Topic: Pals and Gals (1954)

[metaldams]

http://www.threestooges.net/filmography/episode/154
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0047326/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=CkDUb1JWL2c

Watch PALS AND GALS in the link above



      Well, I gotta say, this stock footage era is getting some focus on how I'm going to write about these things.  I'm starting to notice not all of these are interchangeable after all!  With MUSTY MUKETEERS and BUBBLE TROUBLE, you get films that are re-written, gags rearranged, a relatively extended scene of new footage, and in the case of the former, the ability to give the original a run for its money when the new footage is actually good!  Then you have the RIP, SEW, AND STITCH variety when the new footage never sustains long enough to create new comedy, feeling like a writer's project more than any real comic inspiration.  These are the worst kind of stock footage shorts, and sadly, PALS AND GALS falls into this category.

      Nice to see new Christine footage again, the first time in four years!  A shame she isn't given much to do, and neither are her two sisters or the Stooges themselves in the new footage.  Hey, the girls look pretty, but so what.  The basic formula is they do away with Jock Mahoney's character, kill Doc Barker (!) as a way to introduce new characters, and have some montage of new and stock footage to create a chase scene that would make Ed Wood blush.  Oh, but children, not only do they borrow from OUT WEST, nay!  They go all the way back into the archive, 17 years earlier, and dig a few shots from GOOFS AND SADDLES, the contrasting quality of the film stock quite jarring.  Really a writer's project, PALS AND GALS is, and not much in the way of new comedy.  Again, the equivalent of one of those alternate takes you get on the uber deluxe edition of your favorite album where the song is exactly the same, but half the guitar solo is different.  Not very nourishing.  Hey, if you're sane like 99% of the population, you wouldn't know the difference watching this thing on TV, but for freaks like us?  Meh!

3/10

[Paul Pain]

This short has some real fatal flaws: bad acting from some folks in the new footage, and a terrible "plot twist."

Now, I am ALL for plot twists, but randomly killing a character (a rarity in Stooges stuff) just so you can magically insert Stanley Blystone (who wasn't even in OUT WEST) so that you can include even MORE stock footage, from GOOFS AND SADDLES, is absolutely pathetic.  To quote Garfield: "Clyde Bruckman and Jack White should be dragged out in the street and shot."  It's one thing to cut corners, but it is a travesty to absolutely suck in doing so, and that is the problem with so many of these stock footage jobs.  And most of these cut-and-paste jobs are done carelessly and in a sucky manner.  Hey, Doc Barker is back from the dead even because of the sucky cut-and-paste job!

One can't expect filet mignon every time, but this is s*** on toast for supper.  Norma Randall and Ruth Godfrey get absolutely wasted here as eye candy, and for that eye candy that isn't even much of eye candy with bad wardrobe and typical terrible directing from this era's Jules White.  It's pretty obviously Curly's double jumping out of the window, and it's pretty cool how the boys run out of a basement to jump out a second story window!  Stanley Blystone just magically appears:  three guys are standing around Norman Willis and in an instant Stanley is with all of them.

And of course: chiminipanzees suck 100% of the time, and that is a chiminipanzee!  I couldn't find much to laugh at that wasn't original footage here, and this is easily the worst short to date.  Thus I step down from my as I dole out ratings that don't see much action.  This short can...

BURN IN HELL!

2/10

[metaldams]

This short has some real fatal flaws: bad acting from some folks in the new footage, and a terrible "plot twist."

Now, I am ALL for plot twists, but randomly killing a character (a rarity in Stooges stuff) just so you can magically insert Stanley Blystone (who wasn't even in OUT WEST) so that you can include even MORE stock footage, from GOOFS AND SADDLES, is absolutely pathetic.  To quote Garfield: "Clyde Bruckman and Jack White should be dragged out in the street and shot."  It's one thing to cut corners, but it is a travesty to absolutely suck in doing so, and that is the problem with so many of these stock footage jobs.  And most of these cut-and-paste jobs are done carelessly and in a sucky manner.  Hey, Doc Barker is back from the dead even because of the sucky cut-and-paste job!

One can't expect filet mignon every time, but this is s*** on toast for supper.  Norma Randall and Ruth Godfrey get absolutely wasted here as eye candy, and for that eye candy that isn't even much of eye candy with bad wardrobe and typical terrible directing from this era's Jules White.  It's pretty obviously Curly's double jumping out of the window, and it's pretty cool how the boys run out of a basement to jump out a second story window!  Stanley Blystone just magically appears:  three guys are standing around Norman Willis and in an instant Stanley is with all of them.

And of course: chiminipanzees suck 100% of the time, and that is a chiminipanzee!  I couldn't find much to laugh at that wasn't original footage here, and this is easily the worst short to date.  Thus I step down from my as I dole out ratings that don't see much action.  This short can...

BURN IN HELL!

2/10

Love your passion.

[Paul Pain]

Love your passion.

Hey, the thing we've been lacking is passion because everything has been a dud.  But now we have reason to be passionately...

Hateful

[Lefty]

On this 105th anniversary of the birth of Christine McIntyre, I would like to say a few syllables about "Pals and Gals."  On the plus side, the girls are eye candy, and then there is, ...  Anyway, not until June of 1984, a couple of decades after I had begun watching the Stooges, did I get to see "Goofs and Saddles," so I had no idea that the chase scene with Stanley Blystone and the "chiminipanzee" was stock footage that made little sense in this short.   

[luke795]

Actually, Stanley Blystone plays the Cavalry Colonel in Out West.

[Shemp_Diesel]

Don't know if I have a lot to add to the discussion this week--this one and next week's could probably be best described as nondescript.

Very light on new footage & what new footage there is is nothing to write home about. Then, as Paul Pain previously mentioned, Doc Barker dies in new footage then suddenly reappears alive in the stock footage. I guess Jules White figured no one would notice or care--and who knows, maybe back in 1954, no one did.

But here in 2016, it can only be described as sloppy and careless.

3 out of 10...

[BeatleShemp]

About the only funny part of this remake to me is the brief bit where Moe gouges one of the bad guys in the eyes. Other than that, not a fan of this one at all.

[Kopfy2013]

I like this one better than the original ... the 'eye candy' makes a difference.

Very little new footage though.

I give it a 7.

[metaldams]

Been watching the shorts in order - the stock footage jobs for the first time since reviewing.  The key to these stock footage jobs is to shut the brain off, don’t analyze and view these as alternate takes to the classics.  Unnecessary?  Sure, but when you’ve seen the originals a zillion times, they’re OK.  Much easier to watch when you don’t actually have to review them and give them serious thought, because the old footage is still good and you’ll get an occasional scrap with the new footage.

Here, the Goofs and Saddles age difference and Doc Barker coming to life after death is still bad, but this, one of the weaker ones, I can stomach as mindless viewing.  I agree the trio of girls add a bit of fun, and one is in her forties, one in her thirties and one in her twenties, so no age discrimination.  Sad to see Christine end with the Stooges in stuff like this, but good to see her just the same.

Also funny it took them a while to finally pillage an Ed Bernds short.  It’s as if they had to build up the nerve.

[Woe-ee-Woe-Woe80]

I thought this was an okay remake since the new footage was enjoyable, I do feel they could've done a better job planning Doc Barker's death in the new footage without having him reappear in the old footage, I give "Pals & Gals" a 4/10

[Dr. Mabuse]

One of the weakest stock-footage jamborees — culled from the work of Edward Bernds and  Del Lord. Watching the recycled chase from "Goofs and Saddles" made me miss Curly. 

How could Jules White be gratified by this grainy mess? Pathetic.

3/10

[Daddy Dewdrop]

Not a lot to say about this one.  It's a western, so a big minus right off the bat.  It's got a lot of stock footage - strike 2.  They actually killed a character - strike 3, your out!

#180. Pals And Gals