Film & Shorts Discussions > Random Comedy Reviews
Defective Detectives (1944) - Harry Langdon & El Brendel
metaldams:
Moving today and will be without WiFi for a bit if you guys don’t hear from me much. Can’t wait to get to this one just for seeing some early Christine.
metaldams:
Random observation to indicate the pecking order at Columbia. The Three Stooges always had their own theme music. Everybody else after a while used “Mary Had a Little Lamb.”
This is a prime case of Columbia pushing product. Throw two random comedians together and give them a script that has nothing to go with their characters. The whole business of being incompetent blue collar workers and then wrongfully chasing somebody would work well with The Three Stooges. Heck, throw in one extended routine in this script and make this in 1940 and we’d have a pretty good Stooge short.
As this short is? Two comedians doing stock work. You’d never know the uniqueness of Langdon, even remotely, by watching this. I’m sorry this was your first impression, Paul. While not exactly THE STRONG MAN, at least TO HEIR IS HUMAN has some clever gags, a stronger Christine role and the two comedians compliment one another. Here, no dice.
Paul Pain:
--- Quote from: metaldams on March 02, 2021, 07:36:10 AM ---Random observation to indicate the pecking order at Columbia. The Three Stooges always had their own theme music. Everybody else after a while used “Mary Had a Little Lamb.”
--- End quote ---
Give this man a dollar. I have done much research into the theme songs used at Columbia, and the only comedy teams, that I have found so far, that ever had an unique theme were The Three Stooges (multiple themes), Andy Clyde (Reuben and Rachel), and Charley Chase (For He's a Jolly Good Fellow). In the 1930s, many shorts just had popular tunes as their theme songs.
HomokHarcos:
--- Quote from: Paul Pain on March 02, 2021, 10:14:03 AM ---Give this man a dollar. I have done much research into the theme songs used at Columbia, and the only comedy teams, that I have found so far, that ever had an unique theme were The Three Stooges (multiple themes), Andy Clyde (Reuben and Rachel), and Charley Chase (For He's a Jolly Good Fellow). In the 1930s, many shorts just had popular tunes as their theme songs.
--- End quote ---
By this point The Three Stooges were also the only act that had their own title cards with faces. The rest just had their names listed above the name of the short.
Paul Pain:
--- Quote from: HomokHarcos on March 02, 2021, 12:21:27 PM ---By this point The Three Stooges were also the only act that had their own title cards with faces. The rest just had their names listed above the name of the short.
--- End quote ---
Well, not to ignore the fact that in the late 1930s Charley Chase (not always) and Andy Clyde also had title cards with their faces. However, I haven't seen any 1940s Clyde shorts to see if this continues.
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