All About Hash

Even by 1940, the buzzards at Metro had raped and pillaged Our Gang into a pathetic pastiche of ho-hum "entertainment" and a forum for finger waving morals.......BARF! Robert Gubatosi (Blake) was at the zenith of his nauseating, whining best when he was in this one......... I won't "HASH" over the plot - pun intended....... Even a clown like Leonard Maltin in his excellent anthology "Little Rascals" book indicates that he'd shed no tears (in so many words) if someone strangled Mickey. What a sickening mess it was........And they'd beat the dead "Our Gang" horse for another four years before Louie B and company had wrung out the last drop of soul that the series had ever had. Even character actor Louis Jean Heydt as Mickey's harried old man couldn't save this piece of crap, and, look for Hugh Herbert as a rather nervous customer that visits Mr. Henry's gas station and almost winds up a crispy critter...

This M-G-M comedy short, All About Hash, is the one hundred ninetieth entry in the "Our Gang" series and the one hundred second talkie. The gang have no idea for what to do on the upcoming radio contest when Mickey arrives late and mentions his parents once again arguing over Monday leftovers, or hash, of the previous night's roast beef. So the gang resolves to eat all the roast beef the following weekend with Mickey's parents going to Alfalfa's parents' house the following night which is also the night of the radio contest. Now they know what they'll do there...If you're familiar with my review of the previous OG short Big Ears-in which Wheezer's parents did nothing but bicker-then you know how I hated that one especially the way that was resolved. Since by this point the entries were reduced in length to one reel-10 minutes-the quarreling is kept to a minimum making it a little more tolerable though seeing Mickey Gubitosi-the future Robert Blake-doing even more whining than usual makes him a little obnoxious here especially when his head is superimposed over the radio his parents are listening to. So on that note, All About Hash is only recommended to those Our Gang completists out there like me. P.S. Not only do Louis Jean Heydt and Peggy Shannon reprise their roles from Dad for a Day but William Newell and Barbara Bedford also do so as Alf's parents which they've portrayed since M-G-M took over production of the series. Oh, and Ms. Shannon would eventually die a year later of acute alcoholism. She was thirty-two. Also, this was Janet Burston's first appearance in the series, singing a brief not-very-good version of "Tippy Tippy Tin".

Mickey "whine what's on the cue cards" Gubitosi is having problems with his parents, the same ones he had in "Dad for a Day." However, the marriage has seriously gone south, because Dad whines and complains about Mother serving hash from Sunday's roast beef. This is such an unbelievably minor irritation, you'd think. However, it's enough to get his parents arguing and for Mickey to cry out lines like "I got a headache down here" while pointing at his heart.

There's one mildly funny bit, handled all wrong, when Darla asks Alfalfa to remind her to remind Spanky to remind Alfalfa about dinner. However, the gang later uses a radio contest to dramatize Mickey's situation, whereupon... oh God... Mickey weeps and whines for a full minute while his ghostly image is superimposed onto a radio. For this kid they got rid of Porky?

And... oh boy, this one introduces the unbelievable Janet Burston to the Our Gang shorts. Here we go.

All About Hash (1940)

** (out of 4)

No, this isn't the long-long sequel to REEFER MADNESS but instead it's a rather bland entry in the Our Gang series at MGM. Mickey shows up at the clubhouse upset that his father and mother are constantly fighting on Monday's because daddy doesn't like hash. The kids decide to put on a radio show so that they can teach the parents not to fight so that Mickey isn't sad. ALL ABOUT HASH is a pretty silly entry in the series not because it's funny or tries to be overly funny but instead it comes across as silly because the film tries way too hard to be cute. The entire film has Robert Blake appearing either crying or sad and this here was meant to make us care more about his situation. I will admit that I thought Blake was quite charming in the role and he manages to milk these scenes but the story still doesn't work. The entire thing is just way too cute for its own good and I do have to question how the kids got on the radio so easily but I guess this would be going too far. There are a few funny jokes from Spanky and Buckwheat is the butt of a racially insensitive joke but I will admit that it made me laugh because of the way Alfalfa delivered it.