Year: 1998
Country: U.S.
Subgenre: Zombies/Ghosts/Horror For Kids
Runtime: 77 minutes
Director: Jim Strensum
Again, yes, this is a serious suggestion. For a few years in the late 1990's/early 2000's a series of Scooby-Doo films with real monsters were produced. Scooby-Doo on Zombie Island was the first of these; it is also, by far, the scariest of them. The film opens with the gang on a road tour for Daphne's television program, on the hunt for a real haunted house. It has a great little montage with a song about fake ghosts in the spirit of some of the old Scooby episodes from the 1970's that featured songs to further the action. They soon find themselves in New Orleans (naturally!), and a cook from a swamp mansion on an island fittingly called "Moonscar" assures them that the house she works in is truly haunted. They are all in and soon set out for the island via a ferry boat through a creepy bayou. Once there...well let's just say things get scary....VERY scary! I was one of the first generation Scooby kids, I LOVED the show so much more than any other Saturday morning cartoons that it was a bit nuts. So, like several other first generation Scooby kids, as adults we appreciated that the characters were thrust finally into stories with real monsters. It didn't last long though. Of the four films made, Zombie Island remains my favorite. Amongst the cast lending their voice talents are Mark Hamill (aka Luke Skywalker) and scream queen Adrienne Barbeau; and, of course, Frank Welker (!) the original Fred. This is technically horror for kids, but be aware it's not for very small children. It's that scary!
