The Great Film Discussion

[ymymeatemup]

FAMILY TROUBLES (1943)

Things I like:
Aurelia. The sister, not the aunt. Keeping in mind that her amusing little attempt at singing made this list only because I'm comparing it to everything else that happens in this episode. Which brings us to.....

Things I don't like:
Janet. This was her big moment in the series, being a rare outing in which the girl of the Gang plays the central role. Aside from her usual heavy-handedness in the acting department, we get to sit through several moments of Janet crying as she recites such treacly dialogue as "I thought my poor heart would break." And speaking of reciting, she seems a bit obsessed with this activity. Is this what kids of the forties did for fun? I guess twerking hadn't been invented yet. The trouble is, even when she's cheerful, she describes herself as "a very nice little girl, too!" (Incidentally, anybody notice that when Mrs. Jones tells Janet to "scrub the floor," Janet responds with "rub the floor?")
The Boys. This wasn't their worst outing, but that's probably because they've got less to do than usual. The pacing back and forth while giving their speech to the Joneses is just plain silly, and Froggy's final gag is one of the biggest duds ever. Although I will at least give the Frog Man credit for the "all clear" signal he gives to Buckwheat.
Mrs. Burston. The one person who actually makes Janet sympathetic in this episode is her mother (which is good because Janet fails to do this herself).  I'm pretty sure "Mother" is supposed to be one of the good guys, and if there was any subtlety to this film, then it would be some sort of mishap that led Janet to think that she wasn't loved anymore, and her mother WOULD be one of the good guys. But because this is Our Gang MGM-style, the situation can't be that nuanced, so she really does come off like a heartless jerk to her kid.
The Joneses. Speaking of heavy-handedness, you know it's the forties when the neighbors can emotionally abuse your child and you think it's just as funny and appropriate as they do. The glee on Mrs. Jones' face as she says "Oh, she's in the kitchen!" makes me wanna toss a banana peel in front of her.

Grade: F

[ymymeatemup]

FARM HANDS (1943)

Things I like:
The General Idea Of It. The boys spend a day on a farm, which is quite a promising scenario considering what happens in most of the 1943 episodes. At this point, the series was almost always tethered to the MGM studio, so that even exterior footage would be shot on one of the various exterior sets on the extensive studio property. This particular short was a nice exception, since the situation called for most of the footage to be shot on an actual farm, far away from over-rehearsed floor shows, morality tales, and World War II - a return, shall we say, to the gag-oriented comedy of the series' heyday. And then they made the film.

Things I don't like:
Every Single Gag. It's not so much the gags themselves, it's the woefully inadequate execution of said gags that transforms one of the most refreshing ideas MGM ever had for this series into just another bottom dweller from the series' waning months. In the Roach era, the gags were always a bit hit-and-miss, but even the misses were usually more convincingly carried out. The simple reason for this is that the people who worked at Roach specialized in comedy. MGM specialized in the type of sanitized family-oriented entertainment that we'd later associate with Disney, and only did comedy as a side project, usually with writers and directors who weren't particularly gifted at it. If ever there was a film that could drive home this point, it's "Farm Hands."
The Grunts. As Buckwheat and Happy are pulling the rope to lower Mickey into the well, we hear various grunting noises. And for some reason, only grown men were available for the dubbing session.
The Stunt Work. I understand that young kids can't be made to do anything dangerous in films, so obviously some trickery has to take place during Froggy's misadventure with the mule. Nevertheless, if it's going to look that phony, why not just think of another idea?

Grade: D-

[ymymeatemup]

THE GLORIOUS FOURTH (1927)

Things I like:
The Paper Bags. One of the most pathetically amusing situations in series history, with penniless Farina popping paper bags in lieu of fireworks, and Mango gleefully waving the American flag.
Charley Chase. There's a lot of adults in this episode suffering the onslaught of various runaway fireworks, but Chase has the best bit among them. It's fairly obvious why he had his own series while the other grown-ups that populated the Our Gang world didn't.
Jack Hanlon. You know "Pansy" must be more trouble than he's worth when his owner actually gives Farina a quarter to take him off his hands.
The Titles. This short has a unusually high number of Beanie Walker's greatest hits, such as the ones about unbuttoning the baby and blowing up Santa Claus.
The Fireworks Stand. Some part of me has always wanted to see what it looks like when an entire fireworks stand goes up in smoke. Thank you, Roach Studio, for this.

Things I don't like:
Joe. I realize it's a fictitious scenario and all in the name of comedy, but I find myself being a bit too preoccupied with what a bunghole Joe Cobb is in this short.
The Motorist. I refer to the guy whose car just blew up and is now hanging from an innertube slung around an overhead beam. And actually, I understand that in order to improve the gag, he must move his legs to get himself to bounce up and down. But that doesn't mean that the film editor should include the bit where he's moving his legs.

Grade: B

[RJH]

Farm Hands (1943) - The boys are staying at Mickey's Uncle George's farm. Froggy decides to bring along his Mexican jumping beans, which scares Buckwheat who thinks something is wrong with Froggy's heart. When morning comes, a jealous rooster knocks over Mickey's alarm clock and wakes the boys himself. That is okay for a gag, but it's all downhill from there. The rest of the film stresses the boys' stupidity. Buckwheat expects the cow to milk itself, while Mickey, Froggy and Happy pound chicken seed into mash, I guess. After Froggy spills his jumping beans into the chicken feed, we are treated to chickens being jerked off the ground by wires. Getting thirsty, none of them have the brains to lower a bucket into the well. Instead, they lower first a ladle, and then Mickey. After pulling him up, Buckwheat and Happy let go of the rope when trying to drink the ladleful of water. They look over the edge, and should have been splashed in their faces, but ... nothing. They just pull Mickey up again. At least Mickey doesn't complain about this. Froggy goes for a ride on a horse, with some cheap special effects, and then the boys are chased by a mule up a haystack that is being fed into a baling machine. While Mickey's dad and uncle control the mule, the boys drop through the machine and get encased in bales of hay. Once they're stood up and they see the mule again, they run away and shout the unrealistic line, "We'll write you a letter."

This gets off to the most promising start of the 1943 films. One factor is that Janet is not in this. But after the rooster kicks the alarm clock, everything falls flat. I much prefer the old gang that was familiar and comfortable with farm animals, and Stymie knew how to milk a cow as recently as Mush and Milk. 10-12 year olds can't possibly be so stupid as to not know how to get water from a well. The final gag with the hay bales had potential, but the creators did everything wrong with it. First, the "hay bales" are obviously cardboard boxes with hay glued on them and holes cut out for the heads and legs. This would have been much more effective had they taken the effort to wrap the boys entirely in real hay. One of the men calls this "terrible," when it clearly wasn't, and Mickey unconvincingly answers "where am I" when asked if he's hurt. Then there should be more realsitic reactions, like them racing to see who could get loose the fastest. Or make a game of it, trying to knock each other down. The "We'll write you a letter" closing line makes no sense and is not something anyone would say in that situation. In summary, the best idea for a plot in a while, but ruined by writers who had no sense of comedy.

The Glorious Fourth (1927) - As July 4th approaches most of the gang is setting off fireworks, with such results as Jay R. getting a bucket stuck on his head and Harry's face getting blackened, while poor Farina and Mango are content to pop paper bags and wave an American flag. After creating a mountain of bags, Farina gets annoyed and tries to join the gang, but gets shooed away. The rest of the gang uses coins from Jackie's bank that Jay opens with an ax (Jay's father has opened many a bank) Mango finds a live firecracker, and Farina throws it into the street, making a motorist think he has a flat tire. The motorist finds the firecracker and drives off, but a second explosion, that he ignores, causes a real flat tire.

Joe's mother runs a fireworks stand, but is called away because a baby swallowed a button and needs to be unburtoned. Joe takes the opportunity to let his friends set off several of the fireworks. Meanwhile, Farina comes into a fortune when a random kid offers him 25 cents to take the dog Pansy off his hands. Farina immediately goes to the stand to get the biggest thing available for a quarter. Joe sells him a hug firework rocket but sets it off himself. The rocket soars majestically thorugh the air and comes down on the stand, setting off all the fireworks still there and creating mayhem all over town. The best reaction among all the adults affected is by the inebriated Charley Chase, who concludes a firework was a cigar that was loaded.

After the commotion settles down, there ia a big disconnect and suddenly the emphasis is on Bahama-oil (called banana oil by the gang), where a scientist is giving a demonstration of the powerful explosive. Pansy eats nearly all the capsules, and strikes fear in everyone, afraid he will blow up the town. Instead, he coughs the pills up one a time, causing minor explosions. A golfer hits one of them by mistake, calling "fore" before his stroke and "five" after. Then Pansy climbs a ladder to a roof, and drops a capsule behind the gang trying to hide, scaring them. The whole gang then cooperates nicely when they fear Pansy will jump. They get a blanket and move back and forth under Pansy while he goes back and forth along the edge of the roof. The dog finally jumps, they catch him and roll him up in the blanket, but then Farina is charged with holding him until everyone else is safe. Pansy stays close to Farina and coughs up another capsule into his hand, whcih Farina throws near the gang and causes them to run through a patch of fresh cement at a street corner. The cement layer smooths it over, but there soon follows more explosions and the gang running back over the cement, and then many townspeople and police officers. A car gets blown up, with its pieces flying high in the sky and the motorist winding up dangling from a beam jutting out from a building. When the police ask who is repsonsible for all the trouble, the gang blames Farina, but Joe's mother comes back and gives Joe a good spanking. Finally Pansy causes another scare and it seems like most of the town runs through the cement. The cement layer loses his mind, sits down in the cement and plays pat-a-cake with himself.

Once again another film with about a quarter of the footage missing. What is available is largely upbeat, lots of action, and several good performances by the adults. The major downer is how Joe is such a jerk towards Farina, and that lowers the rating a full notch. The rest of the gang isn't much better, but Joe really dominates them here. It wouldn't have been hard to rewrite this to make Joe closer to his usual character. I suppose a silver lining is that this does give Allen Hoskins a chance to shine as an actor. Joe getting a spanking at the end isn't very satisfying for the mean things he did, and his mother doesn't know all the reasons why Joe is so deserving. It is nice to see Mango present through most of the film. It would be nice to know what is in the missing footage to make a more accurate assessment of this film.

[RJH]

Feed 'Em and Weep (1938) - Mr. Hood expects to enjoy a quiet birthday party when the gang, now conisting of Alfalfa, Porky, and Philip Hurlic come in. They constantly interrupt his attempts to eat, first by giving him presents of a frog, baby duck and a cat which the family dog doesn't appreciate, and then arguing over whether Tarzan or Flash Gordon is stronger. By the time Mr. Hood eats his soup, it's cold, and Alfalfa asks him why he didn't eat it when it was hot. When Mr. Hood starts to carve the chicken, Alfalfa, playing with his silverware, flips his sthingy into the gravy bowl and splatters it on Mr. Hood. By the time he cleans himself off, the boys plus Darla have eaten the entire chicken, despite Mrs. Hood sayiing they could only have a little. Porky and Philip then blow out the 32 candles on the cake, and Alfalfa sings to Hood's further annoyance. When Mr. Hood goes to answer the door Percy (Leonard Landy) tricycles in, delivers the message that Alfalfa is wanted back home, and takes Mr. Hood's piece of cake when offered it by Porky. Starving, Mr. Hood announces he's going to a restaurant to get something to eat.

Here the emphasis is not on the gang but on Johnny Arthur as Mr. Hood, who does a great job with the role. The premise is a bit bizarre; I never heard of neighborhood kids going to someone's house to celebrate a parent's birthday. Some supsension of disbelief is helpful; the boys say they have already eaten dinner but manage to carve and eat a whole chicken, with a little help from Darla, in under a minute. Given the angle Mrs. Hood cuts the cake pieces, more than half of the cake should have been left after giving a piece to each kid, yet the implication is that there is no more left after Percy takes Mr. Hood's piece. After seeing how the evening was developing, Mr. Hood should have ignored all the distractions and just ate his dinner, so he brought some of this on himself. The boys remain blithely unaware of how aggravating they have been and conclude that Hood is "tetched in the head." Still the gags are all good; none of them fall flat and they continue non-stop throughout the film.

[ymymeatemup]

FEED 'EM AND WEEP (1938)

Things I like:
Johnny Arthur's Dialogue. This short is worth watching if only for phrases like "lettuce sandwich on gluten bread" and "natal anniversary."
Philip & Porky. They're obviously a nuisance to Mr. Hood, but they're both young enough that they can be given a pass. They also don't do anything that isn't overshadowed by Alfalfa's obnoxious behaviour. Philip Hurlic is quite a likable kid, though he wasn't comical enough to really be a threat to Buckwheat's job in the series. And Porky - well, there's something about the way he says he's "kinda this way about it" that I find funny.

Things I don't like:
Alfalfa. It's really all three boys who are driving Mr. Hood up the wall, but Alfalfa's the only one who's old enough to know better. He's also the only one who flings a sthingy into Mr. Hood's soup, and most notably, he sings one of his more annoying numbers in this short.
Mr. Hood. As much as I admire Johnny Arthur's comic abilities, I find him more appealing in his two earlier Our Gang appearances. The main problem regarding this outing is his complete inability to carry out simple tasks such as putting a sthingy in his mouth or putting a knife to a roasted chicken in spite of the doorbell ringing or celery being eaten in his vicinity. The implausiblity of this situation just crosses a line for me and I wind up being far more annoyed than amused.

Grade: C-

[ymymeatemup]

Jun 9, 2014 21:43:56 GMT -5 ymymeatemup said:

He's also the only one who flings a sthingy into Mr. Hood's soup

Jun 9, 2014 21:43:56 GMT -5 ymymeatemup said:

such as putting a sthingy in his mouth

Two things:
1. We all know that certain words (and usually very tame ones) are censored and transformed into "thingy" on this message board, but surely "s p o o n" is only a naughty word when we remove the "S." So now we get "thingy" with an "S" at the beginning?
2. Isn't it ironic how the second quote becomes so much more naughty after censorship?

[RJH]

Wow, I never noticed the same censoring in my post. Does replacing the letter "o" by the digit zero work?

sp0on spo0n sp00n SP00N

Apparently yes. What a worthless censor tool.

[ymymeatemup]

This calls for the Ted Nugent test:

Wang Dang Sweet thingytang

Ha!

[myhomeo]

I'd use the opening bit from 'Fightin' Fools' as evidence of MGM's indifferent-to-awful execution of gags. (Pretty sure I've gone over this before but what the hey...)
Slicker and his bunch tie the Gang's clothes in knots while they're at the ol' swimmin' hole. We then see the Gang in the usual trinity of improvised garments --Spanky has a grass skirt, Mickey a grain sack, Froggy a barrel, if I remember right-- vowing vengeance.
Except we see the boys swimming. They're wearing perfectly respectable bathing suits. Now it's understandable they couldn't exactly have the boys skinny-dipping but didn't it occur to them that wrecked the entire joke? On top of that, only the three 'Stars' are wearing covering garments. Tubby, Buckwheat, and Leonard are just in their suits, again spoiling the whole joke.
The lamest, most derivative joke in the WORLD and they couldn't even get THAT right...

[RJH]

Fightin' Fools (1941) - The gang is swimming, or rather wading and splashing in a small bond, except for Buckwheat who wants to get a suntan first. Tubby is afraid to dive in, and when he finally jumps, all the water splashes out. With no more swimming, the boys then find out their clothes have been tied into knots by the Third Street Bunch. After some taunting and a remarkable inablility to untie the knots, the gang trudges home. Meeting in a barn, Spanky decides they need to declare war. The challenge is accepted, and things go badly for Our Gang at first. Tubby is hit by some old fruit and starts crying and quites immediately. Buckwhest, Mickey, and Leonard advance behind a goat-drawn piece of wooden fence and throw some objects, but then the goat is hit and runs away, leaving that trio exposed. They get hit by limburger and stuff and want to quit also. Spanky begs them all not to quit, and Froggy's speech convinces them to keep trying. With clothespins on their noses, they are more successful. Tubby jumps from a stepladder onto a seesaw that catapults watermelons that damage the enemy's arsenal. Buckwheat, Mickey, and Leonard then initiate the air attack, which consists of egg-filled baskets attached to balloons and kite strings that drift over the enemy's position. At the right moment the strings are pulled, dumping the eggs on the Third Street Bunch. They surrender, and are forced to unknot the gang's clothes as Spanky berates them.

This is among the best films of 1941, but of course that says little and this has several problems. Among the most unpleasant is Tubby as a fat stereotype. The special effect of all the water splashing out of the pond is amazingly unrealistic, and Mickey and Froggy aren't in the right places after the water aimed at the camera lens clears up. At the start of the conflict, Tubby is supposed to jump on the seesaw catapult, but is hit and doesn't fire back. An obvious solution is for Spanky and his not-insignificant bulk to take Tubby's place, but Spanky is so full of himself as general he can't bring himself to participate in the actual fighting. The shield drawn by the goat is reasonably clever, but I don't like the innocent goat getting hit by something. Spanky whining is out-of-character and grating. There is another unrealistic effect of Tubby jumping back up to the top of the stepladder when the film was obviously run backwards. The egg attack does show real creativity is one of the best gags in this era. At the end, I think it would be more realistic if the Third Street Bunch just ran home instead of sticking around to unknot the gang's clothes, which appear to be duplicates of what they wore to battle. "Dogs of War!" was so much better. Overall, "Fightin' Fools" has a few good things to go with all the bad, so it isn't among the worst of the MGM era.

As to the embarrassment of walking home not fully attired, when I first saw this I thought the boys were swimming in undershorts. Male bathing suits before WWII, whlie sleeveless, generally covered the upper body. Depending on local standards walking home that way through several suburban streets could be humiliating. (Walking through the woods where no one else could see shouldn't be.) . For the record, it was Mickey with the barrel and Froggy with the sack. Spanky fashioned a skirt out of leafy branches, and Leonard might have done the same; he is mostly obscured in that scene because he was the least important. It actually looks like those four might have abandoned their clothes since they aren't carrying any. Can't be sure of Leonard being obscured so. It looks like Buckwheat tied his tied-up clothes around his waist, and Tubby may have slung his over a shoulder; he is partially obscured. This leads to another question - why were a barrel with straps so it could be worn and a grain sack so handy?

[ymymeatemup]

FIGHTIN' FOOLS (1941)

Things I like:
The General Idea Of It. It's good to see the Gang having an old-fashioned neighborhood battle against their rivals, though they were unfortunately at the wrong studio for this type of thing. It's also nice to see them outdoors through most of this short, though I'm pretty sure they were on MGM property the whole time. Overall, I find this short flawed but pleasantly appealing.

Things I don't like:
The Execution Of The Gags. As usual, gags that would have been funny in a Hal Roach film fall flat in the hands of MGM. Nowhere is this more apparent than in the use of a slide whistle every time the catapult is used.
Spanky. Two points: First, I find his whiny, helpless routine to be really unappealing. In fact, it seems that the whole Gang is a bit wimpy this time around. It's a good thing the rival bunch is led by the watered-down-Butch-wannabe Slicker, or the Gang wouldn't have a prayer. Secondly, I'm not buying into this idea of Spanky being one of the non-fat boys of the troupe. Surely, everything that happens with Tubby in this film could just as easily happen with Spanky.
Froggy. I'm not nearly as convinced by his pep talk as the boys are.
Ear-Wiggling. A minor quibble, since it lasts for only a few seconds, but Leonard's ear-wiggling really seems to have been shoehorned into the proceedings. It was perfectly appropriate in "Time Out For Lessons," but seems pointless in this instance.

Grade: C-

[myhomeo]

Note On Bathing Suits: Actually, from what I can tell, tops on boys' suits became unfashionable around the mid to late Thirties, about the same time undershirts did.

Should note, however, one kid is definitely wearing underwear: Buckwheat. It might be a throwaway gag, though, where he's theoretically repurposed some old boxer shorts as his 'bathing suit.' Tubby, meanwhile, is definitely wearing a suit, including the top, presumably feeling a tad modest since he's named Tubby and the first gag in the film is a fat joke at his expense. (Still, he's not a complete stereotype; I don't THINK there were any jokes about him constantly stuffing his face with food.)

The other boys' shorts look more like swimsuits than underwear to me, but I must admit they're hard to really pin down. Most boys' suits I've seen from the period were darker colored. On the other hand, they don't resemble any shorts I've seen in films.

Which leads to the question, is there any way to discuss this without feeling completely creepy?

[ymymeatemup]

GOOD CHEER (1926)

Things I like:
The Miniatures. It may have been the silent era, but Hollywood already had some tricks up its collective sleeve that could enchant filmgoers.
The Car Gag. One of the funniest things that happens in this short involves the car covered in icicles. Honorable mention goes to Mickey's comment about how lucky the one-legged boy is.
The Snow. I must say, the Roach studio sure made it look like blizzard conditions on their backlot. Quite impressive for Sunny California.

Things I don't like:
Pretty Much Nothing. I wouldn't rate this as one of the best silent episodes of the series, but I also can't think of anything terribly wrong with it. It's quite different compared to other episodes of the era, being a bit sentimental in places and just kinda strange otherwise. It's a little like those turn-of-the-century Christmas postcards where they've got all the same traditions we have now, but everything's a bit altered, like those Santas with the straggly beards that would be put to shame once Edmund Gwenn came onto the yuletide scene. My main gripe is that they didn't do another Christmas episode in the talkie era, particularly around the time Gus Meins was directing. Shorts like "Mama's Little Pirate" and "Shrimps For A Day" make it clear that the Our Gang unit was perfectly geared for such an outing.

Grade: B

[ymymeatemup]

GROWING PAINS (1928)

Things that intrigue me:
John Aasen. He was a circus giant, having previously been featured in "Why Worry" with Harold Lloyd. In that film, he seems to be about twice the height of Lloyd, so I can only imagine how huge he looks in his scenes with the kids in this film. Mary Ann and Wheezer are siblings, and their mother keeps giving Wheezer cod liver oil to make him grow big and strong, joking that a whole bottle of it might make him into a giant.  Mary Ann has been battling the boys of the Gang, so inevitably, she empties the bottle into Wheezer. Conveniently, Aasen has just started to board at their house and decides to play along, standing in for Wheezer. He's not only tall, but has almost super-human strength, being able to knock the kids down simply by blowing at them, and being impervious to being hit in the head with various hammers.
Mary Ann. This was only her second appearance in the series, and already she's given her first featured role. In this film, she comes up with various creative ways to sneak up on the boys and knock them into the mud.  She has some minor justification for this, since the boys leave her out of their fun, but she overdoes her comeuppance, so her ultimate defeat seems about right.
Some Notable Gags. This is one of those films where Farina's pigtails stand on end - this happening, of course, when he first sets eyes on the giant. Aasen's treatment of the boys is actually a bit cruel: At one point, he steps on Farina's foot and flattens it, laughing while Farina hobbles around on it. Meanwhile, Joe is suffering from a swollen rear end after Aasen has spanked him. In the end, the boys get the better of the giant, treating him to the type of punishment that we'd later see James Mason go through in "Fly My Kite."