Watch Hey Good Lookin' For Free

Good concept, poorly executed.

After playing with our expectations, this turns out to be a very different sort of film.

Blistering performances.

The acting in this movie is really good.

Hey Good Lookin was finished in mid-70's, and it was Bakshi's Fourth feature film. It's original version, featuring Animated Characters against live-action characters discussing girlfriends and haircuts must've been a treat to watch.But Warner Brothers delayed the film for 4 years before they officially scrapped it entirely, and ordered Bakshi to re-made the whole film in animation, and throughout the production of Wizards and Lord of the Rings, Bakshi used his gains from those movies to remake Hey Good Lookin in animation, but he didn't felt like it, so in the end, he didn't even watched the final film, so just like Cool World, Hey Good Lookin was just made without any love or care, it's just a shell of what it once was.The reason why this film would feel much different than the original version is because it probably had a charm to it, the new version doesn't has a charm, it's just colorful characters slapped on lifeless, static and bland backgrounds, there are a few scenes where the characters are against a Live-action background, and it looks great, not Roger-Rabbit great, but it's a different take, it's not supposed to look like they're really there, it's just an experiment Bakshi made to see of how far the suspension of disbelief went.However, there are a few scenes that I like in the current version, SPOILER ALERT, like the scene where Vinnie and Crazy hang out in Manhattan, or any of the scenes with Vinnie and Crazy in them, because they're really well acted, Richard Romanus and David Proval showed some really nice chemistry on their parts as best friends Vinnie and Crazy Shapiro. I like the rumble scene, where the dancing people are rotoscoped, quite surreal, and I like the scene where Vinnie griefs for the death of Crazy, and walks around by himself in Manhattan, it's kinda heartbreaking, to be honest, and I like the ending too, despite what some people say. I don't like sad endings, I like closure.All in all, I really want to see the original version of Hey Good Lookin. Come on Warners Brothers, time to dust off that Hey Good Lookin print sitting on your vault and restore it to it's full glory and release it on Blu-ray. You did it for the Theatrical Cut, why shouldn't you do it to the original version?

Though, I usually watched family-oriented animated films. But I guess, I am like wholesome vs taboo. I first encountered Ralph Bakshi's films when I was a teenager; I don't know how old I was. I started with "The Lord of The Rings;" then "Wizards," that film became my favorite Bakshi film. And then I watched on YouTube : "Fire & Ice," "Cool World" (live action/animated), "Heavy Traffic" and this film "Hey Good Lookin'."Well anyway, this film takes on a gritty,outrageous look at Brooklyn, New York in the 1950s. But the film's story is about the gang-leader Vinnie, his gang called the Stompers; his relationship with his sexy girlfriend Roz and his "friend" "Crazy" Shapiro. And also the all-out rumble with the black rival gang called the Chaplins near the film's ending.I love the scene where we first meet Roz, it has a great homage to Tex Avery's "Red Hot Riding Hood" cartoons. I also love the part where Vinny screamed at the corpse buried in the sand and all the Sicillians that are on the beach, dogpiled and beat up Shapiro; that guy is TOO MUCH!

When "Coonskin/Streetfight" caused a load of controversy and the technical specs caused difficulty, this one sat on a shelf for WAY too long.And it may be Bakshi's best.This was like "Heavy Traffic" but two decades earlier. Take away the 70's lingo and bring in the greasers. Ralph seems to be exorcising a rough past with his father here. Not for the first time either.The best part of this film is the wrecking of the 50's myth. It wasn't all great economy and capitalism. The poor existed. Gangs ran rampant. And the races were at odds. This film points that out. And points again...The autobiographical angle shows too. Both this and "Traffic" have the struggling artist character getting heat from all around him.This was like a JD flick but VERY serious. Getting lost in that shuffle was the worst thing that could happen to it.Go see it.

ALL MY REVIEWS CONTAIN SPOILERS. EVERY ONE OF THEM. I first saw this movie when I was 6 years old. Until that time, all my knowledge about the 50's greaser era was fed to me through a miserable show ironically called Happy Days. Fonzie was the type of no nonsense gang leader who encouraged children to drink milk and say their prayers. He was my hero until I watched Hey Good Lookin' and met Vinnie. Vinnie's salute wasn't a thumbs up sign, it was a crotch grab. Vinnie reminded me so much of myself: Perverted, rebellious, and mad at the world. I could relate on so many levels. He also had the biggest hands known to mankind, the better to kick your ass with, my dear.Vinnie was definitely frightening. He was an ugly, ape-like man with plenty of Neanderthal features. His buddy Crazy was no pretty portrait, either. But Vinnie had the finest girlfriend on God's green Earth. Her name was Roz, a sexy post-Betty Boop but pre-Jessica Rabbit cartoon who fulfilled all my night time fantasies as a child, and sometimes in adulthood as well. Not only was this movie packed with 3 major interests of mine (cursing, violence, and sex) but it was a cartoon as well. I was 6 years old. I literally thought I had died and gone to heaven.Hey Good Lookin' is vulgar and rude. It is violent, pointless, and cliched. It is ugly, stereotypical, and misogynistic. In other words, it is perfect. It begins with a completely senseless opening featuring a garbage can conversing with trash about spiritual philosophy. What this scene means I will never know, but that's the beauty of it. It makes no sense! I was howling with belly aching laughter from the opening frame. We meet Old Vinnie and Old Roz in present time first, and they both look absolutely terrible. We flashback 30 years to Vinnie as a young man, and he looks absolutely terrible. Vinnie is the leader of a Brooklyn gang called The Stompers. His first Lieutenant and best buddy is a guy named Crazy. Crazy is a misunderstood hoodlum with silver dollar nipples. His dad is a detective who hates him, and routinely tries to kill him.Vinnie meets Roz, a sultry sex pot drawn specifically for the adolescent male demographic. A running gag in the movie is the fact that Vinnie can't keep his hands off her more than ample breasts. That same joke is done repeatedly throughout the movie, and I had no problem with it. One day, at the beach, Vinnie bumps into his old nemesis, Boog-a-loo, the leader of a rival gang called The Chaplins. Boog-a-loo is the blackest black man I have ever seen in a movie. If there were ever any stereotypes towards black people, Boog-a-loo fits every one of them. He looks a lot like Eddie Griffin, and part of me is convinced Griffin did his voice...but I don't think he was around back then. Anyway, a rumble is set. The movie rapidly moves from one pointless scene to the next, leading up to the big rumble showdown, which is actually a try out for Dance Fever.But who even cares about the "plot..." what the hell was going on in this movie?? Remember the scene where Crazy bangs this fat broad in a sea of hamburgers? And how about the scene where Crazy becomes a rooftop superhero and fights an army of man eating trash cans and giant naked ladies with no face? Boog-a-loo shows up on the roof with Crazy, and to this day I still am not sure if he tossed Crazy off the roof, or if Crazy jumped on purpose. If it was indeed suicide, why even include Boog-a-loo in the scene? And if Boog-a-loo pushed him off, why didn't they show it? I can't believe I'm even asking questions about this movie.The movie is basically an animated version of Mean Streets. Speaking of the animation, it's horrible-- but that's cool, cuz I've never been a fan of The Lion King anyway. Everyone is drawn terribly, and all the characters look like Satan. The audio comes in and out and many characters talk at once, so you never really know what's being said. This is why the movie will forever be a classic, it leaves the mystery door open. I have been waiting for the sequel now for 20 years, and if Ralph Bakshi reads this, hopefully he will oblige, instead of going "Hollywood" and making pure crap like Cool World, a movie with no nudity.* * * * * stars out of 5.