MEET THE BARON/GOLD RAIDERS Stooges movies dvd

[RedKing]

I got this very cool disc for Christmas. It features two of the very rare feature films the boys made-MEET THE BARON from 1933 and GOLD RAIDERS from 1951, incidentally the only feature length film they made with Shemp. Of the two I liked GOLD RAIDERS better as the boys are the stars. In MEET THE BARON they are, of course, stuck in the side-kick role to Ted Heel..er,Healy and have only one really good scene. The movie itself is actually quite funny and stars the incomparable Jimmy Durante and Jack Pearl as Baron Munchausen. Pearl does a great hokey german accent which is very funny, as I think German is by far the funniest accent there is! But Stooge wise, the boys do have a very funny scene early on-they and Ted are the fix-it guys for Cuddle College-an all girl school. Well the lovely young ladies are all in the shower-which in this place is a big communal thing so they can all sing a Busby Berley type musical number in the shower(yes it's as risque as it sounds-this was before the censorship codes went into effect!)Well, something goes wrong with the plumbing and the water stops, so the dean-a hatchet faced biddy -calls downstairs for the repairmen -who are busily engaged in a poker match! Not wanting to be bothered, the boys make alot of noise while Ted tells the dean that they're busy-until the dean mentions the girls are all trying to take their shower and the water has stopped. "Wait a minute-you mean the girls are in the shower now? And they're waiting for us? Why didn't you say so-we'll be right there!" This leads into the old "get the tools?What tools? The tools we've been using for the past 10 years" routine and the dean making hem put handkerchiefs over their eyes before they go in, to which Curly replies-"Oh, like the time we held up the bank!" Later on the boys get to do their slapstick antics on Jimmy Durante and Jack Pearl-Durante takes refuge under the bed and laments-"It's disgusting, that's what it is! Under a bed and not a husband in sight!" Oddly in this movie, Curly adopts a cross-eyed expression.GOLD RAIDERS features Moe,Larry and Shemp as bogus salesmen out to make a fortune selling junk to the cowpokes in the west. Stalwart western star George O'Brien is the hero. The boys end up being O'Brien's right hand men once their plan backfires and they almost get strung up. This movie was really good and featured a decent Western plot and lots of action along with the usual shenanigans from the boys. George O'Brien was a big barrel-chested man and throws a mean looking punch! Now if Columbia will put out the handful of features the boys were in, that would be great!

[Xenorama ™]

that does sound like fun, even with ol' Healy in there. i'll have to see if i can find the movie out here.

[RedKing]

It's definitely worth it. I'm not positive, but I think it's only like 10 bucks or less for both movies! I've seen a handful of the feature films the boys made with Curly-DANCING LADY with Joan Crawford and Clark Gable(they really don't do anything and Larry has the most prominent role of the 3), the Baron one I mentioned, SWING PARADE OF 1946 that they made at Monogram which was very entertaining and one of their Columbia features, which like GOLD RAIDERS with Shemp, is also set out West. I have it on tape someplace because it was on Showtime like 15 years ago when I recorded it! I believe it's called ROCKIN IN THE ROCKIES, not to be confused with ROCKIN THROUGH THE ROCKIES which was one of their shorts. I know they appeared in a few other films for Columbia too and it would be great if they released them. Heck, I'm still waiting for them to do chronilogical box sets of the shorts, but I don't see that coming anytime soon!