The Looney Tunes Golden Collection Warner Home Video 2003     Reviewed by Tony Buchsbaum	Is there anyone reading this who isn't a member of the group of people who used to get up on Saturday mornings and run into the room where the TV was, then plunk down and watch what seemed like hours and hours of Looney Tunes? There was nothing like it, was there? Getting lost in the antics of Bugs Bunny, the disastrous foibles of Wile E. Coyote as he tried to snare the Roadrunner using the latest ACME device, the spitty, manic desperation of Daffy Duck, the almost charmingly innocent naiveté of Elmer Fudd. My dad loved them, and so did I, and I understood, even early on, that we loved them for entirely different reasons. I loved their frantic, violent nature and I remember noticing how the coyote and roadrunner cartoons accomplished so much drama without a single word spoken. My dad surely loved the layer on top, the aspect that appealed to the adults. This was a sexier layer, one that spoke volumes to the psyches of the men who watched the cartoons with their kids. (These days, I have fun watching both layers myself, marveling at how truly risqué some of these cartoons really are.) There was a luscious, even lascivious nature to Bugs Bunny's shapeliness when he dressed up in women's clothing to seduce -- that is, distract -- Elmer or Yosemite Sam. Bugs knew, as my dad knew, that a woman's shape telegraphs something. But to us kids, it was all about the comedy of jaws hanging open, of faces blushing, of feet stamping the ground like Thumper in anticipation of things that would never come. While the original Looney Tunes are still shown on TV, now there's a lot of competition from Spongebob Squarepants, Powerpuff Girls and all that anime. Spongebob is the best of these. If you haven't started watching it, do. It's a Looney Tunes for our time, and hardly any other cartoon series is loonier. Best of all, it's got that whole layer-for-the-kids and layer-for-the-parents thing down. But as great as Spongebob is, nothing even approaches the sophistication of the work of Friz Freleng, Chuck Jones, Mel Blanc and Carl Stalling, key members of the team at Warner Bros. who churned out more than 1,300 Looney Tunes and Merry Melodies cartoons. These men didn't make cartoons so much as classic comedies. They were the Pixar of their day: brilliant filmmakers whose chosen medium was animation. Their story sense, their timing, their acting and music and sound effects, all combined to create a body of work unequaled in Hollywood or anywhere else. Now 56 of the best of these gems have been gathered in what promises to be the first of many DVD boxed sets (I hope), The Looney Tunes Golden Collection. The cartoons are restored, uncut and nothing less than glorious. Honestly, they would have been enough reason to buy this set, but the DVD gods have seen fit to treat us to many an extra: making-of documentaries, commentaries by noted film historians, behind-the-scenes featurettes, and much more. (It's almost too much merriment.) The set has been assembled with a meticulousness not often seen, with the focus on fun and ease-of-use (I mention this because so many DVDs are assembled to make it harder to get to the good stuff, a practice I don't understand.). You can play your favorite cartoons one by one, or you can play a whole disc's worth all at once, without interruption. The numerous extras are spread across all the discs, and they're catalogued on elaborate fold-out packaging for easy reference: you won't waste any time searching for whatever you want to see. The behind-the-scenes pieces include detailed peeks into the production facility itself, Carl Stalling and his landmark music, the talents of voice man Mel Blanc, the direction of Chuck Jones and Friz Freleng, and whole featurettes devoted to the development of each classic character. Then there are the cartoons themselves. Wabbit Trouble is here, with a mischievous Bugs and a more prototypical Elmer Fudd. The classic Rabbit of Seville, in which Bugs wreaks havoc on an opera set and on Elmer's scalp. Fast and Furryous, with Wile E. Coyote and Roadrunner. Duck Dodgers in the 24 1/2 Century, in which Daffy goes into space. The Scarlet Pumpernickel, in which Daffy skewers Baroness Orczy's tale. And animated adventures starring Yosemite Sam, Foghorn Leghorn and dozens more. It's just too much fun. These days, my two sons and I gather downstairs in the family room, lights off, TV on, all four DVDs in the player. Much as I love watching these treasures for the umpteenth time, it's even better to watch the boys watching them. Their discovery of this gold is a powerful thing, and their laughter is warmer than the heaviest blanket we own. To tell the truth, I don't know who enjoys this stuff more. Me or them. I guess it's a draw. | December 2003   Tony Buchsbaum is the author of Total Eclipse. At night he works on another novel and a screenplay. Days, he writes advertising copy in Lawrenceville, NJ, where he lives with his wife and sons.	There was a luscious, even lascivious nature to Bugs Bunny's shapeliness when he dressed up in women's clothing to seduce -- that is, distract -- Elmer or Yosemite Sam. Bugs knew, as my dad knew, that a woman's shape telegraphs something. But to us kids, it was all about the comedy of jaws hanging open, of faces blushing, of feet stamping the ground like Thumper in anticipation of things that would never come.