{"id":43381,"date":"2024-03-29T19:16:18","date_gmt":"2024-03-29T23:16:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/?p=43381"},"modified":"2024-03-29T19:16:18","modified_gmt":"2024-03-29T23:16:18","slug":"the-bootleg-files-luno","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/2024\/03\/29\/the-bootleg-files-luno\/","title":{"rendered":"The Bootleg Files: Luno"},"content":{"rendered":"

BOOTLEG FILES 859:<\/strong> \u201cLuno\u201d (1963-1965 series of theatrical and television animated shorts). <\/p>\n

LAST SEEN:<\/strong> Some of the shorts are on YouTube.<\/p>\n

AMERICAN HOME VIDEO:<\/strong> A few shorts turned up on VHS video.<\/p>\n

REASON FOR BOOTLEG STATUS: <\/strong>It fell through the cracks.<\/p>\n

CHANCES OF SEEING A COMMERCIAL DVD RELEASE:<\/strong> Not likely.<\/p>\n

You never know what you\u2019ll find on Facebook. The other day, while scrolling through the site I came across a couple of a screenshots from an old cartoon that I didn\u2019t immediately recognize. After reading the captions for the screenshot, I vaguely recalled the production being featured. I looked up the titles and found them on YouTube \u2013 and then, I remembered viewing these works during my childhood in the early 1970s.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

The cartoons in question belonged to a series called \u201cLuno\u201d and it centered on the adventures of a highly imaginative little boy named Tim. Whenever something exotic or mysterious piqued his attention \u2013 either from a classic work of fiction or a historic event \u2013 Tim would reach to a shelf in his bedroom and pull down the toy of a white winged horse. Tim would then clutch his fingers over his head and chant, \u201cOh winged horse of marble white, take me on a magic flight.\u201d Suddenly, the toy became a full-grown winged horse named Luno that talked in a deep male voice. Tim would jump on the horse\u2019s back and the boy\u2019s bedroom abruptly changed into the open skies. Luno would fly Tim across oceans and through time, landing in the midst of some chaotic situation that needed straightening out.<\/p>\n

\u201cLuno\u201d was produced by Terrytoons, a low-budget animation studio best known for creating the Mighty Mouse and Heckle and Jeckle series. The Terrytoons shorts stood out from the other animation studios, and not for the right reasons \u2013 the artwork was often shabby and sloppy, the scripts were hectic and nonsensical, slapstick was frequently crass, and the characters had little dimension. Studio boss Paul Terry wasn\u2019t concerned about those flaws, quipping, \u201cLet Walt Disney be the Tiffany’s of the business. I want to be the Woolworth\u2019s!\u201d Terry retired in 1955, and after a brief period of leadership by Gene Deitch the studio was run by Bill Weiss, who sought to re-energize the output with new characters.<\/p>\n

\u201cLuno\u201d was launched in 1963 as a theatrical shorts series, via a 20th Century Fox release. This was a curious decision because the theatrical shorts market in the early 1960s was a shadow of its former self, with much of the output consisting of weak material. The studio already made inroads in television, which would have provided a wider and more focused audience. But despite Terrytoons\u2019 usual brand of cheapjack animation, the \u201cLuno\u201d shorts were very entertaining endeavors that packed a great deal of mayhem into five minutes.<\/p>\n

In creating these shorts, the Terrytoons artists wisely kept Luno as the sturdy, no-nonsense hero and Tim as the plucky, go-getting mini-hero without making them comic figures. The other characters they encountered were played-for-laughs bumblers who needed rescuing and inspiration from the flying horse and his young master. Some of the cartoons have the same character \u2013 a dumpy, jittery, none-too-wise man \u2013 at the center of the chaos, either wearing a turban as Sinbad the Sailor, a mariner\u2019s jacket and hat as Captain Ahab (minus the peg leg) or in an animal skin onesy as the caveman who invents the wheel. Luno and Tim rescue this guy from various dangers \u2013 an angry Roc in the Sinbad episode, Moby Dick with Ahab, and a belligerent dinosaur with the caveman.<\/p>\n

Each cartoon has a high degree of wild sight gags \u2013 I particularly enjoyed when Moby Dick\u2019s tail was spun about and let loose, causing the great leviathan to take off in flight. Unlike many of the earlier Terrytoons shorts, the slapstick here fit the stories and weren\u2019t irrelevant slices of surrealism.<\/p>\n

At the end of the cartoons, Tim would be back in his home to offer a brief comment on what occurred. In some shorts, Tim\u2019s mother would peek in on him and happily wonder about his imagination. Luno would return to being a stationary toy, although sometimes he gave off a faint neigh to affirm the adventures happened.<\/p>\n

Terrytoons produced five \u201cLuno\u201d shorts in 1963 and 1964 that played in theaters. Another 11 were made for television as backup segments for Terrytoon\u2019s \u201cDeputy Dawg\u201d and \u201cThe Astronut Show.\u201d Bob McFadden gave Luno his deep, authoritative while Norma McFadden gave Tim a child\u2019s innocent voice in the theatrical shorts and Dayton Allen gave him a somewhat older and more masculine voice in the television offerings.<\/p>\n

\u201cLuno\u201d didn\u2019t really catch on with the public \u2013 there was minimal merchandising, with one children\u2019s book and one coloring book \u2013 and it mostly disappeared from view in the 1970s. A couple of cartoons turned up on VHS videos featuring a grab-bag of Terrytoons titles, but to date there has been no single collection of \u201cLuno\u201d shorts. <\/p>\n

Some of the cartoons were uploaded to YouTube, which offers cartoon lovers the ability to appreciate this long-forgotten but entertaining entry in the Terrytoons canon.<\/p>\n