User Reviews

" . . . you're nothing but a bunch of rats," Warner Bros.' Looney Tuners rage through their mouthpiece of Sylvester Cat in the VERY FIRST American Presidential Endorsement for Donald Trump, noted author of Capitalist How-To-Be-A-Billionaire-Like-Me books, such as WHO STOLE MY CHEESE? Sylvester's goal as the title character for THE PIED PIPER OF GUADALUPE is to round up all Spanish-speaking Americans, no doubt with an eye toward their eventual deportation (sound familiar yet?). Warner's animators depict a Mexican Gang--led by Speedy Gonzalez--as Lawless Terrorists, defying Authority (Sylvester), blowing up random bystanders (a bulldog), and causing a public transit vehicle to crash by sabotaging street signs. (This being a cartoon aimed at BOTH kiddies and their parents, the only Trump Campaign Slur about Mexicans Warner does not echo-in-advance is the Trumpster's comment about "rapists.") Of course, as a stand-in for Trumpenstein, Sylvester's ability to transform everyone into mindless automatons through a few musical phrases also foreshadows the millions of Angry Loonies who've already voted for the Trumpeter Swan so far in the Primaries.

Directed by Friz Freleng, "The Pied Piper of Guadalupe" is a brilliant Speedy Gonzales/Sylvester cartoon. Sylvester learns to play the flute so that he can hypnotize a group of mice into dancing and subsequently trapping themselves inside a jug. It's then up to Speedy to outwit Sylvester and rescue his "compadres".

Highlights: Speedy dances gracefully to Sylvester's flute melody (a familiar Mexican hat dance) before clobbering the slobbering cat with a mallet. As Sylvester rides a motorcycle to chase Speedy, Sylvester's bulging eyeballs break the glass on his goggles just before he rides off a cliff in an overhead shot; completely underwater, his motorcycle elicits some flatulent sounds. In the end, Speedy turns the tables on Sylvester (who is now on crutches and wrapped in bandages, with his foot in a cast) by playing HIS flute; Sylvester loudly protests as his body hypnotically hops along to the hat dance!

"The Pied Piper of Guadalupe" will surely tickle your funny bone as it does mine. In fact, it's one of my favorite Speedy Gonzales cartoons!

This is a fairly funny Speedy & Sylvester short. Sylvester is fed up up being tormented by the mice of Guadalupe so learns to play the flute so he can lure them out of their mouse hole and into a large jar. This works well until he tries it on Speedy who seems immune to the musics hypnotic effects. He starts rescuing his friends; freeing another each time Sylvester uncorks the bottle to catch him.

The best gag is when Sylvester chases him on a motor bike and is lured over a cliff, as Sylvester realises his inevitable fate his eyes bulge out so far they burst through his goggles. After more chasing he crashes his bike through a bus and ends up in hospital, as he leaves Speedy offers him the flute back but Sylvester makes the mistake of saying he can keep it.

. . . it produces an eerie, foreboding sound which causes otherwise functioning people to "freeze," or even WALK TOWARD danger, as do the mesmerized mice succumbing to Sylvester's panic flute playing during THE PIED PIPER OF GUADALUPE. Gales at sea "singing" through an endangered ship's rigging (like Gordon's dirge on the Ed Fitzgerald in the 1900's), tornadoes ripping through trailer parks drowning in the sounds of Nashville and hurricanes punctuating the jazz funerals of New Orleans with dismembering steel slats bopping along at 150 MPH all illustrate this phenomena. This makes PIED PIPER a good choice to hunker down with before you lose your power to Ida in the Big Easy today.