The Classic Hanna-Barbera Saturday morning show from the 1960s gets a horror twist in the 2019 movie adaptation of the series.
Banana Splits obsessed Harley, aged nine, wants nothing more than to see a recording of his favourite show, to which his mother gets tickets to take him and a friend on his birthday. The Banana Splits in this film are animatronic robots and when they learn that the show is going to be cancelled with immediate effect, mayhem breaks loose – the Splits are not going to let that happen.
At the show, it’s announced that audience members who have a star on the back of their ticket get to meet the Banana Splits backstage and have a photograph taken with them. This is where the horror really kicks into overdrive as the Splits start to slaughter the adults in Saw-like fashion. The children are taken prisoner by the Banana Splits to watch the show – forever unable to leave.
This new show that’s put on for the captive audience could rival the best of the torture porn genre in terms of gore. Some of the kills in the film are ingenious for example early on a person is sawn in half in a magic box and split in half and another killed by a large lollipop.
I would highly recommend that any horror fan out there get a hold of this one while you still can – it has been released directly to DVD.
If they can turn something as innocent and harmless as the Banana Splits into a horror movie there’s still hope they may be able to do the same for Scooby-Doo one day.
The Banana Splits Movie (2019) review by Stephen Pierce