Fast Company

This review is for people who grew up with the Little Rascals (Our Gang). I grew up watching the talkies only, though I knew there were silent films which featured Farine, Joe, Mickey and Mary when they were kids (in the talkies, you saw them a few times grown up). This short is all sight gags in the best tradition of the time: The gang goes into a hotel for the well to do to "save" Mickey and mayhem ensues. There is little need for titles, though they are here. Its just great to watch these fairly gifted young actors make you laugh.While I love some of the talkies, this little film captures the essence of the concept, that it is a group of friends who are looking to help another friend. Also, it is not race specific, everyone is the same in this film, black and white. These days, it almost appears as if they have characters of various ethnicities in TV and film so as to be "politically correct". This film was way before that wave (by decades!)and none of the acting is forced. Bravo, Hal Roach, who was way ahead of his time. TCM just ran 24 hours of Our Gang, so if they show it again, Little Rascals fans of all ages should watch this. It was fun, funny and a true delight!

Fast Company is the sixteenth short in the "Our Gang/Little Rascals" series created by Hal Roach. Many of the boys here want to go swimming but Mickey has to make a delivery. On the way, he encounters a rich boy waiting at a station for his mom and as they get to talking they trade places since Mickey has never seen the inside of a hotel and the rich kid just wants to play. When the rich kid returns to the gang with the goat-pulling wagon, however, they resolve to go where Mickey is which is where the fun really begins...Plenty of very funny gags abound like Joe's heavyset parents arguing with the mother using a rolling pin to hit her husband that-when the target's head gets it-causes the appliance to jump up and down, Farina tries to drink some water from a hose that keeps squirting and unsquirting because of the other kid turning it off and on and when "she" finally gives up says to Ernie (via inter-title) "'At ol' water kaint make up its mind!", a hotel monkey using firecrackers to surprise many of the adult patrons, and the gang trying a pipe that later gives them a really unwelcome feeling. Long considered lost, I found Fast Company on YouTube with, I guess, the best prints that were available and with the wonderful LeRoy Shield score from the "Little Rascals" talkies added for sheer pleasure. Regular director Robert McGowan had suffered an injury when a camera platform collapsed just before this short began filming so Charley Chase (under his real name Charles Parrott) was hired in his stead though he couldn't finish it since he also had meetings with executives at Pathe, Roach's distributor at the time. So a year later, McGowan completed it and, with the help of Mrs. Roach, secured cameos for her children with Hal, Hal Jr., 6, and Margaret, 4. When Mr. Roach saw them in the screening room, he was pleasantly surprised. So on that note, I highly recommend Fast Company.

Fast Company (1924)

** 1/2 (out of 4)

Better than average Our Gang short has Mickey trading places with a rich kid who never gets to do anything "fun" due to his boring parents. Mickey gives the rich kid his goat cart and when the gang sees this other kid driving it they want to know what's going on. The gang goes to a rich hotel to look for Mickey and chaos follows. I've found many of these Hal Roach-Our Gang shorts to be lacking in terms of laughs but this one here actually managed to have a few good moments in its 14-minute running time. I think the highlight of the film has to be this goat cart, which is exactly what it sounds like. Another good moment happens once the chaos breaks loose in the hotel with one scene where a kid hides in a shower and surprises a woman getting ready to get in. The film runs about six-minutes shorter than the majority of the films in this series but I must admit that I think the shorter time actually helps everything. It makes the film seem a lot more complete and it doesn't seem as if added non-jokes are here just to expand the running time.

According to IMDB, "Fast Company" was a film where part of it was made....the film was then shelved...and then it was resurrected and finished about a year later. Well, after seeing it, I can see that this was the case as the film is rather disjoint.

Mickey is out delivering eggs for his father using his goat-drawn cart. He meets a rich kid near the train station and the rich kid is bored and wants to play and be a normal kid. Mickey likes the idea of switching places, as it means staying at a hotel until the rich kid's parents show. Soon, the rest of the Gang arrives at the hotel and all sorts of chaos ensues...including the goat and a monkey running amok through the lobby.

The film switches, oddly, from the hotel to a restaurant within the hotel and the kids are suddenly dressed up as some sorts of savages. There's no transition and why they are dressed this way is never explained....and this seems pretty clearly to have been filmed at a later time.

The movie has its moments but it also seemed a bit more disjoint and confusing. It also features the gang as they were in their early silents...more destructive and jerk-like than the 'nice' Our Gang films of the sound era. Overall, worth seeing but a relatively weak short for this comedy group.

By the way, the funniest bit in the film was also the most inappropriate....more inappropriate than the kids smoking. The beginning features Joe Cobb's parents beating each other up and although I know it's not funny, they did it in a way that did, I am ashamed to say, make me chuckle.

This delightful short has all the elements that made the OUR GANG/LITTLE RASCALS so wonderful. It starts with a title card explaining that Joe Cobb's Mom and Dad are now in there 100th round of marriage… we cut to a shot of the wife pounding the husband with a rolling pin and as can only be pulled of in silents the sight-gag is a surprise and hilarious. As the story continues, we meet more delightful, cute kiddie characters just trying to be kids when opportunity for adventure comes along. The gang decides one morning to go on a swimming trip but they run across a stranger driving Mickey's goat cart and stop to get the whole story. It seems Mickey met a spoiled rich kid who never gets to play so they trade places ala THE PRINCE AND THE PAUPER. The gang decides to go and visit Mickey now living it up at a ritzy downtown hotel. In the lobby we find a lady with a pet monkey, a fireworks salesman and the OUR GANG kids complete with goat cart! A very funny film that I hope to see again!