Talk About Cinema

Disney had a good lock on the animated feature film market in the U.S. during the mid-20th century. I don't mean that judging by their box office receipts; I mean that they were the only company making animated features in the U.S. for most of that period. Prior to the 1950s, only one other studio in the U.S. even attempted to compete in this market for a brief time: Fleischer Studios, otherwise known as the team behind the Popeye cartoons, the Betty Boop cartoons, and Out of the Inkwell . Today I'll be reviewing the first of their two feature film efforts, Gulliver's Travels . Gulliver's Travels  takes part in Lilliput, an island of tiny people. King Little (Jack Mercer) and King Bombo (Tedd Pierce) sign a wedding contract for the marriage of their children, but call it off and go to war after failing to agree on the wedding song. Meanwhile, Gulliver (Sam Parker), has landed on the beach and the Lilliputians initially fear him due to his large size. After scaring off...

At first glance, Lost in Alaska wouldn't appear to be all that promising of a film given that the whole snowy theme was already done in Hit the Ice . But while Lost in Alaska does have a few problems (very few Abbott and Costello films don't), overall it actually does manage to be a pretty solid comedy film. Lost in Alaska finds Abbott and Costello playing Tom Watson and George Bell, two volunteer firemen who save the life of "Nugget" Joe McDermott (Tom Ewell) after he attempts to kill himself. McDermott had struck rich in the Yukon, but decided to end his life when his girlfriend, Rosette (Mitzi Green) stopped loving him. He later receives a telegram from Rosette claiming she still loves him and decides to return to the Yukon with Tom and George in tow, since the newspapers mistakenly reported that Joe had been murdered by the two of them. In Alaska, Tom and George must protect Joe from "old-timers" who want to kill Joe for his gold. The story is dec...

Jack and the Beanstalk marked the first of two independent films that Abbott and Costello made to be distributed by Warner Bros. Both were filmed in color and clearly had high production values put towards them, certainly higher than their most recent Universal film . Does this make it a good movie? Eh...kind of. Costello plays Jack, who is given the task of babysitting the siblings of Eloise Larkin (Shaye Cogan). While attempting to read the story of "Jack and the Beanstalk" to Eloise's brother Donald (David Stollery), Donald instead ends up reading it to Jack and makes him fall asleep. In his dreams, Jack imagines himself as the Jack from the fairy tale, with Abbott portraying Mr. Dinklepuss, the man who cons him into trading his cow for magic beans. When the beans grow into a beanstalk, Jack and Mr. Dinklepuss climb it in an attempt to find everything that was stolen by the giant, including a princess and a prince (Cogan and James Alexander). This is one of the mor...

Comin' Round the Mountain sucks. The end. 1 out of 10 OK, OK, fine. I'll talk about the film, but...oh my gosh, I could not believe how awful this film was! Sure, Abbott and Costello made awful films before, but this film was just flat out uncomfortable to watch, even more than Abbott and Costello Meet the Killer, Boris Karloff . Abbott plays Al Stewart, a theatrical agent who represents Dorothy McCoy (Dorothy Shay) and The Great Wilbert (Costello). After hearing Wilbert scream during a bad performance, Dorothy deduces that he must also be a member of the McCoy clan, and takes him and Al to meet the rest of their family after revealing that Wilbert could make millions from a treasure that was hidden by his grandfather. Granny (Ida Moore) agrees that he's a member, but cannot reveal the location of the treasure until after Wilbert is married. This results in entanglements with love potions, a feud with the Winfield clan, and some backstabbing from members of the McCoy ...