Wobblyland Wobblies Making Music

Here’s a series produced by Academy Award nominated Brown Bag Films from Dublin. It has a Mr.Men, Roobarb and Custard feel about it. Narrated by Geoffrey Palmer.

Brown Bag have been working on a new series of Noddy with Chorion. It’s about a million times better than the last Noddy series, thanks to Brown Bag’s involvement. Hopefully they’ll release some footage soon so I can feature that here!

Dot and the Kangaroo

Remembered this film the other day while chatting with brother Greg. Sort of a hippy Aussie film about Dot who gets lost in the bush and discovers that animals can speak too! She connects with a kindly kangaroo who’s lost her joey. This is parts one and two – there are more on YouTube. It mixes live action and 2D animation. The weirdest thing about this film was that the sounds of the bush really stuck in my head, and years later when I found myself visiting the Atherton Table Lands in Queensland Australia I realised that I recognised the sounds of the bush from Dot and the Kangaroo.

Part One – Dot gets lost

Part Two – Dot meets the kangaroo

Also the Bunyip Dance – the scary Aborigine style bit

Harry and Toto on Cbeebies

Created by Paul Shuttleworth at Handle and Spout Productions, Harry and Toto is a series for Cbeebies based on Aesop’s fable about the Tortoise and the Hare. Sing-a-long now at the Cbeebies website

Jamie and The Magic Torch: Ghosts

You have to love the false sad start of Jamie and The Magic Torch. Then comes ‘The Who’ like guitar and ten minutes of psychedelic nonsense. Mister Boo. Truncheon eating Officer Gotcha. A dog called Wordsworth with a farm-country accent. Wonderful! Voiced and Written by Brian Trueman.

There’s something very Mighty Boosh about this episode, especially the ghost.

Buy the DVD of Series One and Series Two if you’re feeling really nostalgic!

Monty Python meets Lego

This is some kind of joyous union – Monty Python in lego. In this short, highly polished piece, King Arthur and his knights arrive (almost) at Camelot. Cue Spamalot song and dance number.

The Flumps

Here’s a Flumpeting blast from the past. I loved this as a kid. Pootle was always a favourite character since he was a bit naughty. And I always loved Grandfather… I think because with his cap, glasses, moustache and ear for music… he rather reminded me of my own Grandpa!

More information on The Flumps can be found at Toonhound

Buy The Complete Flumps [1977] on DVD

We’ve, we’ve, we’ve made the sunshine…

…out of the falling rain. Here’s a blast from the past. This is the conclusion of the Puff the Magic Dragon Jackie Draper/Paper story where they all burst into a big ole 70’s singalong after being drenched in Chicken Soup. Obviously! I love this song… it’s probably not cool to like it, but hey!… it’s part of my childhood.

Watch the first two parts here…

Part One

Part Two 

Musical Honkbarn!

And now for something wonderfully silly… Honkbarn! from Flash animator Todd Ramsay. Honkbarn! is a series of musical journeys through the world of the musical Honkers and the quite-loving Grunchers. The characters are beautifully drawn and the backgrounds have a wondeful hand created quality rather than a solid graphic look. The songs are also catchy little loops and more than a little bit bonkers. Enjoy four instalments below.

I Lived on the Moon

Here’s a rather haunting song from Parisian band Kwoon set to some impressive animation from a chap called Yannick Puig, a French animator living in Valencia, Spain. It features a young boy taking a strange, sometimes sad and yet wonderful trip to the moon.

Puig describes it like this: “A father speaks to his son. He explains how was his life on the moon. A place filled with flying snakes, fireflies and three tailed monkeys.A beautiful place, safe and far away from the human culture. A place for imagination, a place in which you’ll find the entrance only if you open your mind.”

There’s more about the film at Puig’s website

More Spookiness with the Biteneck Beatniks

Curtis Jobling of Frankenstein’s Cat fame has created another spooky kids TV series concept called Biteneck Beatniks. It’s currently in development with a Canadian company Sardine Productions. Hopefully it will make it beyond the development phase into the real world. You really can’t have enough spooky kids animations in my book! Here are a couple of trailers for the series with some smooth music!