Soup to Nuts with the Three Stooges

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(4 stars) - The Stooges are not the stars!
The first thing to understand about this DVD is that, although it is promoted to Three Stooges fans, this is really a 1930 movie in which Moe (not even called that at this stage!), Larry and Shemp are bit players in pre-Three Stooges days. It is most interesting in terms of the evolution of the Stooges, and indeed the evolution of film itself. Bear in mind, this is only two or three years after the first talkie, and it is evident that microphone technology is still in its infancy. Actors dare not wander too far away from wherever the microphone is hidden, for fear they will not be picked up. In one or two scenes on larger sets (e.g., in the fire house), there is a certain hollowness. Bearing all this in mind, the quality of the sound -- and, indeed, the picture -- is terrific.

The Stooges (and there are more than three) are mere adjuncts to the relatively unfunny vaudeville player Ted Healy, whose "stooges" they originally were. He is one of the stars of the movie, but the Stooges aren't. One wouldn't get this DVD as an example of the Stooges' work, but for its historical value only. And in that context, it is a very good buy indeed. It is a pity that there are no extras; a commentary track by a knowledgeable film buff would have been valuable. It is also a pity that the packaging designer seems to have thought that this is either a colour or a colourised movie. The cover photos have been colourised; the movie certainly has not.

As with most comedy films of this period, there is very little plot to speak of, just a series of connected gags, and the connections are often tenuous. Such as it is, the script is by the legendary Rube Goldberg, better known for his cartoons featuring impossibly complicated "inventions" designed to do stuff that was actually quite simple.

By all means buy this item. I think it's quite good value, but be aware of what it is -- and what it isn't.

(4 stars) - Corny, Clever, Charming, and Pre-Vintage Stooges
Well, folks, I dunno' . . . maybe I'm just a little nutty myself, but I really like this film. For the record, I also like the movie "Meet the Baron" and a couple of the Fox Laurel & Hardy movies; on the other hand I think "Dancing Lady" is very BORING, and I think "Swing Parade" is BEYOND boring and a terrible waste of talent, especially in the finale. So that's where I stand...

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The slap-dash manner of throwing in everything AND the kitchen sink is very entertaining to me. After all, the script was a Rube Goldberg construction, and I don't think it lets us down as such. Oddly, I did not care for the kitchen sink element of "Hellzapoppin", a contrived affair, whereas "Soup to Nuts" just seems breezily convoluted.

The story moves along briskly with one colorful character popping up after another, and the jokes doggedly marching along. If you don't like one gag, you'll laugh at the next. Well, smile anyway... Happily enough, there are indeed a number of Rube Goldberg's "inventions" on display throughout the film.

The Three Stooges appear suddenly in the first shot of the movie, and the whole scene is very funny. They sing and do the sand-bag routine that they would reprise in the 1950s on the Ed Wynn Show. Here it is more logically framed and much better timed with a stronger ending. I find Ted Healey very charming and funny, too. His girlfriend (Frances McCoy) is perfect: darling and hilarious, and remains one of the great mysteries of film--absolutely nobody seems to know whatever happened to her!

There is actually quite a lot of Stooges, and they have as merry madcap a fire department you could please. If you think of the movie being in 3 parts, they are in two-thirds of the film.

The quality of this film is GREAT, both image and sound. Imagine: a 1930 movie that no one cared about, saved at the last minute and looking so good. OK, it's just not a "great" film, so 4 stars out of 5; but the restoration is 5 stars. (One curiosity is that the end music is quite long, but there is no picture!)

We should be so lucky to see the Laurel & Hardy movies again in such pristine condition. Hallmark should be shot.

(5 stars) - A Must Have For Every Stooge Fan
This is a must have for every Stooge Fan. Most people didn't know that the Three Stooges was a side act that Ted Healy had to get more laughs. Ted Healy is truly the Fourth Stooge and It's great to see some of their stage act seeing how my Dad wasn't even born yet.

The Three Stooges isn't the main act in this DVD. The stooges just appear from time to time but it's well worth the wait. To see how life was back then and what we have today is cool to see as well. Do your Stooge fan a favor and buy them this DVD.

(2 stars) - More nuts than soup
If you love zany slapstick from the early years, you might enjoy bits and pieces of this melange of madness: you've got firehouses, costume shops, crazy inventions, restaurants, all as backdrops for alot of frantic antics. One thing is certain: there's exactly *one* funny line of dialogue and it's nice that Larry Fine has it. I won't spill the beans (or the nuts).
This is really a showcase for Ted Healey, a real showman with an impressive baritone singing voice and a knack for off-mike muttering (once in a while something mildly amusing is audible). Of course, he's the original Stooge Supervisor but in this 1930 movie he and "the boys" do not have much time together on film. Harry [aka Moses/Moe], Shemp, and Larry, have alot of nutty business, but without the benefit of technology, meaning the kind of editing and sound-effects available later in the decade from the one company that could really put together a slapstick short - Columbia, they sometimes get lost in the din.
Stooges fans and historians can get a strong sense of the Stooges live on stage from this awkward entry.
A big problem is that practically every character is supposed to be funny, including one called "Whispering Willie", a ghoulish little figure (who also manages to play a mean zylophone!) who has one decent gag in the latter half of the film. His part is overdrawn - it's like watching a Keystone Kop pratfall every twelve seconds. Also, there's an ill-conceived scene involving a burning building and people in need of rescue. The actors continue to wisecrack while lives are at stake. Bad stuff.
Also for Stooge-philes, there are plot elements which one could reasonably assume found their way onto later classics like "False Alarms" and "Flat-Foot Stooges"; later, for a few bits on The Ed Wynne Show.

(4 stars) - A real smorgasbord
Watching this film, it's hard to believe that once not so long ago it was first considered lost and then thought to be beyond the point of saving in its entirety. The restoration team did a super job, and the final product proves yet again how very important film restoration is. Sure this film isn't exactly a classic or a great movie, but film restoration is about saving all films, both classics and ordinary movies. It also helps that this movie is historically very important, even if it's not that great. One should also consider that most films from 1930 aren't considered classics today, let alone even remembered, because of how new talking pictures were and how crude, primitive, and stilted many of them appeared in comparison to silent films that had been being made just a few short years ago. And speaking of early sound films, the sound itself in this film does sometimes have that awkward crude feel that a lot of other early talkies do. However, given that this film was produced by Fox, a studio whose sound recording system was considered far superior to the ones used by RKO and Warner Brothers (so much so that the studio made a lot of money loaning it out to other studios), it might more logically be argued that the less than smooth sound quality might be due to how this film was considered lost and unsalvagable for so long, something that couldn't be fixed in the same way as a deteriorated pictorial quality.

The plot itself is little more than fluff. Ted Healy, the star of the picture, spends more time hanging around with his buddies at the fire department (Shemp, Moe, Larry, and Freddie Sanborn, a strange character who might best be described as a weirder version of Harpo Marx) than at his real job, whatever that might be (we're never exactly told what). He's also friends with Otto Schmidt, who runs a costume store that's gone bankrupt and is being taken over by Richard Carlson, who falls in love with Louise, Schmidt's young niece. Ted's obnoxious girlfriend Queenie also works at the shop, and is constantly telling Louise everything, even when it's bad news she's been warned by Ted to shield Louise from. Through some behind-the-scenes dealings, Ted and Carlson take actions to save Schmidt's store, though with all of the crazy goings-on in this movie, the store's future might not be so rosy after all.

Most people today are only going to be interested in this film for the screen debut of the Three Stooges, who aren't in all of the scenes. The real star is Ted Healy, their original straight man and leader. This film might not be very funny or even very good, but that doesn't subtract from the fact that the guy had a natural screen presence and a whole lot of talent. It's not fair to judge him by just this one film, particularly when most people alive today didn't get a chance to see him in vaudeville, where he was a huge star. Knowing about his success in vaudeville gives one a background in why he did have such a huge reputation and why he went on to become such a successful and highly-paid supporting comedian after he transitioned to the screen. Unfortunately he's gotten a very bad reputation over the years; he wasn't a perfect little angel, but he was also far from the complete monster and talentless shill that a lot of people routinely make him out to be without even knowing all of the facts. This film is also our only real chance to see what the vaudeville routine of Ted Healy and His Stooges (in their original lineup) looked like, in the scene at the costume party where they're entertaining the crowd. Another highlight of the film is that the women playing the Stooges' girlfriends whom they go to Coney Island with were their real-life wives, and that they weren't acting when they were on that fire truck. It's also a bit shocking to see how young they look in this film; Larry in particular (the youngest member of the original lineup by some years) looks really fresh-faced and doesn't even have his trademark haircut. Actually, none of them have their trademark haircuts in this picture!

This isn't a great movie, and it didn't get too many laughs from me, but it is historically important, and it does have more than a few good scenes in it. It may largely seem like little more than a curio, but at least it's not a boring curio. It's also one of those movies that gets better with repeated viewings.

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