What, No Men?

What, No Men? (1935)

** (out of 4)

Technicolor short from Warner has two men (El Brendel, Phil Regan) kidnapped by a group of scientist and taken to an island where there's only women. Once on the island El Brendel goes around telling non-funny jokes while Regan sings a few numbers. WHAT, NO MEN? isn't nearly as clever or as entertaining as one would hope and in fact it really drags in spots and in the end there's not really a reason to watch it. I believe this was the second film that I had seen with El Brendel so I'm not sure if he acted the same all the time but his slow-witted characteristics are pretty hard to take, although they are easy not to laugh at. I really didn't find any of his humor to work here but to be fair the screenplay really didn't come up with any good jokes. Regan has a nice voice and he does a good job with the songs but none of them are very memorable. In fact, there's really not too much that stands out with this film except for the rather insulting way the women are made to "act" like Indians and of course there are several negative stereotypes that come from this. Fans of early Technicolor might want to check it out for this but others should just stay away.

First, fair warning of bias: I don't consider El Brendel to be a funny comedian. His naive Scowhegian dullard simply annoys me. Nonetheless, he was a popular comic actor from the late 1920s (when he had a major role in WINGS) through his death in the mid-1960s.

Because of that, I attribute the Oscar nomination of this short subject to its excellent, if subdued 3-strip Technicolor, its fulsome musical score and its sheer bizarreness, including a passel of mad scientists who rocket El and local cop Phil Regan to a tribe of scantily dressed Indian maidens, from whom they are rescued by a town of rather Amazonian settlers. There's also a major Busby-Berkley style dance number. The sheer spectacle of this production number undoubtedly helped.

Still, for my taste, the whole thing looks like an overproduced mess.

"What, No Men?" is an incredibly frustrating film to watch. After all, it starts off wonderfully and then just loses its way...especially each time when the singing starts!

The story begins with a room of brilliant scientists. A bill collector (El Brendel) arrives...and it's an opportune time to test out their rocket ship. Inexplicably, they also toss a policeman (Phil Regan) inside as well. Soon the pair blast off and arrive (with wires if you look carefully) in the old west in this Flash Gordon inspired ship. There, they find a lot of very frisky American Indian ladies who want them in the worst possible way. The Medicine Woman, in particular, is infatuated with the pipsqueak bill collector. They hightail it out of there and arrive in town...a place also almost entirely made up of hot and semi-hot women who are aching for the guys...even the pipsqueak.

The film starts off with a great premise. The problem with this lovely to look at color short film is that whenever the plot starts getting funny, the folks would break into song...and the momentum would be totally lost. Plus, what followed the rocket blast off never really took advantage of the great situation....and it really lost its way later in the picture. This made it a very frustrating film to watch, as I really wanted to love it but couldn't.

If you see the film, pay close attention to the medicine woman. Although she's not listed in the credits, it sure sounded like Marjorie Main.