Pardon My Pups

A FROLICS OF YOUTH Short Subject.

A teenager, embarrassed by his fear of dogs, runs away from home. The abandoned spaniel he finds helps to change his mind.

PARDON MY PUPS is an enjoyable little film, with Shirley Temple stealing all her scenes as the hero's lively kid sister. The opening gag - dealing with bedwetting - is in poor taste, but is quickly forgotten. Highlight: the climactic fisticuffs, which look impressively realistic.

Often overlooked or neglected today, the one and two-reel short subjects were useful to the Studios as important training grounds for new or burgeoning talents, both in front & behind the camera. The dynamics for creating a successful short subject was completely different from that of a feature length film, something akin to writing a topnotch short story rather than a novel. Economical to produce in terms of both budget & schedule and capable of portraying a wide range of material, short subjects were the perfect complement to the Studios' feature films.

In the 1930s studios would use short films like this one sort of as testing grounds for new actors, given their relative ease of production in comparison with full length feature films, so it's interesting that this one should star Shirley Temple, who had long since established herself as The Most Famous Child Star of All Time. Then again, she probably wasn't the one being tested, I would imagine that would have been Frank Coghlan Jr., who played Shirley's brother Sonny in the movie and delivered a comparatively less impressive performance. Then again, a 9-year-old Shirley Temple was probably not an easy act to accompany.

The film opens with an unimpressive sight gag involving a leaky ceiling, which I suppose was designed to have Shirley Temple give a scornful look at the ceiling, illustrate the working class status of the family in the movie, and provide a clean transition into the next scene, which features Shirley gleefully stomping in the rain.

It's Sonny'y birthday, and his father makes occasional and horrendously botched efforts to hide the fact that he wants to give Sonny a dog that he really wants for himself, but Sonny is afraid of dogs because he was bitten by one once and has been creeped out ever since. It's curious that, when his father insists on getting a dog, Sonny decides to run away from home rather than have a dog in the house, and as he is running away with no destination in sight, it's also curious that the movie illustrates what seems to be an indifference to homeless people that surpasses even the astounding indifference that exists today.

Sonny passes a man cooking bacon in an iron skillet at the side of the train tracks (right after a train flew by which, given how close to the tracks he was, you would think would have blown the guy right off the tracks, but no matter). After Sonny gives up on sharing breakfast due to the sour stare that his gleeful smile receives from the guy, he continues on and the homeless guy disappears from the movie. It's interesting to consider what a longer film would have done, because this one leaves this poor guy as a loose end.

Not that that matters, Sonny soon hears a dog whining underneath a trestle as he passes over it, and jumps down to find a dog covered in burrs. It might seem trite that he immediately takes the dog up and adopts it since he just left home because of his fear of dogs, but it seemed to me that he just needed to be reminded not of his power over dogs, but of their lack of power over him. As soon as he saw a dog in need he overcame his fear.

Hey, if that's all it takes, all I have to do is find a helpless spider and I'm set!

It's a very convenient movie in which everything works out exactly as it is supposed to, but it's cute enough and enjoyable enough (and short enough, as it were) to still be a fun movie. We already don't expect an epic plot in a 19-minute film, but Pardon My Pups still packs in a substantial amount of story and character development in its short running time. And it also features a fight scene at the end of the movie that must have made Charlie Chaplin proud. I am hardly an expert of Shirley Temple's films, but it's not hard to see how she became The Most Famous Child Star of All Time.

I won't say that it is going to blow you over, but it is a very nice little short story about a boy who is afraid of dogs, but is challenged to overcome his fear when he is presented with the opportunity to help one who is hurt. There is quite a bit of slap stick comedy toward the end, and it is all in good fun!

{This if one of the movie shorts from the "Shirley Temple Festival"}

This is one of the better features in the series of short family comedies that starred Junior Coghlan and Shirley Temple as brother and sister. It is 'cute' in a generally positive sense, while usually managing to avoid becoming cloying. The story, while contrived at some points, has something of a purpose to it, and the movie also adds in a couple of the less innocent gags that turn up surprisingly often in Temple's short features.

The setup has Coghlan's character Sonny celebrating a birthday, and hoping for a motorcycle, but knowing that his father prefers to give him a dog. With the help of his girlfriend and loyal little sister Mary Lou (Temple), Sonny has to contend with his father's stubbornness and with a pretentious rival. The story that follows is fairly predictable, but it has some good moments.

Most of it is enjoyable, and the plainer stretches do not last very long. Coghlan, who is nominally the star, has a rather bland acting style, but he does have a decent screen presence. Temple's energy and charisma, so unusual for her age, are readily apparent, and she stands out in constant contrast to the less interesting older characters.

I could truly identify with Pardon My Pups since when I was a kid I had a fear of dogs that Junior Coghlan had. Of course I'm not the type that would have wanted a motorcycle.

But that poor frightened animal who was about to have pups gets to you every time. There is no way you can make a bad movie about kids and dogs.

Shirley Temple is in this one as well and it's not her short subject per se. But with her cuteness there was no doubt the young lady was definitely going places. Shortly she would be the biggest shining box office star and in Fox's firmament.

That last sight gag here is a pip. Shirley's still loyal legion of fans will love Pardon My Pups.