Brincando com Fogo

Originally, "Fireman Save My Child" was intended as an Abbott & Costello film. However, Lou Costello was apparently too ill to do the movie and instead Universal rewrote the film to star Buddy Hackett and Hugh O'Brian....as well as Spike Jones and his band.

The story is set around 1910 and is set at a firehouse featuring a VERY odd group of firemen. While their jobs are supposed to be all about putting out fires, they seem to spend most of their time playing goofy music. Into this bizarro firehouse come Smitty and Smokey (O'Brian and Hackett). Smokey wants to be a fireman to test out his latest fire prevention invention but he's so darn dumb and clumsy, the invention seems to have been forgotten for most of the movie. Can Smitty keep Smokey out of trouble and make a real fire fighter out of him?

Compared to other Abbott & Costello films, this one far more slapsticky...with more pratfalls, goofy action scenes and the like. I personally think a few LESS would have helped the story as they were pretty cheap laughs and we often used instead of plot. The same could be said of Spike Jones and his City Slickers. While their songs were weird fun, they also seemed to take the place of plot. As an adult, I sure noticed this. If I'd seen it as a kid...well, I probably would have loved it! As an adult, I really found it tough to enjoy...though occasionally a real laugh snuck into the film.

By the way, if you watch the movie, pay attention in some of the shots. A few were actually filmed with Lou Costello and a few times it actually is him in distant shots instead of Hackett.

Very much a Spike Jones show, although Buddy Hackett was fun to watch, also. The only comparison I can think of (without Spike's music) is Steve Martin's "Roxanne", which was also a comedy about a volunteer Fire Department. Mostly, I very much miss seeing this film on the late-night movie circuit and hope for its return.

I hope someone will make a video of this wonderful old Spike Jones comedy. It was good family fun! I remember when my father watched it he laughed so hard tears were rolling down his cheeks. He said he laughed so hard his stomach hurt! I would love to see it again and hope my daughter can someday see it.

Here's another of those 'lost' films that somehow fell through the cracks and don't even show up on Turner Classic Movies at three in the morning, when they tend to play obscure so-so pictures for a cult audience that either sets the tape machine or sits up all night long, staring at the tube. Wish they would revive it, though, for it this is anything but subtle, it does contain several well mounted slapstick situations of the type that flourished in the early days of film, before sound came in. Originally, the film was to have starred Bud Abott and Lou Costello. When they dropped out, the studio inserted Hugh O'Brian, who shortly would incarnate the ultra-serous marshal Wyatt Earp on TV, and Buddy Hackett, just then emerging as a world-class funnyman. The decisive move was to rethink this as a (the?) vehicle for Spike Jones and His City Slickers, a madman band that offered more comedy than music. And, as earlier said about this film itself, they weren't subtle but they sure were funny. Another forgotten film waiting to be found.

I've spent years looking for a copy of this film(16mm,dvd,vhs), so I could show it to my kids. The movie is funny, and Spike and the members of his band show why they were the best musicians in the business. They had to be that good to play that demented. I like it and recommend it for movie lovers of all ages.

The movie is about a turn of the century firehouse, with a crew of misfits that are firemen and the department band (when not fighting the fires). There's the usual running gags, plus the mayhem of Spike Jones and his Orchestra. Also, comedy relief provided by comedian Buddy Hackett and straight-man Hugh O'Brien.