Three Stooges Collection, The: Volume Six, 1949-1951 (DVD)
APPROX. 390 MINS. - PROD. YEAR: 1949 - MPA RATING: NR
" Though Shemp is no Curly, it's interesting to watch him grow into the role he once played before his brother made it all his.
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"Self-Made Maids." The boys do double duty as themselves and the three "girls" whose portraits they're commissioned to paint. It's one of the stronger episodes from this era.
"Three Hams on Rye." Three struggling actors are asked by a failing Broadway producer to keep an eye out for a critic who can save his career, but they're distracted by three beautiful showgirls.
"Studio Stoops." A studio mogul thinks Moe, Larry and Shemp are publicists, not the exterminators they are, and he hires them to get publicity for a starlet . . . who's summarily kidnapped.
"Slaphappy Sleuths." The Onion Oil Company hires the boys to nab whoever's robbing all their service stations.
"A Snitch in Time." This time the boys are furniture makers whose customer fails to warn them that her house has been taken over by jewel thieves. Talk about a difficult delivery.
1951
"Three Arabian Nuts." Shemp rubs a lamp and a genie grants him three wishes. But real Arabian knights are on their trail, along with a couple of thugs who want the antiquity for themselves.
""Baby Sitters Jitters." To avoid being thrown out on their ears, the boys appease their landlady by agreeing to start a babysitting service in their apartment.
"Don't Throw That Knife." Census-takers Moe, Larry, and Shemp run into a woman with an abusive husband who happens to be a performer . . . and very jealous. So when he comes home and finds the boys there, well . . . as the title suggests. One of the stronger episodes.
"Scrambled Brains." Shemp just got out of the sanitarium but he's still hallucinating, and he falls for a woman who's only beautiful to him. Some funny moments, including a telephone booth gag.
"Merry Mavericks." The Stooges are cowboys again in this reworking of "Phony Express," which has the boys going up against Red Morgan and his gang of bandits.
"The Tooth Will Out." Out West, the Stooges are dentists, and they have to treat the toothache of a murderous outlaw.
"Hula-la-la." When a movie studio buys a South Sea island and sends the boys there to teach the locals how to dance, the "natives" get restless and turn out to be headshrinkers.
"Pest Man Wins." They're exterminators again in this entry, a remake of "Ants in the Pantry" that finds them planting bugs in a house to drum up business in the middle of a high society luncheon.
Video:
Re-mastered and in High Definition, the Three Stooges have never looked so good. Though they're presented in 1.33:1 aspect ratio, they look pretty good stretched to fill out a 16x9 screen. No real noticeable "fun-house" distortion on the edges, as is sometimes the case. Contrast is also very good. I remember a number of these episodes from television, and they had black levels that weren't nearly as strong. It's a nice, solid video presentation.
Audio:
The audio is nothing special, though--just an English (CC) Dolby Digital Mono. But it's worth noting that it doesn't have the Gramophone effect that these shorts seemed to have on cheaper releases. You know, with all sorts of hiss, snap, crackle and pop. These soundtracks are pretty clean. There's some background white noise, but it's very slight.
Extras:
No extras, knuckleheads.
Bottom Line:
Stooge fans are going to buy this one no matter what. Though Shemp is no Curly, it's interesting to watch him grow into the role he once played before his brother made it all his. As with Volume Five, there are some laughs here--just not as many as in some of the previous volumes.
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