hood and her grandma agree with him.
So Avery throws together 'Red Hot Riding Hood,' an adult cartoon set in the big city – the Wolf is a sex-crazed womaniser, Red a knockout nightclub dancer, and Grandma a libidinous old lady with her own high-rise penthouse.
Somebody must have forgotten to inform Avery that he was producing cartoons for children, since there's actually little to laugh at for anybody who isn't yet acquainted with the birds and the bees.However, for those of us who have surpassed that particular checkpoint, 'Red Hot Riding Hood' is very funny.
The sheer audacity of a children's cartoon about sex – particularly given the typically innocent and wholesome image of Little Red Riding Hood – is something to be applauded.
Also worth noting is that 'The Mask (1994)' directly referenced 'Red Hot Riding Hood' in the scene where Jim Carrey wolf-whistles (in the full sense of the word) Cameron Diaz during her nightclub performance – I'd never realised this.
For fans of Tex Avery and MGM cartoons, this one is essential viewing..
This is a wonderfully kooky and sexy film from MGM and director Tex Avery.
Never before had such a hot cartoon leading lady been released by a major film studio and audiences of the day were both incensed and excited at the prospect!
The cartoon begins with the traditional Red Riding Hood story.
So, moments later, Red Riding Hood is a living pin-up girl and the wolf is a sex-crazed "wolf" on the prowl for such a tasty dish!
Like SWINGSHIFT Cinderella, however, the old lady (grandma in this case) is dead set on catching the wolf herself and does everything she can do to thwart the wolf from capturing Red. Most of the action is very high-paced and goofy--just like you'd hope in a Tex Avery cartoon.Overall, this is a great cartoon.
'Red Hot Riding Hood' is howling good time!
Released with the 1943's Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer movie 'Dr. Gillespie's Criminal Case', Frederick Bean Avery, better known as Tex Avery 1943's animation short 'Red Hot Riding Hood' is one of the most wacky cartoon ever.
Although, there have been many semi-sexy adult- oriented animation adaptations of the classic fairy tale, 'Little Red Riding Hood', before this short, like Van Beuren Studios 1931's short, 'Red Riding Hood', Fleischer Studios 1931's 'Dizzy Red Riding Hood' & Warner Bros, 1937's 'Little Red Walking Hood', which Avery also produced before leaving for MGM.
None of them, stands the test of time, like this classic 7 minute film about a socialite playboy, literal and figurative wolf (Voiced by Frank Graham) trying to woo the heart of a beautiful nightclub singer (Voiced by Sara Berner).
Thank goodness, Avery's humor and perfect comical timing set the new tone of well-rounded comedy that is still used today by animators & filmmakers, alike.
There is no better, example of that, than the hybrid films of 1994's 'The Mask' & 1988's 'Who Framed Roger Rabbit' whom directors, were highly influence by Avery's works.
If anything, 1925's 'How Could Red Riding Hood (Have Been So Very Good)?', written by A.P. Randolph, suite the movie, better, even if that song is kinda banned from the public (except in instrumental versions), due to possible sexual connotations at the time.
Still, it did rub the wrong way with the Hays Code, at the time, to the point that MGM release a censor version, where the wolf doesn't react in highly cartoony wild way to Red's dancing.
Despite that, the film is one of Avery's most famous cartoons, to the point that, two other sequels shorts were made: 1945's 'Swing Shift Cinderella' & 1949's 'Little Rural Riding Hood'.
It's still a nice animated film from Tex Avery.
'Red Hot Riding Hood' is a shining example of some of the best, the golden age of animation can bring to the table.
Tex Avery had already established himself as a master of groundbreaking and adult-oriented humor and the king of comical timing after only three movies at the MGM.
He made other masterpieces after that, but if there was one to keep, it is "Red Hot Riding Hood", certainly the most defining of all his films.
I mean, is there a better illustration of Avery's legacy than the wolf continuous whistles and howling during Red's sexy song.
But let's get back to the first three waves that somewhat predated the shock of hilarity "Red Hot Riding Hood" provided (spoilers ahead in the next paragraph)Let's see, the first one, "Blitz Wolf" was a propaganda short based on "The Three Little Pigs" with a wolf embodying Hitler but not one of these ugly-looking caricatures from Warner Bros cartoons, he was evil but sympathetic enough to carry the film.
Avery's creativity was going all over the place but "Little Red Hot Riding Hood" combine the comedic core of all these elements, as many ingredients to a great sandwich we devour with appetite.
And what he accomplishes is even more impressive because he doesn't just make a cartoon with adult characters, he takes as a starting point a fairy tale, the epitome of childhood-oriented stories.
I said Avery mastered the ending of his shorts, this is perhaps one of the few times where the beginning is the most memorable part, it even plays like a real epiphany for the world of animation, Avery's anti-Disney testimony, expressing his deepest belief that there's no reason fairy tales should be meant to please children, there was something strongly adult in them, and when we know what the metaphor of the 'big bad wolf" was intended to, we can hardly disagree.The short opens with one of these Disney trademarks, a book opening, and the narrator starts with "Good evening kiddies", then using a very corny falsetto voice, as if dumbing down the tone was the best way to reach children, he shows good old riding hood going to her grandma's house, the brave old lady waiting and her bad and the sneaky wolf coming, but as the narrator speaks, the eyes of the animal break the fourth wall and he's finally fed up with always being the "big bad wolf", the girl joins him and then the three characters all in unison express their tiredness, they had enough with the same story being played over and over again.
Then the Averyan magic operates and the narrator announces a few changes will be made.The rest is known by everybody, the wolf becomes the archetypal woman-chaser, red hot a cabaret dancer and the grandma is perhaps one of the most politically incorrect animated characters of all time.
Of course, you can't really analyze the film without passing over the most iconic moment, featured in many movies such as "The Mask" or that striptease with Sophia Loren where Marcello Mastroianni starts howling, the wolf whistles, the frenetic way he hits his head, are perhaps the closest depiction to sexuality ever displayed in a cartoon.
And the perfect metaphor for it, this moment is so important in the history of animation that viewers didn't even notice that even the content of the "Daddy" song was rather racy.On a side note, the film had the fortune to be made in World War II when troops needed mature content to be kept in good spirit so the short passed the censor (except for a marriage that could have been seen as bestiality).Still, the reversal of role we got with the grandma is another demonstration of Avery's genius.
And we're on the road again.Once again, Avery sacrifices his characters for laughs, but like the ghosts, the wolf will be back over and over again, with him and Red, and Droopy for the previous, Avery had already established himself as the King of comedy, "Red Hot Riding Hood" is the quintessential Avery cartoon, named one of the Top 50 greatest cartoons of all time.
"Red Hot Riding Hood" is a 1943 cartoon written and directed by Tex Avera.
Red Riding Hood is a lascivious night club dancer and the Wolf is a guest at that club and when he sees her, he literally wants to do anything with her except eating her.
Unfortunately, when he arrives at her Grandma's place, the old lady is at least as horny as he is and he gives it his all to keep her from doing with him what he planned to do with Red Riding Hood.
Not really outstanding, but a good watch and it's just so much fun to watch Wolf at the night club crushing hard on Red Riding Hood.
Although, to his credit, while borrowing from previous cartoons, he did manage to put a new spin on them; rendering in a sense, "new and improved." TAKING AN AGE old and very well known story such as Little Red Riding Hood and "updating" it and giving the characters 20th Century "face lifts" the master Director just let his imagination run away with itself.
His penchant for all that is fast paced and outrageous easily fills up the running time.DURING THAT SAID running time, his innovations include: Red Riding Hood as a sexy vamp/singer, a playboy "Wolf" in the 1940s vernacular, Grandmother's place now being a penthouse and Granny's possessing the libido of a much younger woman!
That is followed by the Wolf's white as a sheet shade's stomping, whistling and hooting for Red Riding Hood, whom has once again taken center stage.