Os Três Patetas

It's a fact of life: Men think the Three Stooges are hilarious, and most women just don't get them. But women might want to give them a second chance after seeing this touching biography.

The thing that struck me most about the Three Stooges movie was its tone. This was a film made by people who genuinely cared about the Three Stooges, people who wanted to express their appreciation by giving the world a glimpse of the men behind the laughs. The Stooges were comic geniuses, but they were human and fragile, just like the rest of us. Sure it was sappy at times, and sometimes seemed to gloss over or omit certain events, but hey--you can't show thirty years in two hours without missing something. Especially poignant was the relationship between Moe and his "little" brother Curly.

Told mostly in flashbacks, The Three Stooges follows the boys from their Vaudeville days with Ted Healy to their triumphant return to the stage after the first TV showing of their two-reel shorts. The reality was that Columbia pictures was making a mint off the Stooges films, but their contract cut them out of any profit-sharing. Anxious to get back to the stage and enjoy some of the fame they've earned, Moe, Larry, and Joe "Curly Joe" DeRita agree to make the first of many personal appearances at a TV station. The final scene has Moe, Larry, and Curly Joe taking the stage for the first time in years.

I'm not ashamed to admit it: When the curtain went up and the surviving Stooges looked out at the packed house, I cried. Maybe because the Stooges are a part of my history--a good and happy part--the way they're a part of the history of every kid who grew up watching their antics.

It's not perfect, but it's the best there is. At the very least, it's a good Stooges primer and a stepping stone to further Stooge research. The Stooges will never go away, because let's face it: As long as men are men, the Three Stooges will be their comic heroes.

The surprise is, or should have been, anyway, that a film about comedy legends is as morose and depressing as this one. Maybe given the usual pandering level of made for TV biographies, this isn't that surprising. After all, everyone 'knows' that every comedian is a noble, weeping clown. Right? --Or if not, it's just the sort of juicy, clichéd skew the makers of biographies can't resist.

I would classify the entire film biography form as one of the last bastions of detectably (not delectably, unless you're John Waters) unselfconscious, pre-ironic Corn. As such, it is an area riper than most for satire and parody. To much of the modern audience, this will pose obvious problems. So I wondered, as I caught more than enough of this film, who can be the typical viewer for this kind of thing. You don't go to film biographies for the truth, the inside scoop, and you don't go there (and certainly not in the case of this film) for a feel-good wallow. Why DO you go there?

This film highlights two critical problems faced by all makers of film biographies, those for the cheap screen (TV) and those for the too-expensive screen (aka The Big Screen). One is finding an apt impersonator for a high profile person whose mug, body language and delivery are seared into the brain of several generations by high level exposure to their shtick. Those casting these films (like the recent Lucille Ball/Desi Arnaz TV flick) can cleave two distinct ways: Accommodate the literal-minded by casting physical dead ringers (the trade-off being that they may not project the subject very well at all) OR pick someone who is not a physical match, but seems to capture the essence (the obvious problem there is how someone who looks nothing like you captures your essence; not out of the question, but seldom pulled off). The casting here is only serviceable. The way you know this is about the Three Stooges is because of their hair. Period. (One is reminded of the Stooges short wherein Moe, playing Hitler, shouts at the guy who swipes his mustache "You've stolen my personality!")

The other big problem is the telescoping or condensing of what may have happened over days or weeks into one impossibly pregnant instant. These instants (which seem to happen only in film bios and really bad drama TV series and made-for-TV movies) always remind me of the moment in those late 30s musicals when Mickey Rooney rallies the kids with "C'mon kids, let's put on a show!" and on the spot everyone agrees, and everything falls right into place. --Where in real life a muddled period of investigating options and making plans would lead more or less ploddingly to a breakthrough.

These films cheat NOT by cutting to the chase, which is always necessary in film, but in the WAY they cut to it. Highly condensed moments never happen this way in real life. It's just bad writing. I know art is not real life, but really good film manages to convey the feel of the way things happen in life. Sometimes total fiction films do it. That's part of the art of film. (Really good comics manage to do it too, even if you can count on the fingers of one hand the strips or books that have managed to rise to that level.) The trite stuff, the rubbish, always rings false, usually comically so. An example: '1955' the screen says. Two of the Stooges are obviously at a funeral. Larry asides to Moe "Shemp always gave his best; he really put his heart into everything he did." Moe back to Larry, with a sanctimonious smirk: "Yes, but he was always overshadowed by Curly." Fade out. That's the entire funeral scene.

Now hold on there. I realize some condensation has to take place if you are showing entire lives in a couple of hours. That isn't my complaint. It is the unlikeliness and poor positioning of dialog such as this one that undercut the entire form. If Larry and Moe sat and reflected half an hour a day for two weeks after Shemp's funeral, a fly on the wall might digest what they were saying into "Yes, but he was always overshadowed by Curly." But who can believe for an instant that anyone would speak those words over a coffin? And when Moe pretends to two-finger poke a new manager in the eye, he immediately takes a moment out to explain to the manager --but, duh, really to us-- that "That's how we do it, make contact with the brow bone, not the eyes; looks real on film though." Hoo-boy.

Even big films like Pollack have had the same sort of problem. When art phonies corner Pollack between benders and affairs, and simper on about how he is creating "the only meaningful painting these days", you don't believe it for a second. In real life, Pollack would have dismissed these knuckleheads who talk like they write, rolled out the yard goods, uncapped the paint and called up a liquor store that delivers. Not in film bio land, though: When fools talk, mouthing the most absurd dialog ever, everyone listens with a straight face. All film biographies, even the big ones, seem to exist in an abstract never never land that feels like a gloss and collage of newspaper clippings. They are uninspired highlight reels.

The Stooges newsgroups were ablaze with postings that blasted the movie before even seeing it.

Paul Ben-Victor did a very nice job as Moe. He was stronger in the Life sections then in the On Screen sections.

Jon Kassir was very good as Shemp.

Michael Chiklis did the best he could with the toughest job; Curly is by far the most famous and sharply defined character of the bunch. Chiklis's main failing is one he really can't help: during the "Take Off Your Hat" scene, he was attempting to look puzzled and frustrated, but his own particular eye-squint came across as angry and mean.

Evan Handler was an absolutely wonderful Larry. As written, he is the most easy-going stooge, and only slightly hen-pecked by a blonde-bombshell of a wife. (Sidenote: Larry really was the only Stooge to have a babe for a wife, on whom he allegedly cheated frequently. *Larry*?!) Handler and Annalise Phillips, who played Mabel Fine, had a wonderful, complex rapport.

And there was a nice rapport between the Stooges. The movie took the usual liberties with time and space, but for the most part it had a very good feel for the Stooges and what they went through to survive in comedy.

Two bits of major criticism:

1. Sloppy Motivation. Upon hearing of Ted Healey's death, Curly snaps, "Healy's not dead." Larry: "He's not dead?" Curly: (indicating Moe, with whom he's been having a tiff) "He's right here." Nobody, upon hearing the news that someone you knew and worked with just died violently, is going to maintain a snit (even if, according to this movie, Curly never worked with Healy, which he did in real life.)

2. Bad Routines. The movie gives the impression that the Stooges, on their own after breaking with Ted Healy, went the Martin & Lewis nightclub route, winging it with no set routine. The Stooges had a complete, set act, which was meticulously timed and rehearsed. They *had* to, or they would have killed each other.

In all the comments I have read before this one, not one mention of the man responsible for the production was Australian actor, Mel Gibson. Gibson, a life-long fan of the Stooges, was the executive Producer of the Film and put up most of the money for the production.(He even did a Stooges routine in the opening scene of Lethal Weapon). And it was filmed entirely in Australia. It is a shame that no American Studio thought enough of them to make the film.

The film was a wonderful tribute to the Stooges and the portrayals were magnificent. Here it is two years later and the movie is still not available on Video. How fortunate I was to tape the movie (less commercials), so that I have enjoyed it time and again since I first saw it. I do hope ABC will repeat it or Cable will pick it up to screen on the TRUE Channel.

JohnnyReb

Seeing this ABC TV Movie changed the way I looked at the Stooges. I still found them to be very funny (who didn't?) but this showed how they were really ripped off. Paul Ben-Victor, Evan Handler, Michael Chiklis and Jon Kassir do an excellent job of portraying the famous Stooges. This was a drama about the classic funny men. It really was a sad tv movie with not as much humor as you might expect. On the bright side, the film's ending was on a high note for the Stooges.