Three Stooges - G.I. Stooge (1944)

Boobs in Arms (1940): The troops on both sides are in real trouble when Moe Larry and Curly are enlisted by a jealous husband who also happens to be a sergeant. Friendly fire takes on a whole new meaning as they attempt to defend themselves with a canister of laughing gas and their plan backfires.Back From the Front (1943): After merchant mariners Moe Larry and Curly mistake a torpedo for a whale and accidentally cause it to explode they find themselves cast away at sea in a lifeboat...until they board a Nazi warship and make an even bigger mistake.G.I. Wanna Go Home (1946): When Moe Larry and Curly are dis-charged they go from bunkers to bunk beds upon learning that they now have no home and there are no vacancies to be had anywhere. With their fiancees they move into a vacant lot and make the most of it until a farmer forces them to move on.Wee Wee Monsieur (1938): They ll always have Paris...even if Paris wouldn t have them! Moe Larry and Curly are having a hard time making it as artists which means they have no means to pay for rent or food. An assignment with the French Foreign Legion might be just the solution.No Dough Boys (1944): Mistaken for Japanese saboteurs after posing in make up to look like Japanese soldiers for a magazine ad Moe Larry and Curly decide to stay undercover and fight the high-ranking German spies into whose hideout they ve stumbled.Dizzy Pilots (1943): It seems nothing goes right when Moe Larry and Curly attempt to prove to the military that they can fly their airplane the Buzzard. But it s not only their egos that are inflated and Moe appears headed for a crash landing.System Requirements:Running Time: 123 Min.Format: DVD MOVIE Genre: COMEDY Rating: NR UPC: 043396077843 Manufacturer No: 07784 Product Description

Yeah, OK, it could have been handled better, BUT.......

after years and years and YEARS of Stooges stuff being available primarily only from non-Columbia/Sony sources it's nice to see these discs come out from Columbia/Sony.

I would have preferred a chronological version too but I'm not going to lose sleep over it or start tongue lashing Sony. I am happy to be able to buy Stooges shorts from the original source.

Funny though, as I put in the disc and the intro came up, I noticed the familiar Screen Gems opening and noticed blips and scratches, etc and I thought "geeez, they could have done A LITTLE restoration". But then it occurred to me....we've all grown up watching these shorts and seeing all of the age related wear and tear to the films. I guess I would rather have the wear and tear visible if only to remind me that what I am watching are ageless, priceless classics.

Moe, Larry, Curly and Shemp. I love you all and it's good to have you in my home. April 3, 2008

Another mixed bag

Unlike many of the other "themed" discs in this series, at least this one stays consistent throughout by being composed entirely of shorts with a military theme, instead of including a few unrelated shorts or ones with a tenuous connection at best. However, the quality of the shorts once again isn't really consistent. We see a few great shorts packed in with ones that are above average or mediocre. Although at least the weaker shorts on here aren't anywhere in the league of a short like 'Sweet and Hot' or 'Scheming Schemers.' The shorts included:

'Wee Wee Monsieur' (1938) is a bit above average. It starts out with the boys as Parisian artists who owe 8 months back rent, and while escaping the irate landlord, accidentally sign up for the French Foreign Legion. While they are supposed to be guarding their captain one night, he gets kidnapped, and they have to enter a harem, disguised as Santa Clauses, to bring him back safe and sound. The first half is great and quite funny, though it slows down a bit in the second half. Not really a classic, but far from a bomb.

'Boobs in Arms' (1940) is one of the best shorts on here. Once again the boys accidentally enter the Army, this time while fleeing from the irate husband of a woman they were trying to sell greeting cards to. When he came home, he saw them acting romantic with his wife (since she wanted to make him jealous and felt he didn't love her anymore), and lo and behold, he ends up being their Sergeant. (The man who plays Sgt. Hugh Dare was Richard Fiske, who incidentally was killed in action in France in WWII.) Obviously they can't do anything right in basic training, and once on the battlefield, they fire a cannon filled with laughing gas onto themselves, and continue to laugh hysterically even as they're captured by the enemy and are taken to their headquarters, where they cause more chaos.

'Back from the Front' (1943) is my favorite short on here. This time they're sailors fighting in WWII, and are being incompetent as usual when their ship gets bombed. They manage to survive, and with the ship's little dog pulling their raft, they eventually find another ship and climb on. Once on board, they find out that this is a German ship, and then recognise their lieutenant, who turns out to be a Nazi spy. After knocking out most of the sailors on board, stuffing them into a sack and pushing it overboard, they disguise themselves as Hitler, Goering, and Goebbels to take out the ranking officers who are still left on the ship. Moe does a great impersonation of Hitler; it was kind of scary how much they looked alike. (I wish I understood enough Yiddish to know what all he was barking at the officers; the only line I know is "Pupik gehabt haben," "I have had a belly button." I love how often they used Yiddish words and even entire sentences in their shorts, even though to most people it probably sounds like gibberish.)

'Dizzy Pilots' (1943) is also a really good short, finding the boys as the Wrong Brothers, who have received a draft deferment for 30 days so that they can build a great new aeroplane. Of course, the plane doesn't fly very well for long, and before they even got the plane off of the ground, Moe twice falls into a bathtub containing a liquid that hardens into what is supposed to be a protective rubber suit for pilots. The first time it happens, he starts flying into the air and has to be shot down into a well. This short was good enough on its own, so it was pretty lame how the ending was recycled footage from 'Boobs in Arms.' They could have easily shot new footage of them being put through basic training (although at least then the excuse was trying to save money during a war, not because Columbia's budget was down to practically nothing, the way it was when almost all of their shorts consisted of a few minutes of new footage padded out with liberal stock footage). It's also pretty stupid how these two shorts were included on the same disc, since they both have identical footage. Why not include another military-themed short, like 'Half-Shot Shooters' (1936), 'Three Little Sew and Sews' (1939), or 'Booby Dupes' (1945)?

'No Dough Boys' (1944) is pretty mediocre. It doesn't really have anything to do with the portrayal of the Japanese but more with the fact that I found the plot kind of uninspired and just average. Some of it is a bit hard to watch today, though at least here, as opposed to 'The Yoke's on Me,' the Stooges are acting stupid as usual, the same way they would act even if they were themselves and not dressed up as Japanese soldiers. The three guys who are playing the actual Japanese soldiers in this one don't act stupid or caricaturish at all, unlike the Japanese in 'The Yoke's on Me.' And it's far from the worst example of wartime propaganda against the Japanese. Some people would try to claim that anyone who finds stuff like this somewhat uncomfortable to watch today is just being "too PC," though I think it's more a case of being honestly offended or at least made uneasy by racist portrayals of the Japanese. It's easier to watch their shorts making fun of the Germans; that enemy was rightly being mocked for their horrible leaders, not because of their race.

'G.I. Wanna Home' (1946) actually isn't too bad for being from the sick Curly era. He does look and sound sick, but at least here you can't see his stroke coming from a mile away. He's slower than usual, but there are scenes where he almost appears like his old self. The boys are playing GIs who have just come home, and are looking for a place where they and their sweethearts can live so that they can all be married. Though they don't have any luck for awhile, eventually they find what at first appears to be a pretty nice place, until the camera pulls away and we realise it's no more than a vacant lot with fences and doorframes around it. Moe and Larry have some great scenes together in the middle of the short, more than making up for Curly's illness. After all, they were the Three Stooges, not "Curly and two other guys," as many people seem to believe. (And I agree, it was a very stupid mistake for the disc to label this short as 'G.I. Wanna Go Home' when the boys are *already* home, just in search of a house, and when the opening credits clearly refer to it as 'G.I. Wanna Home.')

Overall, this isn't the strongest disc in the series, and Columbia does need to get its act together and release the shorts properly, with extras, a "Play All" feature, and possibly even in boxed sets and in chronological order, but it's not like the weaker shorts on here are from the bottom of the barrel either. August 8, 2006

WOW!!!!!!!

This DVD is amazing. I'm serious!! Columbia actually put a lot of effort into making this DVD. The quality is astounding. It looks like Columbia finally opened the doors to the room where they keep the original 35mm prints. All shorts look really good. On the VHS, Columbia used bad prints for "Back From The Front" and "No Dough Boys", but not here. Columbia used the best prints out there. I guess Columbia read all of the complaints people wrote here and they finally got the message. Out of all The Three Stooges DVDs that were made, this one looks the best. So, go ahead and buy it. You won't believe that it was Columbia who made this DVD. July 27, 2003

Not As Bad As Everyone Says It Is...

I agree with what many people have said that Columbia Pictures could be handling the Stooges DVD releases better than they have been recently. Someone hit the nail on the head with the suggestion that Columbia should release the shorts in some sort of order (chronological, by films featuring the "Third Stooge", etc) instead of releasing them with a running "theme".

In my opinion, the overall quality of "G.I. Stooge" is not as bad as people have said, although I do agree that Columbia should be taking more care and paying more attention to the quality on future releases. Some of my all-time favorite shorts are on this disc, including the seldom-seen "No Dough Boys"; while this film doesn't rank amongst their best, it still has much of the Stooges' sardonic humor, particularly in their portrayal here of Japanese soliders. Moe is VERY convincing in this role, both in appearance and dialect; rather unheard of for a film to be released while the country was at war with Japan at the time!

While I'm a big fan of the older shorts featuring Curly, I agree with everyone who commented that Columbia should also release more (but preferably all) of the films featuring Shemp and especially Joe Besser. To many, Besser may not have been very "Stooge-like", but that doesn't mean he wasn't funny; some of my favorite Stooge episodes are with Besser. I think he more than deserves a fair shake!

I enjoyed this DVD, as I'm sure many Stooge fans will! It also wouldn't hurt for every Stooge fan to tell Columbia Pictures what you think and what you want to see in the future; there's always strength in numbers, and persistence DOES pay off. If they receive enough comments/complaints, they'll get the message. October 23, 2002

Hey Columbia, Do You See What Everyone Else is Doing?

OK, every other DVD compilation is made up of entire seasons, so why can`t Columbia release the Stooge shorts by year & in release date order? Would it really be that difficult to do? Of course not. Columbia is just out to rake in as much money as possible. They don`t care what the quality of the product is. The VHS tapes shouldn`t look better than the DVD. October 16, 2002

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