The Three Stooges - Goofs on the Loose (1937)

NO TO COLORIZATION!!!!!

I bought a couple of these out of desperation for some of the shorts. Now that Columbia is releasing these shorts the way they should be, these DVD presentations are obsolete and I can get rid of them. I've never watched the colorized shorts and never will. Colorization is an insult to the creators of a film. This would of been a 5 rating if not for the inclusion of the colorized versions. Also, there is a small superimposed object in the upper right corner that looks something like a camera. I have to hit my display button to remove it. I've got no idea what it represents. It appears at the beginning of each episode. October 5, 2008

COLORIZED AND B&W ON SAME DISC!! AWESOME!!

IM NOT USALLY A FAN OF COLORIATION OF OLD CLASSIC FILMS, BUT THE JOB THAT HAS BEEN DONE ON THESE STOOGES COLOR DVD'S HAVE BEEN VERY WELL DONE! AND WHAT I LIKE MOST ABOUT THESE DVD'S IS THEY OFFER YOU THE B&W VERSION AS WELL. ''THE BEST OF BOTH WORLDS ON ONE DISC''! I THINK THAT'S GREAT! I HOPE COLUMBIA KEEPS PUTTING OUT MORE OF THIS COLLECTION. I JUST WISH THEY WOULD COME OUT WITH NEW STOOGES SHORTS, NOT THE SAME OL' SAME OL', YA KNOW? ANYWAYS,..THIS IS AN AWESOME DVD SERIES. JUST KEEP THEM BOTH COLOR AND B&W.SOME THINGS I WOULD RATHER HAVE LEFT IN B&W , (EXAMPLE ):OLD POPEYE CARTOONS!!! DON;T COLORIZE THEM MAN!! AND RELEASE MORE POPEYE B&W ON DVD, REMASTERED AND RESTORED! SORRY..""GOT OFF TRACK ABIT", BACK TO THIS STOOGE DVD. BOTTOM LINE, YOU CAN'T GO WRONG WITH THIS SERIES. COLOR (WELL DONE) AND B&W! IM A HUGH STOOGE FAN! 03-03-07 March 4, 2007

No wonder it didn't sell well

Who are the executives at Columbia who seriously thought that this would be a good idea? Fans of classic film sent the powers that be a message in the Eighties that they hated colorisation, and after the issue was seemingly dead and buried, it rears its ugly head again in a new generation. The Chroma Color (from what I saw of it on the self-congratulatory featurette) does look better than the colorisation of the Eighties, but that's still not saying very much. It might look better and more realistic, but it still looks fake and distracting. And even if it did look totally natural and lifelike, it just doesn't feel right. Some people you can only ever picture in black and white; to imagine the Stooges in color (apart from a handful of films they made that were actually originally shot in Technicolor) would just seem wrong. These shorts were shot in black and white and have been enjoyed in black and white for over 70 years now. The technicians can do all of the research they want on what types of colors these things might have been, but it's still missing a big point--the colors that were actually chosen were chosen precisely because of how they would register on black and white film stock. The colors used certainly wouldn't have looked anything like what they actually do in Chroma Color. Frankly, the only reason I even rented this disc was because I hadn't yet seen 'Playing the Ponies' or 'The Sitter-Downers.'

This disc also has the misfortune of only having two previously unreleased shorts. It's great that one at least has the option of viewing them in B&W or color (and there is a "Play All" button, something that was absent on almost all of the previous discs), but it's not great at all that the consumer is basically being asked to pay much more money for something that only has two new-to-DVD shorts. 'Men in Black' and 'Punch Drunks' were already released on the 'Curly Classics' disc. Including both the B&W and colorised versions, there are 8 shorts on this disc; if only they could have been 8 shorts that hadn't been released on DVD prior instead of consisting of two rehashes. And come on, only 4 shorts on a disc, regardless of how many had already been released?

The shorts themselves are somewhat of a mixed bag. 'Punch Drunks' (1934), their second Columbia short and the only one they got credit for writing themselves, is a classic, even though they hadn't really ironed out their comedy style, their screen personae, or their screen relationship yet. If only this and not 'Woman Haters' had been their first short, since it has the three of them meeting one another for the first time in the opening scenes and starts to establish their characters and relationship.

'Men in Black' (1934) I personally find to be kind of overrated. It is rather memorable, but more because of what an odd short it is, not because it's fall-down hilarious or contains a lot of classic lines and routines. It seems like a lot of their early shorts have been declared classics only because they were done so early in their tenure at Columbia, and not for any more substantial reasons. Seriously, would this short be considered such a great classic had it been made in, say, 1940 or 1938? Still, as strange as this short may be, at least it's nowhere near the likes of 'Horsing Around' or 'Rumpus in a Harem.'

'Playing the Ponies' (1937) has some fun stuff in it, but overall I didn't find it to be so hot. This short got a one-star rating in 'The Three Stooges Scrapbook,' though I wouldn't give it such a poor rating myself. (This is also the same book that gives 3-star ratings to the likes of 'Sweet and Hot,' 'Hoofs and Goofs,' and 'Fling in the Ring'!) This is a cute fun short, but overall it's not one of their classics. I'd consider it a bit below average.

'The Sitter-Downers' (1937), which stars Ted Healy's sister Marcia as Cora Belle, could perhaps be viewed as the short in which they entered into their golden era. There's a lot of great stuff in this one, and even though the premise of trying to build a house had been done before (by Buster Keaton in 'One Week' and by Laurel and Hardy in 'The Finishing Touch'), it doesn't seem like an old and tired situation. The possibilities for comedic mayhem are endless when carpentry is involved! The concept of sit-down strikes was also something that would have hit the original audience very close to home, as they were all over the news that year. The ending is somewhat abrupt, but everything that went before was so great that it doesn't really matter.

This is not a collection I would recommend getting, even considering that one does have the option of watching them in B&W only. Though the overall quality of the shorts is pretty decent, there are still only 4 shorts, and half of them have been issued before. It's ridiculous that someone actually thought this would sell well and generate a lot of interest instead of indifference and anger. August 25, 2006

Great for what it is

The real contraversy with this release seems to be the addition of colorized versions. This isn't really a bad thing - it does add an extra dimension to the Stooges, and it's purely optional for you cats who prefer the purer black and white. Why not include both to satisfy all fans? Unfortunately, a lot of the Stooges fans seem to be taking a note from their heroes. They've accused this release of including an icon to toggle between B&W. Some have theorized that it's for piracy protection, others that it's for the ease of switching. They're both wrong. The toggle icon is a feature of the DVD player - not the DVD - and is ENTIRELY REMOVABLE if you know how to use the player itself.

When I first bought my player, that was the first thing I turned off, and it hasn't been a problem ever since. Consequently, the icon is NOT displayed when I'm watching these Stooges classics. The process of shutting that (typically) optional feature involves going through the dvd *player* menus and shutting it off. If your player doesn't have one, it's time to slap your face, and Curly shuffle down to your local store to get another because quite a few special editions have (what my player calls) "angles" (i.e. simultaneous displays).

Like everyone else, the fact that a dvd which can fit up to 4 hours (dual layer) in SP has only 4 shorts which amount to 68 minutes is plain ridiculous. I will never collect these releases and will continue to wait until they release an exhaustive set. June 28, 2006

More sucker-bait for Stooges fans

The Stooges are great, but the core of their achievement -- the approximately two hundred comedy shorts they did for Columbia -- has never gotten anything remotely approaching the respect it or its fans deserve. This latest piece of junk adds yet more insult to injury.

A one-sided DVD will hold at least thirteen Stooges shorts, but Columbia, when it sporadically decides to knock out a new one, only includes five to eight shorts. Until now, that is.

This latest disgrace only has four shorts. You read that right -- less than a third of what it could hold, out of some 200 shorts in the Columbia vaults. And at least one of the four -- "Men in Black" -- is already out on an earlier-released Stooges DVD collection (*Curly Classics*).

The nyuk-nyuks are on us consumers, apparently.

Naturally, given Columbia's bent, it's charging more than ever. Pay more for less value, in other words. That should be Columbia's motto.

Oh, that's right: These are colorized. Like the Stooges really need that.

New and improved colorization, supposedly. There's even a little "featurette" trying to sell us on the colorization (when what consumers really want are a lot more Stooges shorts released, with far more shorts per disc and more reasonable prices). Colorization, we're assured, has made great technical strides since the old controversy about it in the '80s.

Let *me* assure you: *This* colorization job looks as bad as ever. Nothing looks real, and everybody's skin has that ghastly orangey washed-over look.

Fortunately, the colorization effect can be turned off. But not the distracting icon that's on the lower right corner of every frame of the Stooges shorts. Presumably this is to discourage piracy: But, if so, how do thousands of new movie and television DVDs get released without them? Why are Stooges fans singled out to suffer them?

The bottom line is that this is yet another example of Columbia's gross disrespect for both its products and its customers.

I'd gladly pay hundreds of dollars for thoughtfully released DVDs of the complete Stooges Columbia shorts: circa 13 shorts to a disc, lost scenes restored (another notorious failure so far by Columbia), no repetitions of shorts from disc to disc (the greed of these cheaters is illimitable), and, hopefully, some meaningful chronological order (by release dates or, better still, production sequence).

Not that I'm holding my breath.

For now, I'm just renting these Stooges DVDs on a one-time-only basis for myself and my children. I wouldn't dream of buying any of them given Columbia's greedy and insulting marketing schemes. Columbia won't get my money, and I hope it doesn't get yours.

And it shouldn't get any of our money until it finally decides to do right by the work and the fans of the Stooges -- and market those 200 classic shorts with some shred of decency. February 13, 2006

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