Der Ladenhüter

I saw this movie at a Sunday matinee in 1963. The movie was so funny that the mere memory of that movie was enough to get me laughing. And I got sent to the principal's office as a result. So you can say that Jerry Lewis got me in trouble in school!

Jerry Lewis is an incompetant errand boy who is engaged to the store owner's daughter. But to get him out of the daughter's life, the store owner turns the screws on the engagement by assigning him the worst jobs. The store owner then moves him from one department to another, leaving massive chaos and destruction everywhere he goes.

The results are hilarious enough. But the aftermath of his time in the appliance department, alone, is worth watching the movie alone. It left me laughing so hard that I had stomach cramps!

I saw the movie again many years later and it was second childhood all over again.

Who's Minding the store is Jerry Lewis at his very best! Frank Tashlin directing, and with Tashlin directing Lewis, you know it's going to be a CLASSIC. One moment after another in this 1963 film, Jerry Lewis leads the audience into one madcap nutfilled scene after another, from the scene where Jerry's supposed to be selling gourmet "De-Lights" food, being forced to eat Fried ants in a scent free sauce, to trying to sell shoes to a 300 Lb. Female Wrestler, who's actually been hired to make Jerry want to quit... Well this film is as funny as any film of the 1960's, included are the Pink Panther, Shot in the Dark and It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World....

This is also one film of Jerry's that you really don't have to be a fan of Jerry's to appreciate...with an awesome supporting comedy cast of Agnes Moorehead, John McGiver, Ray Walston Jill St. John, this film in my opinion is Jerry Lewis FINEST, without Dean Martin, and maybe his best of all-time. (But that would take alot of doing.) My advice, If you get the opportunity to see "Who's Minding the Store?" See it, if you don't find it utterly hilarious, it's time to make an appointment with the undertaker.

When I turned 16 or so and began to develop a mature sense of aesthetics, the films of Jerry Lewis became anathema to me. Suddenly I couldn't stand him, and that culturally elitist attitude has persisted to the present day. Yet when asked which of the films I've ever seen are the funniest, I have to mention this one. I don't remember much about it -- I saw it in a drive-in on a misty night in 1963 when I was 12 -- but I still recall the scene in the appliance department of the store, with the vacuum cleaner sucking up everything in sight. I don't think I have laughed that hard since -- it's amazing I survived to see the age of 13!

This is one of my favorite Jerry Lewis movies. The cast of characters are funny and talented. I especially enjoyed watching the very sexy secretary, Shirley Lott played by Francesca Bellini in her tight skirts, silk blouses and her gorgeous legs in high heels. Ms. Bellini's key scene was towards the end of the movie when clumsy Norman Phiffer, played by Jerry Lewis was repairing a vacuum cleaner and increased the suction to its highest power and then turned it on. As she got off the elevator with the vacuum out of control and pointed in her direction her skirt was sucked right off her body revealing her gorgeous legs encased only in dark brown silk stockings held up by a black lacey garter-belt over her pretty black panties. Embarrassed, she screamed and ran off to hide. This was Mr.Lewis's trademark in almost every movie where a woman would get her clothes ripped or torn off her to the delight of every male in the audience.

Jerry Lewis plays Norman Phiffier, a poodle dog walker who is going to marry a rich girl named Barbara Tuttle (Jill St. John) who works as an elevator operator at a department store.Barbara doesn't want Norman to know that she's rich.Barbara's mother Phoebe Tuttle (Agnes Moorehead) doesn't want her daughter to marry such a fool as Norman so she gets Norman a job from the store Barbara works and gets him the worst jobs.Norman has to eat fried ants for example.Frank Tashlin's Who's Minding the Store from 1963 is filled with hilarious situations.Jerry Lewis causes disasters and makes people crack up.It's hard to say the best movie of Jerry Lewis but this must be one of the them.It has everything Jerry Lewis fans need.Watch this movie if you want to get a good laugh a'la Jerry Lewis.