First, fair warning of bias: I don't consider El Brendel to be a funny comedian. His naive Scowhegian dullard simply annoys me. Nonetheless, he was a popular comic actor from the late 1920s (when he had a major role in WINGS) through his death in the mid-1960s.
Because of that, I attribute the Oscar nomination of this short subject to its excellent, if subdued 3-strip Technicolor, its fulsome musical score and its sheer bizarreness, including a passel of mad scientists who rocket El and local cop Phil Regan to a tribe of scantily dressed Indian maidens, from whom they are rescued by a town of rather Amazonian settlers. There's also a major Busby-Berkley style dance number. The sheer spectacle of this production number undoubtedly helped.
Still, for my taste, the whole thing looks like an overproduced mess.
Because of that, I attribute the Oscar nomination of this short subject to its excellent, if subdued 3-strip Technicolor, its fulsome musical score and its sheer bizarreness, including a passel of mad scientists who rocket El and local cop Phil Regan to a tribe of scantily dressed Indian maidens, from whom they are rescued by a town of rather Amazonian settlers. There's also a major Busby-Berkley style dance number. The sheer spectacle of this production number undoubtedly helped.
Still, for my taste, the whole thing looks like an overproduced mess.