One-Horse Farmers

One Horse Farmers (1934)

** 1/2 (out of 4)

Fun Hal Roach short has Thelma Todd and Patsy Kelly playing friends stuck on a crowded subway. Kelly is charmed by a man who talks her into buying a home in the country, which he claims is Heaven on Earth. Soon the friends drive out there but the grass ends and it turns out that the house in on a sand trap. These Todd-Kelly shorts are always hit and miss but this one here turned out to be one of the better ones I've seen from the duo. There's certainly nothing ground breaking going on in this film but there are enough laughs to make it worth sitting through. There are several good scenes but one of the best happens at the end when the house the girl's are living in begins to blow back and forth due to some strong winds and this leads to an even better scene of all the neighbors being forced to come to the house because their own homes have been blown away. This entire sequence contains some nice imagination at work and makes for some good laughs. Another highlight happens on the train when Kelly goes to scratch her leg but ends up nailing into someone else's leg.

The ladies purchase a plot of land in a barren wasteland masquerading as a dream spot called "Paradise Acres" or something Utopian like that. It sounds a little phony to me, too, and sadly it's a one-trick-joke that doesn't quite live up to what it seems to promise.

I think the premise is just as full of holes as the girls' American dream of owning a home ends up being.

Despite its shortcomings, I think it's a wonder anyhow, as claustrophobic as things get, and Meins' direction isn't exactly garden-variety and run-of-the-mill, is it?

Baldie James C. Morton sells them the gold brick and deed to the Brooklyn Bridge, and after they make the move to this hellhole, we never see him again. The chiseler!

The ladies anxiously come with half the zoo in tow, and they can grow whatever they want on their own little slice o' Eden, so as long as they can find any soil nearby. And it doesn't seem as if there's an ounce of soil anywhere for miles.

They get chin-deep in sand, and they try their best at wading through it. We also do some wading here, at times. The soot that keeps pouring in is a hoot, and so are some of the gags, which are at times surefire. Kelly in overalls tickles me pink.

What I DO wanna know is... if the terrain is Californian, what's with the subway? Since when has there been a subway in California? Why would they travel to the entire side of the country just for an acre of land?!

4 ???? Out of 4 ?'s.

Roach's 'The Girl Friends' series plods on with Patsy Kelly taking the place of Zasu Pitts and with second-string director Gus Meins helming the venture. The result is a decent little comedy short with plenty of funny gags, but without, alas, the warmth and chemistry that Miss Pitts was able to bring to her relationship to Miss Todd. Besides the chemistry between Miss Pitts and Miss Todd, their characters were clearly differentiated, Zasu shy and awkward, Thelma brash. Thelma tones it down a bit here, but Patsy Kelly had only one setting.

Yet they are both excellent comedians, they are willing to do all sorts of physical stunts and the gag-writing at Roach was top-notch. The result is a good comedy -- not a great one, alas, but you can't win them all with your second string team.

The film begins with a horribly contrived scene. While in a crowded subway car, Thelma tells her friend Patsy to be careful with the rent money and not to lose it, as it's their rent money. Who would say something like this? What would prompt this comment other than the fact that "One Horse Farmers" is a poorly written comedy? You KNOW that somehow the plot MUST involve them losing their money somehow! And, when Patsy convinces Thelma to invest this money in a farmhouse, you know that the film is exactly as you'd expect. The farm ends up being a total dump--a place that makes the home on "Green Acres" look like a mansion! The place is a giant dust bowl and is obviously worthless. While I never particularly liked the Kelly-Todd films, the sight gags used involving this dusty house were pretty clever...as well as quite complicated and as a result, very impressive to watch! I especially liked the scene where all their neighbors came to their home! Overall, this is not a hilarious film, but a very good one--something I could of sworn was not possible for this usually bland duo.