Boxing Gloves

This is a fairly entertaining early sound Our Gang short. Both Joe and Chubby are easy to like in this one, as is the underrated and under appreciated Farina. Joe's face of anger as his hair gets messed up is priceless. The actual boxing sequence between the two "heavyweights" does contain a few nice chuckles. The film is more a sound "hybrid" as opposed to a full all-talking short. This is what hurts the film in the end. The audio track shows the ravages of time and there are long segments of complete silence that hampers the overall effect. Still, it's hard to find real fault with this or any of the Our Gang series but when stacked up against other shorts from the series, it's serviceable at best.

Boxing Gloves (1929)

*** (out of 4)

Fat Joe and Chubby agree not to fight over girls and that promise lasts a few seconds until one walks by wanting a soda. Farina sees them fighting and decides to put them in his boxing ring in order to make some money. This is the first of the sound Our Gang shorts that I really liked and this one here benefits from a nice screenplay as well as better technical qualities. It seems the quality of this early sound features finally went over well as there aren't any annoying glitches or performances due to the new technology and this makes for a more pleasant film. The screenplay here also has a narrative for the first time out of the first four shorts and it's a very good one. We get all sorts of nice and funny action with the two fat kids running around having their pants ripped and fighting. The boxing match contains plenty of laughs as the two kids think the other is going to fall down in the second round but the thing just keeps going. Jackie Cooper makes his first appearance here.

This is one of my favorites!Very funny.Joe and Chubby are at odds over the lovely Jean.They won't fight because:Joe can't get mad enough,and Chubby is a scared!Of course fight promoter Farina convinces each one that the other will throw the fight! At that time women weren't allowed at boxing matches,so poor Mary Ann is refused admittance and resorts to a few failed attempts,before finally sneaking in.I read that this was Jackie Cooper's debut with the gang,and it was an auspicious one.His big contribution was to be dragged from ringside by Mary Ann,only to have her take his place dressed in his clothes! Still it's entertaining and the fight scenes are very funny!

Our Gang made a very easy transition from silent to sound in 1929 with some of their best shorts being made in the early sound era. Our Gang made its "all-talking" debut in April 1929 with the three-reel "Small Talk". Note that this is before many of the larger studios went to sound, and yet the children are much more natural in their performances than their adult counterparts. That's because the theory behind Our Gang from the start was for the children to behave as naturally as possible.

The acting by these kids is terrific, but this is what is known as a part talkie, and if you don't know that you'll keep playing with the sound thinking something is wrong. It is not. Here the Gang goes outdoors for a boxing match between two rivals, and outdoors was a place early sound equipment could not easily follow. Thus when there are close ups of just a few kids talking, even outside, you have true synchronized sound. Sound effects are added at certain other points outside to give the illusion of truly synchronized sound. However, for the long shots of the boxing match itself with a crowd of the kids making noise, these scenes are silent film with no crowd sounds even dubbed over.

Realize this and just sit back and enjoy the short and I think you'll like it.

Farina and his partner have started a backyard boxing business, but they can't sell any tickets because they only have babies like Wheezer doing the fighting. So, when they see Joe and Chubby about to have a fight, they take full advantage of this and encourage them to duke it out in their boxing ring. The problem is that Joe and Chubby aren't very tough kids and don't seem to want to fight. And, during the fight they keep avoiding each other--Chubby is afraid and Joe doesn't feel mad enough to fight. Eventually, though, they get the hang of it--thanks to Joe having his hair mussed.

While you won't notice at first that it's one of the Gang's earliest sound films, it becomes apparent during the fight when the sound cuts out for a bit--and it's pretty obvious. It also represents the first appearance in these films by Jackie Cooper--though his part is rather small. As far as the quality of the film goes, it's amazingly limp considering the subject matter. There's barely a laugh and it's certainly not among the better films of this series.