Opportunity. It's a word b-movie makers are very familiar with. During the home video boom of the 80s and 90s it was easy to walk into a rental store and see numerous knock-offs of whatever was popular at the time. Which is why its no surprise that the always-busy Fred Olen Ray unleashed Evil Toons on the viewing public a few years after the successful blending of live action and cartoons that was Who Framed Roger Rabbit? Of course, this being a Ray flick, you're going to get a lot more hot girls, juvenile humour, bared breasts and David Carradine than you are in the Robert Zemeckis hit.

Even though this isn't the greatest effort, you have to give it credit for being one, of few, amalgamations of horror and "toons" that arrived on the scene. In fact, the only other one I can think of is Joe Castro's awful Terror Toons. But what sets this apart from the shoestring crap like that is Ray's use of washed-up celebrity guest appearances, a cameo by scream queen favourite Michelle Bauer (who just shows-up to pull her top down and nothing more) and casting Monique Gabrielle in one of the lead roles.

The set-up is as simple as they come, which is perfectly fine. Things open with Carradine's cloaked loony hanging himself in order to get away from an evil, living book that's obviously a riff on Evil Dead. Fast-forward to years later and a group of four girls has arrived at the house in order to earn a hundred-dollars each to spend the weekend there cleaning it up. Amongst the group are the aforementioned Gabrielle playing the naïve smart girl, Ray's then girlfriend Suzanne Ager as the group's leader, porn star trying to go legit Stacey Nix, and Madison Stone as the sluttiest of the girls - who has an affinity for wearing as little clothes as possible and ends up as the one being possessed by our horny cartoon demon to do its bidding.

Speaking of the cartoon demon, it's a wolf-like creature straight out of the Tex Avery school of animation and it gets unleashed after the girls have found Carradine's book in a trunk down in the basement. This leads to plentiful scenes of the girls wandering aimlessly around the house while the possessed Roxanne chomps on them with her sharp fangs. There's also a moment where Gabrielle's character is given the task of translating the book but takes time out to check herself, and her luscious breasts, in a mirror. Also on hand is a somehow resurrected Carradine who does little but lurk in the yard peaking out from behind a tree, long-time cult favourite Dick Miller as the guy who's hired them and Arte Johnson (TV's "Laugh In") as the pervy neighbour.

To call Evil Toons a movie made only for those seeking a quickly shot, goofy flick with girls in various states of undress would be an appropriate description. Ray and company aren't trying to make anything here but a goofy timewaster that would return them a profit. Thankfully, though, Ray (who also wrote under his much used pseudonym Sherman Scott) has also seen fit to put in enough self-referential humour while poking fun at co-star Miller's A Bucket of Blood days by having his character watching the film on television and proclaiming, "I don't know how he never won an Oscar". And let's not forget about Stone's striptease scene where he's piped in wacky sound effects.

Back in my VHS days I had a soft spot for Evil Toons. I saw it around the same time as Ray's low-budget moviemaking spoof Bad Girls from Mars and enjoyed the unserious tone he brought to them. Which is probably why I've seen a good portion of the 113(!!) films on his resume. It hasn't aged particularly well but if you're able to put your brain in check, or you just love the type of movie that would show up on USA Network's "Up All Night" then you're sure to find something here you'll dig. (Chris Hartley, 5/17/10)

Directed By: Fred Olen Ray.
Written By: Sherman Scott (Fred Olen Ray).

Starring: David Carradine, Dick Miller, Monique Gabrielle, Suzanne Ager.

Picture Ratio: 1.66:1 Widescreen.

Picture Quality: More "meh" than "yeah!", the picture quality here is definitely nothing special as it's littered with specks, is somewhat grainy, and suffers from some pixelation during certain scenes - this is most evident during red-lit scenes in the basement. For the most part this looks like a VHS-to-DVD transfer.

Extras: Coming to us in this "20th Anniversary Edition", Evil Toons gets a mix of pointless and interesting special features.

Falling on the side of "who cares?" we get a trailer, an overly silly "Night Owl Theater" introduction clip that's common on Ray's Retromedia discs, an unfinished scene from the editor's workprint, a sound-only track of Chuck Cirino's theme music.

Them comes the good stuff. First up is an interview with Ray (filmed in 2001) about the making of the film which gives us a lot of fun ancedotes and behind-the-scenes information. This is carried on in the highly listenable commentary track where Ray gives us an honest look at working in the b-movie business. I've heard from various people that Ray can be a jerk but he doesn't come across as one here.