WEEKEND STOOGEFEST

‘Three Dark Horses’ (1952) is the 142nd short comedy made by The Three Stooges for Columbia Pictures. No production dates are available but the film was released on Thursday, October 16th, 1952 (the 290th day on the Gregorian Calendar) just three weeks before the election of Dwight D. Eisenhower to the Presidency.

Given the catastrophic state of our current American politics, I decided to rewatch this one to see if it held up. Sadly, it does. The political mumbo-jumbo in the campaign for the Stooges candidate Hammond Egger is precisely as stupid, overwrought and meaningless as anything heard at the Republican Convention this past week. There’s some excellent Shemp/Moe violence in the snappy opening scene but alas things devolve when we get into the Stooges hotel room, which is where the bulk of the action unfolds. By this time, most Stooge shorts were exclusively shot in bland interior sets, rarely (if ever) moving outdoors except for the use of old stock footage. The claustrophobia induced by the relentlessly dull and small sets makes it difficult for them to get much going. They have to resort to the stale, much used ‘bird crawls into turkey cavity and makes them think the turkey’s alive’ bit, which is always a drag to watch unfold and the climax is as exciting as Trump’s speech. Nonetheless, it’s fun to see that the subject matter was brought up just a few weeks before Ike’s election and you gotta love who they used on the poster for candidate Hammond Egger; it’s Bud Jamison, one of their great regular stock company members, who’d died in 1944, eight years prior to the making of the short. It’s a sweet tribute to their old friend and cohort and a rare warm and fuzzy moment in a Stooge movie.

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