How sad is this?

Fresh and Exciting

This film is so real. It treats its characters with so much care and sensitivity.

One of the most extraordinary films you will see this year. Take that as you want.

Conventional wisdom has it that while The Three Stooges were tops in short subjects, they couldn't carry a feature film. "Rockin' in the Rockies" should not be entered into evidence one way or the other, because the truth is Atlas couldn't have carried this thing. It's an oleo of popular Western music acts, some comedic (occasionally intentionally) and Stooge burlesque routines, all linked together with cornball situations, designed to try and make people forget there was a war going on for an hour or so. Except for one scene in which they pretend to be termite exterminators, the Stooges don't even act as a trio here. Moe (with normal haircut) plays a character named Shorty, and serves as comic relief for the Western scenes, while Larry and Curly act as a team. Oddly, though, the don't act like the Larry and Curly we know from the shorts. Larry takes on Moe's traditional role while Curly is subdued (and clearly ailing), and almost plays it British! One can only assume that the script was not written with them in mind. (Their gag appearance in 1942's "My Sister Eileen" had been a last minute addition, so maybe the same thing happened here.) If only Columbia had allowed the people from their short subject unit to write and maybe even direct ("Rockin'"s director Vernon Keays can't even make his shots match) there might have been some energy to it. As it is, the film is pretty much a long hour and seven minutes of bad acting, so-so music, and unfunny comedy.

While technically this film stars the Three Stooges, you'd barely notice it as instead of comedy, the film is more a limp song and dance film that looks a lot like a country-western version of "The Ed Sullivan Show". This is because it truly looks like adding the trio was more an afterthought--and the emphasis was certainly NOT on comedy. Instead, the film is all about some folks out west who have ambitions to become stars and spend much of the film annoying a poor guy on vacation in the hope that he'd take them to Hollywood. As a result, you hear LOTS of musical numbers--and all during this time you keep wondering when the Stooges are going to get a chance to do their stuff. There supposedly is more plot to the film than this--but there really isn't. None of ever gets funny and the film is simply dreadful--with washed out performances by Stooges who seem to have no idea why they are there in the first place. Amazingly dull.

I saw this film on TCM with a slightly different attitude. I recently viewed a DVD set called "SHOWTIME USA;" this was a compendium of circa 1950 low budget musicals from Lippert Productions. ROCKIES, though a Columbia film, share some of the same musical cast seen in the later Lippert movies (including a subliminal Snub Pollard appearance) and it's the musical element, so snidely dismissed here, that I find the most worthwhile! My God, you have Spade Cooley, the Hoosier Hotshots, the charming Mary Beth Hughes, etc. So even if it's musically not to your taste, it's still a valuable thing to have on film. For Stooge-centrics there's obviously way better Stooge stuff elsewhere, but this film definitely has its own merits.

The Three Stooges in a feature length western comedy-musical? Perhaps "Rockin' in the Rockies" was meant to combine the Stooges comedy short with the western musical, in a matinée; if so, this was a pleasant way to break up a Saturday afternoon. Jay Kirby (as Rusty) is a handsome young hero; and, Mary Beth Hughes (as the blonde June) and Gladys Blake (as the brunette Betty) are pretty women. The Hoosier Hotshots are a harmonious group; their songs are quite tuneful; however, this is the 1940s, not the 1950s, so the film doesn't exactly "rock". There are a few laughs; but the Stooges' brand of humor is more subdued than usual. The talking horse is also underutilized. **** Rockin' in the Rockies (4/17/45) Vernon Keays ~ Moe Howard, Larry Fine, Curly Howard, Mary Beth Hughes