Plenty to Like, Plenty to Dislike

Funny, strange, confrontational and subversive, this is one of the most interesting experiences you'll have at the cinema this year.

There is, somehow, an interesting story here, as well as some good acting. There are also some good scenes

It's easily one of the freshest, sharpest and most enjoyable films of this year.

The Bowery Boys tackle the past life regression fad that was popular in the '50s thanks to the Bridey Murphy book and film. This is the second movie in a row where the series tried something different from the rut it had been in for a long time. I give it credit for trying but, unfortunately, it's too little too late. Without Leo and Bernard Gorcey, the laughs are all on Huntz Hall's shoulders. Hall is someone I found barely tolerable at the height of this series but I find him insufferable in these later entries. This is the forty-fourth Bowery Boys film, which is pretty amazing. But the end is near and that's pretty obvious by the lack of memorable scenes in the last few films. A chuckle here and there but, for the most part, these movies stink.This one has Sach undergoing hypnosis and remembering a past life. From there we get into some nonsense about a pirate treasure. Hall does his usual shtick, for those who enjoy him. Stanley Clements continues to be unimpressive as Slip Mahoney-wannabe, Duke. David Gorcey and Jimmy Murphy blend in with the wallpaper. Queenie Smith makes her final appearance as landlady Mrs. Kelly. She was a likable enough actress but never had the comedic talents of Bernard Gorcey or the chemistry with the rest of the cast that he had. Anyway, this isn't the worst of the post-Leo Bowery Boys movies. It might even be the best. That being said, it's really nothing special. I wouldn't bother with it unless you want to see every Bowery film at least once.

Try as they might, the Bowery Boys just aren't up to speed without their leader Slip Mahoney (Leo Gorcey) on board. You could give Huntz Hall an 'A' for effort for soldiering on, but the gags are thin and the only other recognizable gang member is Gorcey's brother David holding on to the end of the series run with Hall.Considering how the film makers recycled themes regularly in their stories, I thought sure the hypnotist gimmick would have already shown up in a Bowery Boys flick, but having seen almost all of them now I can't seem to locate another entry. Needless to say though, Sach (Hall) will be on the receiving end of hypnotist Simon Noble's (Robert Foulk) attempt to regress Duke Coveleskie (Stanley Clements) to a past life.You know, I had to stop and think about how much Noble was actually going to charge the Bowery Boys' landlady (Queenie Smith) for the regression technique - two hundred dollars! For 1957, that seemed to me to be quite a hefty piece of change when even today you could probably find one of these shysters to do it for less than half the amount. No wonder Noble could feel 'that soft pink light bathing me', he would put all the cool green right in his pocket.Well, with Sach discovering that he was once a royal tax collector back in the Seventeenth Century, it doesn't take long for both the Boys and the bad guys to go on the hunt for a missing treasure that Blackbeard the Pirate stowed away in 1682. You know, I was curious about that mention of Hobson's Cove, having been a New York, Hudson Valley resident all my life and never having heard of it. Turns out if you do a google search, 'Hobson's Cove' actually turns up in an Act of Parliament of the United Kingdom under King Edward VII in 1908. It's right there on page 187 under a heading for the Department of Marines and Fisheries, but you have to be fluent in Roman numerals to find it.So with all the shenanigans by Sach and the rest of the Boys, and the clumsy attempt of the bad guys to abscond with the jewels, I was left to ponder what might have been the real treasure chest of the story. For that I would refer the viewer to Dr. Noble's able assistant Cleo, portrayed by actress Jane Nigh, who did all her best work here in profile.

It's not surprising that the Bridey Murphy phenomenon would turn up on the silver screen, even if it's only a low-budget Bowery Boys production. In 1956, a Pueblo, CO housewife claimed to have been "regressed" under hypnosis to a previous life as an Irish farm girl, complete with Irish brogue, etc. For some reason, it caught on and became a brief national fad with all kinds of similar claims being made. Here, Sach gets regressed to a former life as a 17th century English fop, where he encounters pirate Blackbeard and his treasure. Back in modern time, the boys go after the treasure, ahead of the bad guys, they hope, while busty blonde Jane Nigh provides brassy eye candy.Aside from the predictable hi-jinks, Hall (Sach) gets to show off some real acting skills, getting to play more than just his usual buffoonish character. Rather poignant to think how many of those skills went unused once he settled into playing Sach. (An interview with him would be interesting.) Clements does okay as Gorcey's replacement, but Gorcey really makes a better tough-talking Moe (The Three Stooges) to Sach's ever-befuddled Curley. All in all— the 60-minutes provides something of a departure for both the plot and and actor Hall, but with no more chuckles than usual.

Hold That Hypnotist (1957) ** 1/2 (out of 4) Sach (Huntz Hall) and Duke (Stanley Clements) try to protect Ms. Kelly from a crooked hypnotist so they set out to prove that he's a fake. When the hypnotist puts Sach under it turns out that the nutty fool at one time knew Blackbeard the Pirate and also knows where a hidden treasure is. The forty-fourth film in the Bowery Boys series is the third without Gorcey and I must admit that compared to the previous two horrid entries this one here comes off as a mini-masterpiece. A new writer and director were introduced to the series and they clearly made a much better movie than we've seen in quite a few films and this goes back to when Leo was with the series. I was a little skeptical when the movie first started because we got all sorts of silly slapstick that really didn't prove any major laughs but once the story is set in place I thought the pacing was very good and things really started to pick up. I think this film works for a number of reasons but one is that the screenplay doesn't get burdened down in familiar plots. Yes, it turns out that the hypnotist is a crook who tries to steal the treasure from the boys but thankfully this doesn't take over the entire plot. Instead of the plot being centered around this, the bad guy aspect doesn't turn up until the final ten-minutes and by doing this the screenplay can center on the boys and I think it does a very good job at keeping everything moving. There's a very funny sequence when Sach first goes under and then another one later when the boys are flirting with the doctor's sexy blonde. There's a flashback sequence where we see Sach's previous life with Blackbeard and while I didn't understand the "game" they were playing, the entire thing was funny and rather clever. Another plus this time out is that Hall and Clements have got a nice chemistry flow, which is yet something else that was missing in the previous two movies. I thought the two worked well off one another and they also mixed well with the other cast members. At just 61-minutes the movie really doesn't contain any dry moments and in the end it turned out to be one of the most entertaining entries in the series.