Swing Parade of 1946 (1946)

Good start, but then it gets ruined

By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

Although I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.

SWING PARADE OF 1946 is a low rent musical from Monogram Pictures that's notable for featuring the Three Stooges in support. The film is chock full of unknown actors and singing talent, some of which is okay, with the proviso that it is, of course, very dated. The Stooges appear in support as typically bumbling waiters who get involved with the plot involving the usual villains and obstacles in the path of those involved. I didn't find it particularly funny.

the stooges take a small departure from their usual high powered rough house antics and the change will not detract 99% of Stooges fans...I looked that up!good screenplay, smoothly directed...with great musical spots, talking about Louis Jordan and Gail Storm.something about a struggling club run by a rich man's kid...Dad wants the whole enterprise to fail to teach his Son a lesson. but the very cute Gail swings in (she's the recently hired bearer of bad news) and the kid is gaga.the stooges are the enforcers > they will cause as many impediments as possible to block the foreclosure, as they can...with an emphasis on keeping Gail (six years shy of "My Little Margie") in the "spotlight".

"Swing Parade of 1946" is a film that is probably known only to Three Stooges aficionados, and indeed, the boys are given ample time to do their stuff, even though they are not the most prominent stars in the picture and Curly's failing health at the time put a damper on the famous slapstick trio. This rather obscure film focuses on the excitement of nightclub entertainment, with some great big band swing music for accompaniment, even if a majority of the big bands were drying up by 1946. Two of the featured songs are, in fact, well-known jazz standards ("Stormy Weather" and "On the Sunny Side of the Street"), but all the other songs are completely forgettable and cause the film to drag somewhat. In fact, the singing of "A Tender Word Will Mend It All" by bandleader Will Osborne and Marie Finch (Mary Treen) is probably the only bad & embarrassing moment in the film.Highlights: The colorful personality and dazzling presence of saxophonist/singer/dancer Louis Jordan absolutely steals the show, as he & his Tympany Five perform the fantastic jump tunes "Don't Worry About the Mule" and "Caldonia." The best musical moment for the somewhat shy, naive, overreacting Carol Lawrence (Gail Storm) is her fine rendition of "On the Sunny Side of the Street" as she auditions for nightclub owner Danny Warren (Phil Regan) while the Stooges listen approvingly (and in real life, Curly and Larry were especially fans of jazz). The young Windy Cook is very entertaining with his wild impressions of cars, trains, motorboats, airplanes, ginger ale bottles, and saws. While searching for a watch that slipped down a drain, the Stooges flood the basement of the nightclub, with Curly performing a variation of the maze-of-pipes routine that he started in the Columbia Stooge short "A Plumbing We Will Go" (1940). As waiters, the Stooges give a few customers a hard time; Moe insists to one customer that he have roast beef instead of roast turkey, and Curly sits down with an annoyed couple who haven't had their order taken for over thirty minutes. The boys also humorously eject an elderly gentleman (Russell Hicks), whom they think is a process server, from the club, not knowing that he is the father of Danny Warren! "Swing Parade of 1946" is indeed a special treat, with the two best acts being the Three Stooges and Louis Jordan & His Tympany Five. Also, watch for Edward S. Brophy as the well-meaning, yet hot-tempered, headwaiter Moose; Brophy worked with the Stooges (and their mentor Ted Healy) twice before in the 1933 MGM shorts "Beer and Pretzels" and "Hello Pop!"

This is a pretty good movie, it's relatively short and it's got the Stooges, however they're more side characters in this film, but great side characters they were. The plot is also simple, a man opens up a nightclub, but his rich father objects and wants to shut it down so his son will take over the family business. He doesn't want to deliver the paper that will shut down the nightclub himself, so he offers a woman who had just visited the club looking for a job singing (she's just been evicted from her apartment) $50 to deliver it. She gets there and now she is offered a job, so she doesn't even mention the paper. The father sees her name in a newspaper so he heads off to the club himself. The Stooges make an appearance every now and then, and when they do, they steal the show. This movie wouldn't have been all that great without them, but they're in it, so check it out.