Sweet and Hot (1958)

metaldams · **on:** November 19, 2016, 07:49:41 AM

http://www.threestooges.net/filmography/episode/185
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0052262/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1

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

Watch SWEET AND HOT in the link above.

For shits and giggles, below is my review of SWEET AND HOT I wrote 15 years ago! Where has time gone? Who would've guessed back then I now suffer from half these symptoms?

"DO NOT VIEW SWEET AND HOT IF YOU ARE.....pregnant; are on the medications prozac, welbutrin, zyloft, or viagra; have diabetes; high blood pressure; high cholestorol; are on chemotherapy; or like good television.SIDE EFFECTS OF SWEET AND HOT MAY INCLUDE....diarehea, leprosy, impotence, demonic posession, indigestion, vomiting, sterilization, scholiosis, spontaneous combustion, loss of hair, blindness, suicidal tendencies, clinical depression, profuse sweating, difficulty in breathing, seizures, heart attacks, strokes, dry mouth, chicken pox, and finally, death."

OK, back to 2016 and the more mature (clears throat) version of Metaldams. On a personal note, one of my best friends, who is 21 years older than me, was born the final day of shooting SWEET AND HOT, so I have a funny way of viewing him now. I will say this much, SWEET AND HOT is one of the more interesting Stooge films. Good? Not exactly, but interesting. Ultimately, SWEET AND HOT is a vehicle for Muriel Landers. The Three Stooges are supporting players and aren't even a team, as Moe plays....wait for it.....Dr. Hugo Gansamacher!

Since this is really a film that centers around Muriel Landers, I will discuss her first. She can sing and dance, I'll give her that. It's just not my style. The problem is they are also trying to make a comedian out of her. Excuse me for saying it, but Ms. Landers has a figure quite opposite of Etherelda Leopold...she was fat. I bring this up because a lot of the comedy sadly revolves around this fact. A handshake hurts Joe, a hug to Larry hurts him while crushing his cigar in his pocket, her sitting on the couch causes the earth to quake....yeah folks, fat girl jokes. Lame. I also would like to add the flashback sequence is one of the most unfortunate Stooge scenes ever. She dresses like a little girl (if you've ever seen Roscoe "Fatty" Arbuckle in this get up, they actually look similar), and the father is played by Moe, chasing her with a whip! Eye poking Curly is funny, child abuse is disturbing, and yeah, she's on a couch trying to overcome the trauma. Some topics just don't make for good comedy.

As for the Stooges, Joe gets one little tap dancing sequence but is pretty much a non entity other than that. Larry does a funny little dance in the Ed Woodian farm animal montage sequence and gets to play some violin, so that's cool, at least. As for Moe, I kind of like Dr. Hugo, I would just prefer this kind of characterization in a non Stooge film. Throw this role in an Andy Clyde film, it'd be a nice little character role for Moe. Here? The problem with the Besser era is that since they rarely found chemistry as a team, and Moe as the boss suffered the most. Here, they didn't even bother trying to make Moe part of the team.

A very interesting short as far as curios go, just sadly, not a very good one.

2/10

Shemp_Diesel · **Reply #1 on:** November 19, 2016, 07:57:05 AM

Oh my gawd--what to say about this one? Actually, I think I do know what to say. Given that there are shorts like Guns a Poppin, Horsing Around, and coming up shortly, Flying Saucer Daffy--to say that Sweet and Hot is the worst the boys ever did does seem a bit extreme.

Don't get me wrong, this short is a celluloid turd, but given all the other examples I just cited, the stooges have sunk lower than this. Count this as another Besser I haven't seen in years and I'm going to keep it that way. And next week's piece of shit, too...

1 out of 10 pokes....

Paul Pain · **Reply #2 on:** November 19, 2016, 09:08:54 AM

I stopped at the psychiatrist's office... I started to suffer from diarehea, leprosy, impotence, demonic posession, indigestion, vomiting, sterilization, scholiosis, spontaneous combustion, loss of hair, blindness, suicidal tendencies, clinical depression, profuse sweating, difficulty in breathing, seizures, heart attacks, strokes, dry mouth, and chicken pox. I need chemotherapy; this short gave me cancer.

Lefty · **Reply #3 on:** November 19, 2016, 10:39:53 AM

In addition to all of the side effects listed earlier, watching this episode may cause you to vote for the wrong people. Okay, it's safe to watch now.

Muriel Landers was much better, not that that is saying much, in her two appearances on Hogan's Heroes -- "Up in Klink's Room" and "Gowns by Yvette." Outside of Moe as Dr. Hugo, this short has, to paraphrase Archie Bunker, no regleaming features.

Desmond Of The Outer Sanctorum · **Reply #4 on:** November 19, 2016, 01:39:27 PM

Let's see... there's a female co-star that gets heavily focused on, songs that have not aged well, and the Stooges aren't quite themselves. That may sound like WOMAN HATERS, but it's actually SWEET & HOT – the short that even Joe Besser said was a stinker!

What's bad about this short mainly comes down to the fact that the Stooges are mere co-stars to one Muriel "Tiny" Landers. The lame plot is all about her, and she brings hokey songs and a really annoying "little girl" act. Without these things, and in a smaller part, she could possibly have made a decent supporting player. As it stands... ugh. The pained reactions of the animals to "Let's Fall in Love" are appropriate, while "The Heat is On" is even worse; but her "little girl" act is worst of all.

It also doesn't help that the Stooges don't play a trio here, and Moe (who doesn't show up until over 5 minutes in) isn't even himself. He does a good job playing a different character, although I'm left feeling that Benny Rubin would have been better for the part.

Given all this, the Stooges actually do pretty well. Having not watched this in a long time, I was surprised how many funny bits they had (though maybe these just seemed better in contrast to the bad stuff?):
Larry: "Prettier than a spotted heifer."
Moe: "My time is liniment!" (It would have been better if he hadn't followed this line by correcting himself.)
Moe: "I don't want to walk in, I just want to look."
Moe: "Nothing, I just thought of something funny."
Joe: "Watch your language!"
Moe: "Sodium penta... truth serum."
Larry: "Artificial? For what you charge, you give him the real thing!"
Joe: "Mother! Oh, it's YOU."
Moe: "A mice!"

Even more surprisingly, Joe takes quite his share of abuse. He gets sprayed by the churn, has a bottle broken on his head (by accident), gets elbowed in the chest (by Larry), bonks heads with Moe (as does Larry), gets yanked by the ear (by Larry), and gets knocked over by Tiny (along with Larry).

While the flashback scene is mostly painful, Moe does a convincing job playing another different character – albeit one that doesn't even try to be funny. It actually kind of makes me wonder how Moe would have done in a dramatic part.

Things I wonder about:
What is it that Larry gets on his face from the bucket on his head?
Why does Larry's additional character in the flashback have a different name (Louie), while Joe's is still called Joe?
Is Tiny's screeching of "Three Blind Mice" meant as a tribute/reference to the song being used as the Three Stooges' theme music?

Curly Van Dyke · **Reply #5 on:** November 19, 2016, 01:43:33 PM

One of the All Time Worst! I do like when Joe and Larry get knocked down and we hear the stock"Oh" noise.
Anyone see the Columbia short Muriel made with Bek Nelson?

Paul Pain · **Reply #6 on:** November 19, 2016, 03:51:48 PM

Quote from: STOOGE TRIVIA from ThreeStooges.net

The story and screenplay were written by Jerome Gottler, who also wrote the story and screenplay for their musical, WOMAN HATERS. Thus, in SWEET AND HOT, we again have a musical routine and the Stooges appearing in separate roles.

Explains a lot...

Dr. Hugo Gansamacher · **Reply #7 on:** November 19, 2016, 05:15:06 PM

"Pleese, you zit! Now you zit!"

As you may guess from the fact that I adopted the name of Moe's character in this short as my alias, I do not consider this short to be the worst of the worst. In fact, I think it is one of the best of the worst. By "worst," of course, I mean "shorts with Joe Besser," all of which I consider, without exception, to be inferior to any and all of the other Stooge shorts. And by "this short," I mean what is left when I fast-forward through all the bits in which Muriel Landers is singing—not that there is anything wrong with her singing, but it's just not Stoogery.

In fact, I am really just thinking of the scene in the office of Dr. Hugo Gansamacher, which to me is what raises this short out of the excremental swamp of Besserism. Granted, he has the lame line "My time is liniment," which is a wince-inducingly feeble joke, but the rest of his lines are pretty good, and the bit when he peers into "Tiny"'s mouth and starts going "Ah-hah! Ah-hah-hah!" ("What is it, doc?" "Nahting. I just tawt of sahmting fahny!") actually makes me laugh—which is a reaction that nothing else in any of the other Joe shorts evokes from me.

Moe's German accent is bang-on. There is a difference between actors' foreign accents that are just imitations of other actors' imitations and foreign accents that vividly reproduce the real thing, and Moe's is the latter. Perhaps he was acquainted with many German-speaking immigrants in his early life and learned to mimic them. However he does it, he does it right.

Percy Pomeroy · **Reply #8 on:** November 20, 2016, 07:58:26 AM

They didn't show this one much I was kid. I had no memory of it. After reading yesterday's reviews my expectations were low. But I kind of like it. It entertained me, much like an old sitcom of that era might. Loved that it's all new material. No recycled jokes from the Stooges glory days and no archival footage. Much to my surprise I even enjoyed "Let's Fall In Love" and "The Heat Is On".

Tiny setting off an earthquake when she laid down on Gansamacher's couch was well staged and hilarious. The fat jokes were refreshingly un-PC and Tiny joins in on the fun when Joe describes the delicacies awaiting her in the big city. Also, kudos to the writers for presenting Tiny as an attractive woman. Larry references her beautiful face and certainly has a boner for her.

Dr. Hugo wears really cool Wayfarer glasses.

It's a damn shame that the silly fun mood is ruined by the flashback scene. It's regrettable for all the reasons Metal references above.

We know that Larry can play a mean violin but is that really Besser with the fancy footwork. I'm suspicious whenever they do that cut away camera thing to focus on the performer's legs. I like how in this short, and on "I Love Lucy", that if you had some talent you could uproot your life and go make a living performing in nightclubs.

6/10. I would have given this one a seven if not for the whip chasing.

Dr. Hugo Gansamacher · **Reply #9 on:** November 20, 2016, 09:08:21 AM

By the way, I notice that Larry reverts to his original given name of Louis ("Uncle Louie") in the flashback sequence.

Desmond Of The Outer Sanctorum · **Reply #10 on:** November 21, 2016, 06:34:36 AM

Quote from: Percy Pomeroy on November 20, 2016, 07:58:26 AM

is that really Besser with the fancy footwork. I'm suspicious whenever they do that cut away camera thing to focus on the performer's legs.

I wondered about that as well. He does seem to be tap-dancing in the long shot but the close-ups do seem potentially designed to create an illusion.

Paul Pain · **Reply #11 on:** November 21, 2016, 10:03:17 AM

16 minutes I'll never get back.

Shemp_Diesel · **Reply #12 on:** November 21, 2016, 10:31:06 AM

Yeah, this is probably the worst stretch of Besser shorts--no relief from this hell, not until we get to Oil's Well...

Big Chief Apumtagribonitz · **Reply #13 on:** November 21, 2016, 12:50:47 PM

Percy Pomeroy speaks for me. And, no reflection on our own esteemed Dr Gansamacher, Moe is embarrassingly awful as the psychiatrist. And when Moe is bad, he's really bad, i.e. here and doing Curly's clam chowder routine. Keep an eye out for him during the Derita features, too, he sometimes goes so far over the top that he's literally screaming his lines and Joe spends a lot of time just trying to cool him down, time that could have been better spent actually giving Joe something funny to do.

Big Chief Apumtagribonitz · **Reply #14 on:** November 21, 2016, 02:31:34 PM

IIRC, Jerome Gottler may also have written the song from Woman Haters, " My Life My Love My All".

Big Chief Apumtagribonitz · **Reply #15 on:** November 21, 2016, 02:45:35 PM

BTW, the opening song, " Let's Fall in Love " is the same song Larry keeps trying to play on his fiddle in " Punch Drunks ". It was written by Harold Arlen, who also wrote the music for The Wizard of Oz.

Paul Pain · **Reply #16 on:** November 22, 2016, 06:51:20 PM

Quote from: Big Chief Apumtagribonitz on November 21, 2016, 12:50:47 PM

Percy Pomeroy speaks for me. And, no reflection on our own esteemed Dr Gansamacher, Moe is embarrassingly awful as the psychiatrist. And when Moe is bad, he's really bad, i.e. here and doing Curly's clam chowder routine. Keep an eye out for him during the Derita features, too, he sometimes goes so far over the top that he's literally screaming his lines and Joe spends a lot of time just trying to cool him down, time that could have been better spent actually giving Joe something funny to do.

Quote from: Big Chief Apumtagribonitz on November 21, 2016, 02:31:34 PM

IIRC, Jerome Gottler may also have written the song from Woman Haters, " My Life My Love My All".

Quote from: Big Chief Apumtagribonitz on November 21, 2016, 02:45:35 PM

BTW, the opening song, " Let's Fall in Love " is the same song Larry keeps trying to play on his fiddle in " Punch Drunks ". It was written by Harold Arlen, who also wrote the music for The Wizard of Oz.

Everything said here aids the viewer. But it doesn't change the lousy short.

metaldams · **Reply #17 on:** November 22, 2016, 07:16:15 PM

Big Chief, good catch about "Let's Fall in Love" being in PUNCH DRUNKS.

Kopfy2013 · **Reply #18 on:** November 22, 2016, 10:57:42 PM

Different for sure. I give it a 2 thanks to Larry playing the violin and ' prettier than a spotted heifer'

' what did you want to be wHen you were six?'
'Seven.'
'What did you want to be when you were four?'
'Seven'.
'Wow you're in a rut'

Not your standard short

Big Chief Apumtagribonitz · **Reply #19 on:** December 16, 2016, 01:44:16 PM

Paul Pain, I agree that the musical trivia doesn't save the short at all, but, being a fan of music of that era, I enjoy it probably in the same way that an audience of 1958 might have, more so than a contemporary audience would. In other words, a huge negative for most on this site is actually a positive for me, and might have been a positive for a 1958 audience. I'll admit that I like all the stooge musical moments, from Woman Haters on, my favorite being Swingaroo Joe, which for most of the intelligent imbeciles here adds nothing to an already mediocre short.
That said, Sweet and Hot sure is a hunk of shit.

Big Chief Apumtagribonitz · **Reply #20 on:** December 16, 2016, 06:46:38 PM

BTW, Sweet And Hot is no longer available on YouTube, at least as directed.

Woe-ee-Woe-Woe80 · **Reply #21 on:** November 21, 2017, 02:21:12 PM

I remember the first time I've seen this short was back in the Summer of 1996 on the Family Channel and I was shocked and appalled with how horrible this short was, I couldn't even finish it because it was so awful (something I rarely do with a Stooge short regardless of who appeared in it), fast forward to 2007 I've watched this short again online and while I liked it better than I did in 1996 but I agree it was one of the worst stooge shorts of all time, overall it's not quite as bad as Triple Crossed and Horsing Around.

Overall I give this short a 2/10 because it did contain a few minor funny scenes.

Tony Bensley · **Reply #22 on:** February 09, 2018, 10:54:09 AM

This short did seem to rather spotlight Muriel Landers, and was otherwise not very Stoogelike.

I do like musicals, which helps. However, for me, the music in SWEET AND HOT was mostly meh. I also found the flashback scene a downer. The nightclub bit near the end was nice, and Muriel did look classy.

Moe's Dr. Hugo Gansamacher was fine, but his not appearing in what was supposed to be a "Stooges" short before the 5 minute mark seemed like sacrilege.

SWEET AND HOT gets 4 out of 10 Hugos.

CHEERS!

TwoOunceBrain · **Reply #23 on:** April 20, 2018, 01:58:54 PM

Quote from: Curly Van Dyke on November 19, 2016, 01:43:33 PM

One of the All Time Worst! I do like when Joe and Larry get knocked down and we hear the stock"Oh" noise.
Anyone see the Columbia short Muriel made with Bek Nelson?

I have. It was called Tricky Chicks made in 1957 and was originally going to be a new series of comedy two-reelers called The Girlie Whirls, but after lukewarm response from moviegoers and critics, the idea was scrapped. Even the supporting roles from Dick Wessel and Benny Rubin couldn't even save this short.

Mark The Shark · **Reply #24 on:** April 11, 2019, 07:27:43 AM

Given that this short was written by the same guy who wrote "Woman Haters," I wonder if it wasn't an old script from the "Musical Novelty" days.

This is gonna sound crazy, but when I was in high school and college, I turned a few friends on to Laurel & Hardy when we rented some of their movies. We all loved "Way Out West" and I'm not sure what triggered this, but maybe one of them asked me if I had anything similar.

And I thought, here's a Stooge short with some singing and dancing in it...

The response: "I like Laurel & Hardy better. And I like CURLY better." Though he conceded that Joe Besser "seems to have some talent."

I think Moe is great as the psychiatrist.