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Andy Plays Hookey (1946) - Andy Clyde

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Offline Paul Pain

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IMDB: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0168460/

Emil Sitka's Diary notes: http://www.emilsitka.com/andyplayshookey1946.html

ANDY PLAYS HOOKEY has one of the most insufferable plots I have ever seen.  It's a domestic comedy featuring the usual nightmare mother-in-law and brother-in-law.  Andy gets physically abused, is forced to cook after he gets home from work, told he's selfish when he's upset that brother-in-law leaves them nothing to eat, and verbally stabbed for being upset that said brother-in-law committed multiple felonies in Andy's car.  The only thing that could have made this funny is watching Andy kill them all.

The second reel consists of Andy getting himself in trouble while trying to go to a fight with some funny moments at his workplace, and then he has some funny moments with cops mixed in with unfunny moments with cops all while driving his brother-in-law's car.  After that, it is again absolutely unfunny material with Andy trying to get into the boxing match only to get trampled as the fight of course ends right before he can get in to see it.  Once he gets home, Andy's brother-in-law and mother-in-law get it, and Andy resolves to rule his own house and be in charge of his own life.

This short is a two-reel remake of THE MAN ON THE FLYING TRAPEZE featuring W.C. Fields.

This short can... BURN IN HELLTM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

1/10 [poke]
#1 fire kibitzer


Offline HomokHarcos

A two reel remake of The Man on the Flying Trapeze sums the whole film up. Ironically that may have been my favorite W.C. Fields feature, this one the other hand didn't do much for me. At least with W.C. Fields' character you can get an idea of why the mother-in law wouldn't like him. Here Andy seems to get tormented for no reason.


Offline Allen Champion

Why do you folks abuse yourself with these awful Columbia shorts?   What sins are you expiating?   Except for the Stooges and Charley Chase, Columbia made the worst comedy shorts in movie history, and Jules Blight ruined some of the greatest comedy careers with belching and fart jokes, or inflicting Elsie Ames on them.    Don't do it to yourselves--or if you must inflict such self-torture, watch C-SPAN or CNN instead!
"What do you know of the blood, sweat and toil of a theatrical production? Of the dedication of the men and the women in the noblest profession of them all?"


Offline HomokHarcos

Why do you folks abuse yourself with these awful Columbia shorts?   What sins are you expiating?   Except for the Stooges and Charley Chase, Columbia made the worst comedy shorts in movie history, and Jules Blight ruined some of the greatest comedy careers with belching and fart jokes, or inflicting Elsie Ames on them.    Don't do it to yourselves--or if you must inflict such self-torture, watch C-SPAN or CNN instead!
The only time that Columbia used toilet humor that I can remember is in a Shemp short where he rinses his hair with toilet water.


Offline metaldams

First off, bad print quality, but it’s all we have.  Emil Sitka is the first parallel parking police officer and Symona Boniface is in front of the ticket line at one point.  The only way I could tell is their voices.  They’re faces are blurred beyond recognition.

Indeed a remake of THE MAN ON THE FLYING TRAPEZE, which in itself is a remake of Fields own silent film, RUNNING WILD (which has nothing to do with the Judas Priest song or the German pirate metal band).  The Fields feature is indeed a classic, but the problem with this film is they try to condense an entire feature film into a two reel comedy and it just doesn’t work.  The characters and gags in the Fields films breathe, here everything feels rushed.  The shaving mirror gag is from IT’S A GIFT.  When Fields does it, hysterical.  It’s comic ballet.  Here?  Edited to pieces, rushed, no room for Andy.

One point of fascination is Andy’s wife, Geneva Mitchell.  Yes, the same one from RESTLESS KNIGHTS and HOI POLLOI.  If IMDb is accurate, this is her first role in ten years and would be her last.  She was dead three years later at age 41.  I bet the back story of her getting this role is an interesting one.
- Doug Sarnecky