Bowery Bombshell (1946)
*** (out of 4)
Third film in the series has Sach (Huntz Hall) getting his picture taken outside a bank that's being robbed and soon the picture is in the newspaper with the ad that he was the thief. Slip (Leo Gorcey) and the rest of the gang must try to keep the police away from him while at the same time trying to catch the real crook, which just happens to be gangster Ace Baker (Sheldon Leonard). Up to this point in the series this entry is without question the funniest and I'd say it's probably the best film I've seen from them no matter what you want to call them. While this isn't a classic like their drama pics at Warner, it does manage to be their funniest film with one big laugh after another. The first thirty-minutes is near classic as we get incredibly fast jokes that are flying left and right and the shocking thing is that the majority of them hit their mark. A lot of the films going back to the East Side Kids featured decent laughs no matter how bad the movie was but this is the first time where I was actually laughing out loud. The film starts off with the boys trying to sell a junk car and quickly moves to the robbery where Sach gets a $1,000 reward place on his head. The jokes keep flying with one very memorable one is the "shakes" Slip gets as he discovers a large bill on Sach. This is followed by even funnier sequence including one where Sach has to hide in a phone booth while Slip tries talking a cop away. All of this leads up to another very funny sequence with Sach going in drag. What really helps this film, at least over the previous two, is that the screenplay seems to have been written with care and a lot of details are given to the characters. Slip has his typical mangled words but they are double layered here as they are funny because of how dumb it is to mangle them but then there's an added laugh because of what he's says and how it goes against what the situation is at the time. The screenplay is also smart enough to take some of the spotlight off Gorcey and passing it around. Sach gets more time here and does well with it but Bobby Jordan is still stuck in the background. Another major plus are the supporting players with Leonard, William 'Wee Willie' Davis and James Burke doing fine work. The second half of the movie isn't as funny as the first but things finally pick up again when the boys enter Leonard's nightclub acting like they're the gangsters. In the end, this is a very funny movie that will appeal to more than just fans of the series.
*** (out of 4)
Third film in the series has Sach (Huntz Hall) getting his picture taken outside a bank that's being robbed and soon the picture is in the newspaper with the ad that he was the thief. Slip (Leo Gorcey) and the rest of the gang must try to keep the police away from him while at the same time trying to catch the real crook, which just happens to be gangster Ace Baker (Sheldon Leonard). Up to this point in the series this entry is without question the funniest and I'd say it's probably the best film I've seen from them no matter what you want to call them. While this isn't a classic like their drama pics at Warner, it does manage to be their funniest film with one big laugh after another. The first thirty-minutes is near classic as we get incredibly fast jokes that are flying left and right and the shocking thing is that the majority of them hit their mark. A lot of the films going back to the East Side Kids featured decent laughs no matter how bad the movie was but this is the first time where I was actually laughing out loud. The film starts off with the boys trying to sell a junk car and quickly moves to the robbery where Sach gets a $1,000 reward place on his head. The jokes keep flying with one very memorable one is the "shakes" Slip gets as he discovers a large bill on Sach. This is followed by even funnier sequence including one where Sach has to hide in a phone booth while Slip tries talking a cop away. All of this leads up to another very funny sequence with Sach going in drag. What really helps this film, at least over the previous two, is that the screenplay seems to have been written with care and a lot of details are given to the characters. Slip has his typical mangled words but they are double layered here as they are funny because of how dumb it is to mangle them but then there's an added laugh because of what he's says and how it goes against what the situation is at the time. The screenplay is also smart enough to take some of the spotlight off Gorcey and passing it around. Sach gets more time here and does well with it but Bobby Jordan is still stuck in the background. Another major plus are the supporting players with Leonard, William 'Wee Willie' Davis and James Burke doing fine work. The second half of the movie isn't as funny as the first but things finally pick up again when the boys enter Leonard's nightclub acting like they're the gangsters. In the end, this is a very funny movie that will appeal to more than just fans of the series.