La caperucita roja (1960) User Reviews

ooh

[islandsnvrcry · 7/10 · 28 April 2007]

this movie is basically flawless. as a CHILD, i watched the English version and was enthralled by it, and at the same time very creeped out by the incredibly and shockingly sexual predator/stalker character of the Wolf. Anyone who has seen this film as a child can tell you it is an emotional roller coaster on multiple levels. The music, the rustic scenery in "half color", and the emotions just take you to another world; an outsider who is just waiting to see the protagonist come to an end, with the evil being so pungent and in our face, with you completely unable to do anything about it. You constantly fear for riding hood and the villagers because you know what is coming for them. its very shakespearan.

As an ADULT, the movie is the most hilarious thing you will perhaps ever see in you're life, for various reasons, primarily the corniness and high levels of non realism. It is worthe minutes upon minutes of laughter. However, It is also possible to take the film very seriously; just note the above mentioned characteristics of the wolf. Strong other gender and age related issues are also prevalent throughout the film; its a matter of viewing it as styalistic.

An inept hilarious film that even children won't like!

[Casey-52 · 9/10 · 8 July 1999]

LITTLE RED RIDING HOOD was available at a film convention I went to and out of curiosity, I bought it. It was the funniest thing I had seen in years! Not intentionally funny, mind you, but funny! The little girl is so obnoxious, everyone loves her, the perfect little girl. You just wanna ring her neck! The wolf is a man in a raggedy old HIDEOUS suit that stalks around "menacingly" with his sidekick, a skunk (a man in a HIDEOUS skunk suit!). When Little Red sings, her voice is that of an adult opera singer! With a giant spider who's "angry", the wolf's cave that looks like a giant jack o' lantern, and a bunch of comedy relief that isn't comedy and certainly isn't relief for the atrocity of this thing! Get this movie now!

A good choice for kids, but you must see it in Spanish

[traveller-samurai · 8/10 · 14 August 2006]

I am disagree with some comments of the users of this movie because of the very bad dubbing of the movie. We have to remember that, for a Mexican movie, this one is on the standards of this time (beginning of the sixties) and it had to be see it more as a theatrical way than a movie.

The most appreciated character on this movie and the next two had been made is Manuel "Loco" Valdes because he was in his top moment as comedian and actor, so he develop a very funny and unoffensive wolf that became the pivotal of this and the next two movies.

Maybe for me, this movie is now not more than a lot of sugar on screen (currently I am 27), but for the time I saw it (around 20 years before), this series of movies became a very nice experience to see on Mexican TV.

This movie is good for kids that wants to imagine that the characters are real even that they look so unreal on screen, but forget to hear it dubbed in English, the Spanish version is better.

SPOILER: K. Gordon Murray's fractured fairy tales

[rdh7182373 · 27 April 2004]

In 1959, K. Gordon Murray released "Santa Claus" which he purchased from the Mexican Azteca studios. He released it in the U.S. with an ineptly dubbed English soundtrack and it became a surprise hit. Murray's 'high concept' was to book it to theaters as an exclusive "Childrens Matinee". It would only play afternoons in selected theaters rather than evening performances like Hollywood features. For about a decade, Murray and his imitators released Mexican and German imports using this release pattern.

In the sixties my parents took me to see some of his pictures on weekends. There is nothing quite so bizarre as to see these movies on a large screen. Everything is magnified. The shabby costumes, the out of synch dialogue, rediculous songs, endless zooming and characters running into the camera lens. You can see the eyebrows and mascara of the comedian playing the wolf through an obvious hole in the costume. Sometimes the lips move while they're talking, other times they don't. When the girl sings her theme song, a grown woman's voice comes out of her mouth. The skunk babbles incoherantly in every scene drowning out the other dialogue. The continuity is choppy since Murray removed shots and scenes from the original Mexican version. It plays like a low budget horror film rather than a children's fantasy. All of these elements made for a very disorienting and grotesque moviegoing experience. Yet I must admit, I found it memorable.

I recently purchased a VHS of the original spanish language version, "La Caperucita Roja". While still strange, the continuity is more coherant and less choppy. The skunk does not babble as much and a little girl's voice is used for the theme song. I have no idea where Murray got his first scene in the American version of Little Red Riding Hood and Freckles arguing since it's not in the Mexican version.

Murray also released three sequels to this picture. The strangest is "Little Red Riding Hood and the Monsters". In one scene, the girl rips out the chest hair of an ogre and stuffs it in his mouth. There's nothing quite like a K. Gordon Murray Children's Matinee!

Incredible movie...A+++!!!

[bkball4me · 10/10 · 10 December 2004]

I saw the movie when I was a kid back in Mexico. It was a total hit back then along with "Pulgarcito". I was so fascinated with her sweetness and her costume that my dad bought me the 45" record of this movie. For too long I was none other than Caperucita Roja, until I replaced her for a movie star a couple of years later. If by any chance you are lucky to have this movie, I recommend that you have the mind of a child of the 60'S and to watch it and to remember that everything was magic,incredible, pure, innocent, perfect, It just has all the ingredients to make us laugh, be sad, to dream and to believe that goodness always overcomes darkness. A 100% BEAUTIFUL AND RECOMMENDED MOVIE WITH NO DOUBT!!! (p.s. Guess what I just bought from one of these auctions?.... you're right; the record my Dad gave me 38 years ago and also some originals Lobby Cards from the movie!!