Blondie Goes to College

BLONDIE GOES TO COLLEGE (Columbia, 1942), directed by Frank R. Strayer, is a so-so entry to the tenth installment of the highly popular movie series. Instead of opening this segment in typical fashion at the breakfast table with Blondie (Penny Singleton) telling husband Dagwood (Arthur Lake) that he's late for work, thus, having Dag rushing out the door and running into the neighborhood postman (often played by Irving Bacon), the story begins at a football stadium where, after watching a scored touchdown with his wife, son and dog Daisy, Dagwood gets the urge to want to return to school and get a college education. Blondie (who is pregnant with their second child but keeps it a secret from Dagwood for the time being), is against the idea, and after discussing this with Dagwood's boss, Mr. Dithers (Jonathan Hale), he convinces her to let Dagwood take some time off from work and enroll in order to get the college bug out of his system. Taking Dithers's advice, the Bumsteads enroll at Leighton College, and leave their young son, Baby Dumpling (Larry Simms) at a military school. While at Leighton, Blondie and Dagwood pose as a single couple, thus having Blondie chased by the football hero (Larry Parks) and Dagwood getting involved with a pretty co-ed (Janet Blair).

Bright and original idea becomes a bit mediocre at times, but the story does include some funny moments, especially with Dagwood wanting to participate in athletic sports, and failing in almost all of them. One very funny moment that stands in mind for me is when Blondie and Dagwood are in Professor Mixwell's (Cliff Nazarro) classroom where the instructor speaks in nothing but double-talk. Mixwell is "understood" by the other students but confuses Blondie, though Dagwood tries to impress Blondie by pretending to know what Mixwell is saying by "jotting down notes" and looking quite attentive. Otherwise, the rest of the movie is routine with few laughs. The movie closes with the Bumsteads leaving college with Blondie singing "We'll Remember Leighton."

Series regular Danny Mummert returns as Baby Dumpling's next door neighbor friend, Alvin Fuddow, who accompanies him in military school, and of course, the Bumstead dog, Daisy, adding some humor. It's also interesting seeing then unknown actors on the career rise being featured in this film episode, particularly Larry Parks (of the 1946 hit "The Jolson Story") and Janet Blair. Then there's a tall and thin Lloyd Bridges as one of the college students; Adele Mara as Babs; and future TV character actor Sid Melton (the carpenter of TV's GREEN ACRES of the 1960s) appearing as "Mouse." Formerly shown on the American Movie Classics cable channel from 1996 to 2001, broadcast on Turner Classic Movies (TCM premiere: September 9, 2020), BLONDIE GOES TO COLLEGE can be found on either video cassette or the DVD package. Next installment: BLONDIE'S BLESSED EVENT (1942). (**1/2)

This is the tenth in the Blondie movie series. In this one, Dagwood wants to go to college and Blondie decides to go with him though reluctantly. So they send Baby Dumpling to military school. I'll just now say there wasn't much that was funny here though Cliff Nazarro as a doubletalk professor was amusing, as was Dag's attempts at joining some sports teams. Also, having Blondie sarcastically calling her hubby "Daggie" after a coed played by Janet Blair starts calling him that was also good for a laugh. Mr. Dithers seems more sympathetic here though he turns back to his partially mean self soon enough. Among the supporting cast are Larry Parks before his star-making turn as Al Jolson in The Jolson Story and Lloyd Bridges before "Sea Hunt". Not among the supporting cast is Irving Bacon as Mr. Beasley, the mailman. Guess he wanted to take a break from getting constantly knocked over by Dagwood! In summary, if you're a Blondie movie series completest, go ahead and watch Blondie Goes to College. Otherwise, it's skipable. P.S. This is the last one on the Platinum Disc Corporation set I originally bought from Walmart back in 2005 when the "Blondie" comic strip was celebrating 75 years of print. Now that the rest of the series is online, I'll be seeing the rest of them for the first time in the coming weeks and reviewing them afterwards...

Okay, in a strictly logical world, sending B&D to college makes little sense. But this is movie world, where it's contrived situations that count, whether it's good guys winning every gun battle or B&D taking a respite from 40's suburbia. So it's off to college for our comic strip heroes and military school for baby Dumpling and Daisy. Maybe Dagwood will get a promotion for his college effort. And what could be more comically promising than an addled Dagwood among the advanced learning. Now if he can only follow the double-talk origin of the word 'survive', he might even pass etymology class. Then there's the rowing team where he can't stay upright, and football practice where the basic concepts rival etymology. Frankly, I got a lot of laughs out of his good-natured flops.

Then happily we can add eye candy with June Blair as Daggie's aggressive car buddy, plus other coed lollipops from the 40's. Also, mustn't forget coed Blondie who's grabbed by handsome big-man-on-campus, Larry Parks. And if that's not enough, she's quickly conscripted into the top campus sorority. Looks like the Bumstead household may be in trouble, except this is the movies, so thankfully it's back to suburbia once the crop of college laughs are harvested.

No, the entry may not be the series best, but it's hard to beat comedic actors Lake and Singleton. Plus the series concept of a loving family with a wacky husband, a plucky wife, and an unlucky mailman practically guarantees chuckles.

(In passing-I may be wrong, but having Baby Dumpling in military school may well reflect the patriotic urgency of the 1942 production period.)

The setup for this installment of Columbia's Blondie and Dagwood series is REALLY contrived--so much that you wonder who thought this would be a good idea for a film. Inexplicably, Dagwood insists he MUST go to college (despite having a wife, a kid, a job and a home) and so they put Baby Dumpling (who is practically a baby) in military school and the couple go to college--SEPARATELY. They agree to not tell anyone they are married and take up separate housing on campus and even begin dating other people!! None of this makes sense and it sounds more like the plot of a bad porno than a family comedy. All I know is that I really, really like the Blondie & Dagwood films and hated that this one was such a disappointment. The bottom line is that this episode of the series made no sense nor was it particularly funny. All in all, there isn't much to like about this one--and it's amazing, as the previous film, "Blondie in Society" was among the very best. What happened? Did the producer let his cat write this one?!

By the way, the double-talk bit was never funny, though, inexplicably, they used it twice in this film. Lame. And the "I want my mommy" segment was REAAAALLY creepy, as it made the normally lovable Dagwood seem like a child molester!! Yikes.

Keep an eye out for a young Lloyd Bridges who plays one of the students. Fortunately he was able to get past this minor hiccup in his career.

You need to be particularly hard up for gentle, mindless entertainment to find refuge in these Blondie movies. In a certain way, they and their radioshow brethren set the stage for nearly all situation comedies on TeeVee.

I cannot recommend any of them, except for those that have a good joke or two in them.

This one does. Oh, the story: the couple go back to college while baby is in military school. They pretend to be single and each get entangled in affairs. Ho hum.

The joke worth seeing has them in class. Etymology. The professor must be a vaudevillian who does what we see for a living.

He mixes stodgy phrases that we can just barely make out — and some of these are erudite — with incomprehensible blather. In a way, its similar to what Chris Cooper does with W. Bush in "Silver City." But here it is snappy and much funnier.

The pacing of when he comes in and out of the glossolalia is the funny thing. He knows just how to catch us with a portion of a phrase and when to leave us hanging. Its amazing comedy, skilled stuff that I think owes a lot to similar rhythms that Shakespeare uses when he moves from reality to metaphor.

Dagwood and Blondie look at each other in reaction. Its perfect. So much of humor, especially in movies, is of people too dumb to understand the language. Black characters were prime targets in that era for being dumped on. Here, the target is us.

Ted's Evaluation -- 2 of 3: Has some interesting elements.