Topic: Wham Bam Slam (1955)

[metaldams]

http://www.threestooges.net/filmography/episode/163
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0048804/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=45BoIUpFKpM

Watch WHAM BAM SLAM in the link above.



      To you guys writing passionate reviews about this, bless you.  I really don't have much to say.  One of those deals where this passes as perfectly acceptable entertainment on its own merit, it's just that we've seen most of this before.  What little new footage we have doesn't really count as classic, but it's OK.  Larry's pancake recipe is fun, but hasn't this kind of thing been done before?  Shemp and the lobster is short and sweet, but not exactly Curly with the maze of pipes.  It may be old footage, but Larry's "brain food" joke and Moe's ugly sweater never get old.

      At least the new footage is something, unlike a few of these other recycles where it's non stop insert shots juxtaposed amongst old footage.  Again, OK to watch for the majority of the public who doesn't know any better, but for us hardened Stooge dorks, nothing much to see.  A part of me wishes I can just review BLUNDER BOYS and go right to the Besser shorts, but no, let's do this right.

5/10

[Shemp_Diesel]

Yeah, this one is kind of curious--I know for years, it's had the rep of being one of the worst of the Shemp recycles. Of course, I'm not the biggest fan of the original, so having no expectations going in, I would say this is far from being the worst Shemp retread--certainly, nowhere near as bad as the "shit-pile" coming next week.

Anyways, as far as the new stuff goes, I enjoyed Larry putting every condiment known to man on his pancakes--then the "fools are positive" exchange with Moe. And the little jig the boys do when the lobster attacks Shemp is pretty good.

So--as far as recycles go--we've seen worse, much worse...

5 out of 10 pokes...

[Big Chief Apumtagribonitz]

I'm a great fan of Pardon My Clutch, so this one is especially distressing.  Shemp in the lobster scene is a dead man walking.  The finale, "the excitement cured me !"  is a diagnosis that even Claude wouldn't dare try to fob off.  Suck knob on 11 here.

[Paul Pain]

Required reading: PARDON MY CLUTCH discussion

What in tarnation?!  This is 16 minutes and 3 seconds we all wasted off our lives.  The original was already a steaming pile of manure with Matt McHugh, one of the worst actors to ever pollute a Stooge short.  Enter this vile concoction, and all hell reigns.  The new scenes in the middle and end are just lame and filled with things that don't even make the Stooge cut of ridiculousness. 

The opening scenes are nice in their own way, particularly Moe and Larry eating their hotcakes.  Shemp eating the makeup pad is just plain dumb.  No woman is that much of a dumb@$$ as to put a makeup pad on a plate they should know has food considering she just put the plate there!  What a clumsy idiot!  We get the weakest rendition yet of the "coughing up what I ate" routine, although Shemp was fine... the effects were putrid at best, though.  The little business card for Claude was OK, I guess...

This short can...  BURN IN HELL^TM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

2/10

[Dr. Hugo Gansamacher]

I have nothing good to say about this one. Pardon My Clutch has always been one of the Shemp shorts that I find most tiresome (pun not intended), mainly because of the loathsome presence of the boys' officious friend Claude Quacker (Matt McHugh--"one of the worst actors to ever pollute a Stooge short," as our Mr. Pain says). The only part of that short that's any good is the business of changing the tire, with the violent confrontation with the service station owner, and the eventual appearance of Emil Sitka as a lunatic. We get the initial tire-changing business here, but the remaining business is omitted. Before that, we have to suffer through almost all of the business with the repulsive Claude. We get the initial part of the tire-changing bit. Some new business at the breakfast table, centering on the very old business of a foreign object mistaken for pancake (because Mrs. Shemp has the disgusting habit of powdering her face at the table and then drops the puff on a plate with the food).

[Lefty]

I never really cared for the original, so naturally this remake/retread/rehash will not go down in my list of Top-50 Shemp shorts (if I had one).  As Shemp Diesel stated, the "fools are positive" is about the only positive thing going.  The title is what should have been done to the feather-brained imbeciles who concocted this Stupid, Awful, Worthless, Foolish, Terrible show.

There is only ONE word to describe it, and I'm gonna SPELL -- IT -- OUT for ya:  S-A-W-F-T -- SAWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWFT!

[Kopfy2013]

Looks like I am definitely in the minority but taken as a solo project - not as a remake - I like this short a lot.  I thought it was funny.  The story flowed well and made sense.  There was some great one-liners.  The boys work well together - the timing is right on.

To me this is in Shemp's top 10 ... maybe even in top 5.

I give it an 8

[BeatleShemp]

Not a fan of this one. Shemp's lobster footbath was pretty close to funny, but that's about it in this one.

2/10

[Shemp_Diesel]

Complete 180 on this one; this one I like & episode 8 for Shemp is in the "Dunked in the Deep" pile for when you need to burn wood for the fire or use it as Ultra-Strength Nyquil. Not sure what changed my mind, aside from the obvious I liked this one, anyway. Way better than garbage like Rip, Sew and Stitch...  \

 

[Shemp_Diesel]

So, this is case #2 where I find the stock footage remake to be better than the original. Still only about a 6/10, but I find the new footage like the venerable, clap and dance routine to be extremely funny--maybe I'm weird.   

[Daddy Dewdrop]

The original ("Pardon My Clutch") was never a favorite Shemp short (ranking at #133) and I actually rank this one a bit higher (at #127).  The new footage moves this one along a little better.

#127. Wham Bam Slam