Ali Baba Goes to Town

It's always a treat to see another Eddie Cantor film, rarely shown on TV and slow to be transferred to the latest video technology. Eddie dreams he has traveled to Bagdad, where he becomes Ali Baba, becoming involved in palace politics and initiating an Americanization program. He introduces swing music and finally convinces the reluctant sultan to replace his hereditary position with an elected president, with the understanding that the sultan will have no meaningful opposition. Eddie arranges for rally signs displaying various New Deal slogans and also nicknames the sultan(Abdullah) "Honest Abe". But, the people overwhelmingly elect Eddie, even though he isn't running. They dig his swing music played by a Harlem band, his humor and his enthusiasm for reforms benefiting them. The Sultan wins only 2 districts: garbled versions of Maine and Vermont, which were the only 2 states FDR didn't carry in the 1936 elections. Eddie is now in big trouble with the sultan, who is determined to make good on his threat to boil Eddie in oil. Eddie has to get away from here fast, but how? He finds a magic flying carpet, but the magic word to make it fly isn't known. Eddie guesses "inflation", since FDR thinks that should make the economy fly. It works, but without a steering wheel, Eddie is at the mercy of its whims as to where it takes him. His troubles aren't over yet....I'm sure, the screen writers would be shocked if they knew that Iraq would be forcibly subjected to an Americanization campaign only 65 years later.

The musical highlight is the "Swing is Here to Stay" scene: an all African American effort, if we include Eddie in black face as an AA. The supposed band consists of AAs dressed as various native African tribals playing mostly obvious fake ornate or primitive musical instruments while dancing around. Meanwhile, Eddie struts and dances and sings in front, eventually being replaced by Jeni Le Gon, as a wild native dancer, then by the Peters Sisters, primarily a singing trio, with some footwork included. The Peters Sisters pretty well filled up the screen, being on the heavy side, but I enjoyed their act the most. They repeated their performance near the end of the film. It's too bad this seems to be the highlight of their very limited film career, although they continued to perform for several more decades. They may also be seen-heard on DVD in "Hi Di Ho" and heard on the CD "The Jazz Train", although I have not seen or heard these.

In his second "back to the past" dream film (four years after "Roman Scandals"), Eddie Cantor skewered FDR and the New Deal in this satiric look at the Arabian Nights. Cantor and screenwriter Gene Fowler wanted to do a take on "A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court," with the difference that, as much as they poked fun at FDR's policies and oratory, the New Deal policies that Cantor institutes in Baghdad don't backfire quite the same way as the Yankee's did at King Arthur's court.

Hobo Aloysius Babson, a film fan and autograph hound, stumbles onto an Arabian Nights film set and gets made an extra. A miscalculation on his medicine sends him into a dream, however, and he finds himself at the court of the Sultan of Baghdad. Giving his name as "Al Babson," they assume he's the son of Ali Baba, and after surviving an assassination attempt made with his stunt knife, he's made an adviser to the king.

The film is full of Cantor's trademark humor, singing and dancing, and the obligatory rueful reference to Cantor's family full of daughters. A troupe of African musicians--who speak no language but Cab Calloway's--provides a terrific swing number (unhappily, Cantor performs it in blackface), and Cantor and Tony Martin deliver a catchy number, "Vote for Honest Abe," that works as a campaign song for Sultan Abdullah.

The production cost over a million dollars, not a little of which went to create an impressive flying carpet effect. Sadly, two of the crew were killed when the carpet fell on them, and Cantor himself got so knocked about and bruised in the scenes on the carpet that he was elected an honorary member of the Hollywood Stunt Men.

The film ends with Al Babson attending a film premiere in which he sees Eddie Cantor (another common Cantor touch), and a host of stars such as Victor McLaglan and Shirley Temple are also seen there (understandably: the premiere was for "Wee Willie Winkie").

All in all, the film is great fun, with fast-paced and topical dialogue and lots of great sight gags (a "W.P.A. Filling Station" for watering local camels). It's very much of its time, so if you're at all familiar with the New Deal era, it will be an entertaining hour and a half.

Seeing it for the first time on Youtube recently, 'Ali Baba Goes to Town' made for an hour and a half of good fun entertainment and an interesting curiosity. Not a great film, but a pretty good one.

The story is a bit thin and silly, kept afloat by the dialogue, some efficient pacing and the songs but more an excuse to string along musical numbers and comedy. The cast are a mixed bag. Eddie Cantor enjoys himself thoroughly and is enormous fun, while Roland Young is a suitably urbane sultan. On the other hand, Louise Hovick (aka Gypsy Rose Lee) overdoes it and, despite singing gloriously, Tony Martin is very wooden.

However, 'Ali Baba Goes to Town' looks good, with pleasing photography, costume and set design while the special effects still hold up as above decent. The script is funny and cleverly written, while the energy has much exuberance so the film never feels dull.

A big standout here is the songs, which are marvellous. The standouts being "Swing is Here to Sway", "Twilight in Turkey" and "Vote for Honest Abe".

Overall, a fun curiosity if not great. 7/10 Bethany Cox

Bright musical comedy with Eddie Cantor as a hobo who wanders onto a movie set and gets hired as an extra. He falls asleep and dreams he's back in ancient Bagdad.

In ancient Bagdad he's taken as a relative of Ali Baba and gets involved in the palace intrigue where the Sultana (Gypsy Rose Lee as Louise Hovick) and her allies are plotting to overthrow the Sultan (Roland Young). Cantor cracks an endless stream of one-liners about Roosevelt's "New Deal," which of course no one understands. The plot then has Cantor running for president against the Sultan. But it's all a dream.

The two show stoppers are the extended "Swing Is Here to Sway" with Cantor joined by dancer Jeni Le Gon and the fabulous Peters Sisters, and the "Twilight in Turkey" number by Raymond Scott and Quintet and danced by the Pearl Twins. Great stuff.

Co-stars include Tony Martin, June Lang, John Carradine, Virginia Field, Alan Dinehart, Stanley Fields, Warren Hymer, and Lynn Bari as a harem girl. The Peters Sisters, Mattye, Anne, and Virginia, just about steal the show from Cantor, who discovered them at a local nightclub and put them right in his movie.

One of Cantor's best.

Most of this film takes place in a dream. Eddie Cantor (Ali Baba) is a hobo travelling to Hollywood where he wants to hang out with the movie stars and collect their autographs. However, he falls out of the train he is travelling on and ends up on a film set for Ali Baba and the 40 thieves. He is given a part as an extra and waits for his moment. However, he has taken some medication which sends him to sleep.........cue the dream......

The film is fun if you like Eddie Cantor and a few of the cast play dual roles. It pokes fun at legislation that is of its time and this dates it. Also, the songs performed by Cantor aren't particularly memorable and the dancing is nothing memorable either. What does entertain in this film are the novelty numbers and so a mention must go to Jeni le Gon and the Peters Sisters who elevate the film into the worthwhile category.

Gypsy Rose Lee plays a part in this film as the evil Sultana and she is memorable as a baddie. She is mean and must have incorporated dominatrix aspects into her burlesque striptease routines. John Carradine has a very strange outfit in the dream sequence - a sort of inspiration for the New Romantic movement of the early 1980s and a modern-day champion for gender neutrality. He wears a large pearl necklace with matching earrings and what comes across as a clown/joker outfit with angled shoulder pads. He reminded me of Steve Strange in David Bowie's video for "Ashes to Ashes." Carradine's outfit is something that Steve Strange would have worn many years later as he influenced the fashion world and formed his band Visage - "Fade to Grey" is a classic. If you ask me, it's a ridiculous look.