Wake Up the Gypsy in Me Review

Wake Up the Gypsy in Me is a 1933 animated short film from the Merry Melodies series. It is such a good, hilarious flick.

This is easily one of the best Merry Melodies so far as it does everything a few of them manage to do – not only have good music, but memorable characters too. It follows a group of Russian gypsies as they dance around in town while a Rasputin-like figure kidnaps a young girl and forces himself onto her, but the villagers save her in time.

The plot is solid and the setting and the characters are interesting and refreshing for the series. The first half should have been faster and the gypsies aren’t that memorable, but the villain is spectacular, so delightfully goofy and still dangerous. But he is also really funny as him solving puzzles by making the missing puzzles himself was absolutely hilarious along with his laugh. And I liked the titular song quite a bit.

Wake Up the Gypsy in Me features a weaker first half, but such a terrific, memorable villain and very strong humor.