Topic: I Spied for You (1943) - El Brendel

[Paul Pain]

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0132229/

We are truly cheated.  This is the third and final El Brendel short we can review do to limitations.  Latter shorts are shorts co-starring him with other Columbia comedians.  If I were independent, I could order the DVDs from the Shorts Dept, but I am not.  Two shorts we miss are significant.  The first, THE BLITZKISS, was supposedly so good it got nominated for an Academy Award.  The other, SWEET SPIRITS OF NIGHTER, is a true horror-comedy short; it is so much so that, in England, it was given an "H" rating, which is basically like here getting an "R" rating but specifically due to horror content!  Dark stuff out there!

We get here a rare non-Stooge WW2 propaganda film.  It makes me yearn for the Stooges shorts for sure!  The entire short basically consists of El acting like an idiot and getting himself and others in trouble.  Most interesting though is that we see a lot of physical comedy, and El Brendel sure can take a fall!  His Swedish shtick is sore-lacking, but he has the talent for taking a beating as well as catching fish.

Give credit to Bud Jamison here: this is one of his finest performances, and we get a fantastic reprisal of his Johnson character with the bonks he takes off the bunk bed.  He delivers and receives his abuse well in this one.

Vernon Dent and Stanley Blystone do great in this one, though the former is almost insignificant.  The latter is in perfect form and does a great job with it.  Al Thompson also does well as the overly panicked unit leader.

Kathryn Keyes appears in her first of two Columbia shorts, the latter being PICK A PECK OF PLUMBERS also with El Brendel.  She had a lot of potential, but she quietly disappeared and eventually passed away in 2018 at age 101.  She doesn't do bad here.

Overall problem is the plot.  It's a slow plot consisting mostly of angry reactions, dull chase scenes, and yelling.  It's not the most interesting short.  However, this is the same set used in BACK FROM THE FRONT, and it's therefore tempting to compare the two.  They were released a month apart, likely filmed around the same time.  Stanley Blystone is even a Nazi villain in both.  I believe Vera Vague's WW2 propaganda short, which we will review in the future, also used this set. 

Jack White could have done better with writing this, but overall it was a fantastic effort from Columbia's directing, production, and staging crews and their dependable supporting casts.  But it's just lacking a "WOW!" moment.  However, it definitely fits in the line of WW2 propaganda Columbia put out and thus makes it an interesting artifact.

8/10

[metaldams]

      I did watch this one a while back and completely forgot about it until now.  Definitely the best I’ve ever seen El Brendel.  I think the key is the more hysterical he is and the more running around he does, the better.  The Swedish dialect doesn’t make him too believable the more one gets into plot, but it’s fine when things are clownish.  Perhaps the not so developed plot but fast pace action is a plus here.

     The supporting cast is indeed good.  Like Paul said, excellent Bud Jamison performance for sure and one of the better Stanley Blystone performances as well.  Indeed this is the same set from BACK FROM THE FRONT and though she’s underused, any short that has Barbara “Hubba Hubba Kid” Slater in it is fine with me.

   You guys should check this one out.

[Paul Pain]

      I did watch this one a while back and completely forgot about it until now.  Definitely the best I’ve ever seen El Brendel.  I think the key is the more hysterical he is and the more running around he does, the better.  The Swedish dialect doesn’t make him too believable the more one gets into plot, but it’s fine when things are clownish.  Perhaps the not so developed plot but fast pace action is a plus here.

     The supporting cast is indeed good.  Like Paul said, excellent Bud Jamison performance for sure and one of the better Stanley Blystone performances as well.  Indeed this is the same set from BACK FROM THE FRONT and though she’s underused, any short that has Barbara “Hubba Hubba Kid” Slater in it is fine with me.

   You guys should check this one out.

Really, when you think about it, here the accent creates a character who is just a clumsy idiot without malicious intent.  It's not annoying like it is in the Langdon and Shemp shorts.  I edited my rating on this one as a result following a reconsideration.

[Umbrella Sam]

This is easily the best short with El Brendel that I’ve seen. Really, that’s not saying much given the quality of the other shorts, but there does seem to be a slightly better awareness of how to use him here than in other comedies, especially with all the chases. I especially like the gag where he’s being chased while also trying to get Bud Jamison’s attention; that was a really good scene. I also like the little pantomime bit he does too, when he’s trying to trick the spies into thinking he won’t tell on them. The rest of the supporting cast is pretty solid too. Really, the supporting casts in the previous two shorts weren’t bad, but they were forced into a genre that I’ve never really felt had much variety to it.

It’s still not a great short, as there are some slow moments towards the beginning, but I SPIED FOR YOU does pick up as it goes along and for the most part is a pretty well-directed two-reeler.

8 out of 10