O Grande Generalzinho

This is a cute film starring Spanky, Alfalfa and Buckwheat from the "Our Gang" comedies. Set in the South during the Civil War, it may seem a little odd to see Buckwheat as Spanky's slave, but this film is as charming as the best of the shorts with the same cast. This was the only Our Gang feature film, and I highly recommend it over The Little Rascals remake from 1994.

The film starts with promise because there is more interaction between Spanky and Buckwheat, but as the film progresses, the two boys have fewer scenes together. This slows the pace considerably. Billie "Buckwheat" Thomas gives a very strong performance in his early scenes. When he is left behind on the riverboat, his fear and abandonment are palpable and his tears are truly heartbreaking. When he goes from man to man asking for help and is repeatedly rejected the viewer really begins to wonder if this is a comedy or not. Watching a children's birthday party through a picket fence is another moving moment. As another reviewer mentioned, I was also worried about the big dog choking on chicken bones! Once Spanky and Buckwheat are in Marshall Valiant's home, Spanky tends to interact mainly with the adults and the chemistry of the children is essentially lost.

The Old South/Huck Finn-type setting really doesn't do much for the plot except allow the children to be out of doors a great deal. Ralph Morgan is the most engaging adult, but then the other roles really don't have much substance to them. Louise Beavers manages some funny moments with a Yankee soldier towards the end.

The villains aren't really villainous enough and the lovers not intense enough. Yet, I do think it's worth viewing if you're an Our Gang enthusiast, if for no other reason that the odd curiosity of the whole piece. I give it seven stars because, while not a great movie, it kept me engaged the whole time and curious as to what would happen next.

General Spanky (1936)

** (out of 4)

By 1936 Hal Roach was attempting to shut down his short productions and making Our Gang, Charley Chase and Patsy Kelly (among others) join the feature ranks. This film attempted to put the kids on the map of features but it's also clear that it was a pet project for the top-billed George "Spanky" McFarland. In the film, a Southern gentleman (Phillips Holmes) takes in Spanky and his "slave" friend Buckwheat. Soon the children are in the fields playing war as the Civil War is breaking out and the kids end up getting mixed up with real Yankee soldiers. GENERAL SPANKY is a rather controversial movie today because of its subject matter and the way it shows slavery to be something blacks needed and wanted. I'm really not sure what the mindset was in 1936 but it's clear Hollywood really hadn't changed their ways and wouldn't for nearly another two decades so that's important to remember when watching this thing. As far as the controversy, I would never blame anyone for being offended at the idea that blacks enjoyed being slaves and we're constantly going around with smiles on their faces. What's even more disturbing in this film is some early stuff where Buckwheat loses his master and cries about it before walking around a boat hoping someone will become his new master. There are countless stereotype jokes aimed at blacks but I think the idea of a black child needing a master is probably what's not going to sit well with many. What didn't sit well with me was the poor screenplay, which really doesn't try to do anything and I do find it easy to see why Roach and his features didn't work well for anyone. I think the biggest problem is the screenplay never seems to be too worried about being funny. I thought it did a good job at showing the South just before the Civil War but the majority of the jokes just fall flat. Check out the long-winded scene where Spanky is being fed fried chicken while Buckwheat is under the table and wanting a few pieces. Spanky sends them down but the dog gets them instead of Buckwheat. This entire sequence has zero laughs because the scene is told so poorly and the timing is off so bad. Another scene that doesn't work is when the kids are playing war not knowing that the real soldiers are coming down on them. The stuff with the gunpowder I'm sure was meant to be funny but it wasn't. It's a shame the screenplay is such a mess because the performances are actually pretty good. McFarland is as cute as ever and fits his role just fine as does Billie "Buckwheat" Thomas and Carl "Alfalfa" Switzer. GENERAL SPANKY, rightfully or wrongly, will probably always be looked down upon for its subject matter but even if you can get past that you're left with a pretty bland comedy that feels overlong even at just 71-minutes.

This Hal Roach feature, General Spanky, is the one hundred fiftieth entry in the "Our Gang/Little Rasclas" series and the sixty-second talkie. It's also, as I implied in the first sentence, the only one more than two or three reels in length. It begins on a steam boat when Buckwheat is one of the slaves on board and Spanky is a shoeshine boy on it. They both end up falling in the river and-with help from a life preserver-end up on land near a Southern plantation. As Civil War gets declared, Spanky, Buckwheat, and Alfalfa form their own Army and mistakenly is mixed with a real adult one...There's more but I'll just now mention that Spanky and Buckwheat make a good team at the beginning on the boat and the plantation before Alfalfa arrives then it's mostly Spank and him on screen. Since it's Black History Month, I have to mention that many adult African-American cast members are slaves though two more, Louise Beavers and Willie Best-who during the early part of the '30s was often credited as "Sleep 'n' Eat"-play the plantation servants. There's a pretty funny scene with them involving a paint brush. The attitudes-in the movie-of the South concerning slavery is true to the period and it's that fact that makes this film a little easy to take though when Spanky forms his own military outfit, it's nice to know he allows Buckwheat to be a part of it! Also appearing is Rosina Lawrence, usually cast as the Gang's teacher, as the leading lady of the leading man, who in this case is Phillips Holmes. To tell the truth, having the Gang involved in a real-life historical setting especially one which divided the country as The War Between the States (the South's name for it) did not suit their kiddie comedy-style. When producer Hal Roach originally contracted his distributor M-G-M for an "Our Gang" feature in 1935, he wrote one for something called Crook's Incorporated which would have co-starred Charley Chase, Thelma Todd, and Patsy Kelly and sounded like a more suitable feature for those kids. Unfortunately, Ms. Todd faced a tragic end and Chase and Ms. Kelly moved to other studios...

The Our Gang series of shorts took place in more urban settings, and there were few overtly racist moments in those shorts - all the kids were playing together, in the same spaces, going in and out of the same doors, in and out of each other's homes, and no reference made to segregation or Jim Crow, etc. There was stereotyping, for sure - the black American kids, the Italian kids, the Asian kids, the fat kids, etc. But the lack of those overt racist moments is probably why these shorts have translated well enough for modern viewing.

But this full-length feature throws all that out the window: here is a story set in the South and presenting enslaved black Americans as happy, sweet simpletons, treated wonderfully by their owners. It's not "Birth of a Nation" bad - more "Song of the South" bad. There's even a conversation 10 minutes into the movie between two slave owners, bragging at how well fed and cared for their slaves are. Buckwheat, here an enslaved child, overhears the violence these owners say they would do on a re-captured runaway slave, and as he is run-away, he is terrified. It's supposed to be a funny moment - but to any halfway caring human being, knowing what really did happen to re-captured run- away slaves, the incredible violence and humiliation that was all too real, it's painful now to watch this scene, to watch this reality made light of. It would be like watching an old movie making fun of the Holocaust. Lots of other cringe-worthy moments as well, like Spanky proudly proving he's a "Southern Gentleman" to Alfalfa by showing off "his" slave, smiling happy Buckwheat.

So, why did I give it a 7? Because it is a PERFECT example of how, 70 years after the Civil War - and beyond - the myths of the happy slave, the genteel white slave owner, the "noble" and brave fighters for the Southern "cause" and the boorish, cowardly Northerners was/is perpetuated in the USA, this time with the overwhelming cuteness and charm of Spanky and Buckwheat, probably the two most popular members of the Little Rascals (they were always my favorites).