Woman Haters (1934)

Plenty to Like, Plenty to Dislike

if their story seems completely bonkers, almost like a feverish work of fiction, you ain't heard nothing yet.

It’s sentimental, ridiculously long and only occasionally funny

Actress is magnificent and exudes a hypnotic screen presence in this affecting drama.

There's a reason you won't ever see this short on television.At least I've not seen it on TV ever, and only saw it today because I bought The Ultimate Collection.This short would rate 6 or 7 stars if the - very loud - background music was removed.It is difficult to hear the dialog because of the music.That leaves the only other problem, i.e. the dialog being in rhyme. Very distracting from the story.Now, that said, there's not a thing wrong with the acting and the story line is fine though it wouldn't've hurt from a touch more development.

Having just reviewed The Three Stooges' previous shorts they made at M-G-M with Ted Healy, I'm now commenting on their very first short they made at their new studio of Columbia. Moe, Larry, and Curley's (as the latter's name was spelled during this time) first film without Healy was unique in that there's an underscoring throughout and they and the entire cast nearly talk entirely in rhyme during the whole thing. They enter at what becomes a Women Hater's club with Bud Jamison (the first of what would become their stock company at the studio) doing the initiation. Then Larry reveals a week later that he's fallen in love with Marjorie White and that's when all hell breaks loose! I'll stop there and just say that I really enjoyed this unusual short early in their careers especially when Curley does his unique characteristics and those sound effects when they punch and poke each other. And Ms. White is quite good in participating in the slapstick with them. So much so that one wonders how further she would have gone had she not tragically died in an accident soon after filming finished. Also, eventual winner-of-more-than-one-Oscar Walter Brennan appears here as a train conductor so that should provide more than enough interest here. So on that note, Women Haters comes highly recommended.

I’m virtually a beginner when it comes to The Three Stooges: I’d seen a few of their films – and episodes from the animated series – as a kid (this short being one of them, incidentally) but not enough to rank them judiciously in the pantheon of classic comedy.Anyway, this has been advertised as “a musical novelty” – influenced by the work of Ernst Lubitsch, no doubt – with all dialogue written in verse! In essence, it lies somewhere between Laurel & Hardy (with the train setting recalling BERTH MARKS [1929] in particular) and The Marx Bros. – but emerging, in the long run, as less sympathetic than either. The gang joins the titular club but Larry, practically blackmailed into marriage, attempts to keep his status from pals Moe and Curley – but can’t, because his spouse turns out to be a flirt who has her eyes on them as well! Walter Brennan appears briefly as the train conductor.I have to say that the slap-happy antics of the comic trio gets tiresome after a while. To be honest, I wonder how I’ll be able to stick the relentless display of such childish behavior through 19 Stooges shorts I’ve got scheduled (given that I’ve just acquired a copy of the official Columbia 2-Disc collection)...

After the 3 Stooges rid themselves of the highly annoying and abusive Ted Healy,(who was killed in a drunken brawl several years later), they were signed by Harry Cohn of Columbia for a few short films. We know 192 shorts and 23 years later they were rediscovered and revered as cult heros. Their characters were much more evolved in this first entry than any of the MGM films they did, where they yielded the spotlight to Ted Healy most of the time. Once their individual characters really materialized, by 1935, they did some of their best work. The surreal quality of Woman Haters, the lively music score and memorable song: "....for you...my life, my love, my all....." makes this an interesting first entry. A very good print is on the DVD release: "Curly Classics"