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Skippy

  • 1931
  • Passed
  • 1h 25m
IMDb RATING
6.3/10
1.1K
YOUR RATING
Jackie Cooper in Skippy (1931)
ComedyDramaFamily

Skippy, the mischievous son of a wealthy doctor, meets Sooky in poverty-ridden Shantytown, and together they try to save Sooky's pet from a cruel dogcatcher.Skippy, the mischievous son of a wealthy doctor, meets Sooky in poverty-ridden Shantytown, and together they try to save Sooky's pet from a cruel dogcatcher.Skippy, the mischievous son of a wealthy doctor, meets Sooky in poverty-ridden Shantytown, and together they try to save Sooky's pet from a cruel dogcatcher.

  • Director
    • Norman Taurog
  • Writers
    • Sam Mintz
    • Percy Crosby
    • Joseph L. Mankiewicz
  • Stars
    • Jackie Cooper
    • Robert Coogan
    • Mitzi Green
  • See production info at IMDbPro
  • IMDb RATING
    6.3/10
    1.1K
    YOUR RATING
    • Director
      • Norman Taurog
    • Writers
      • Sam Mintz
      • Percy Crosby
      • Joseph L. Mankiewicz
    • Stars
      • Jackie Cooper
      • Robert Coogan
      • Mitzi Green
    • 15User reviews
    • 17Critic reviews
  • See production info at IMDbPro
  • See production info at IMDbPro
    • Won 1 Oscar
      • 4 wins & 3 nominations total

    Photos13

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    Top cast16

    Edit
    Jackie Cooper
    Jackie Cooper
    • Skippy Skinner
    Robert Coogan
    Robert Coogan
    • Sooky
    Mitzi Green
    Mitzi Green
    • Eloise
    Jackie Searl
    Jackie Searl
    • Sidney
    Willard Robertson
    Willard Robertson
    • Doctor Herbert Skinner
    Enid Bennett
    Enid Bennett
    • Mrs. Skinner
    Donald Haines
    • Harley Nubbins
    Helen Jerome Eddy
    Helen Jerome Eddy
    • Mrs. Wayne
    Carl R. Botefuhr
    Carl R. Botefuhr
    • Skippy Skinner (age 3)
    • (scenes deleted)
    Beaudine Anderson
    • Boy
    • (uncredited)
    Jack Rube Clifford
    Jack Rube Clifford
    • Dogcatcher Nubbins
    • (uncredited)
    Dannie Mac Grant
    Dannie Mac Grant
    • Boy
    • (uncredited)
    Douglas Haig
    • Boy
    • (uncredited)
    Payne B. Johnson
    • Boy
    • (uncredited)
    Buddy McDonald
    • Boy
    • (uncredited)
    Guy Oliver
    Guy Oliver
    • Dad Burkey
    • (uncredited)
    • Director
      • Norman Taurog
    • Writers
      • Sam Mintz
      • Percy Crosby
      • Joseph L. Mankiewicz
    • All cast & crew
    • Production, box office & more at IMDbPro

    User reviews15

    6.31.1K
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    Featured reviews

    7Bunuel1976

    SKIPPY (Norman Taurog, 1931) ***

    This constitutes one of the most surprising Oscar wins in history – the Best Direction nod for Taurog (reportedly, the youngest such recipient at the age of 32!) over heavyweights Lewis Milestone for THE FRONT PAGE (1931; who, by then i.e. the 4th ceremony, already had two statuettes to his name!) and Josef von Sternberg for MOROCCO (1930; the first of only two nominations for one of my dozen favourite auteurs!), both clearly superior films. Taurog was perhaps the epitome of the journeyman film- maker in Hollywood's Golden Age – showing a propensity for kiddie fare (such as SKIPPY and its unavailable inferior sequel made the same year, SOOKY, are), notably two BOYS' TOWN pictures (1938, for which he was also nominated, and 1941) and the Venice Film Festival winner(!) THE ADVENTURES OF TOM SAWYER (also 1938), and musical comedies (suffice it to say that he ended his career directing resistible vehicles for the likes of Jerry Lewis and Elvis Presley!).

    Incidentally, SKIPPY was also seminal for having the first child performer to be nominated for acting (nine year-old Jackie Cooper, who happened to be Taurog's own nephew!): needless to say, the role made him a star…yet lasted just a few years at the top (though he formed a durable partnership with Wallace Beery) – not least because the market was subsequently flooded by other talented juveniles (Shirley Temple, Freddie Bartholomew, Mickey Rooney, Deanna Durbin, Judy Garland, etc.). For the record, SKIPPY (which I had previously acquired a low-quality copy of, but did manage to upgrade some time back) was also nominated for Best Picture and Best Adapted Screenplay (co-written by Norman Z. McLeod and Joseph L. Mankiewicz – both better-known as directors, though the latter would only move up the scale 15 years down the line).

    Anyway, the film is a likable effort all round if hardly displaying outstanding merit at this juncture. Though a couple of them are overbearing (especially a girl with a penchant for yodeling!), the kids are practically the whole show here: apart from Cooper, easily the most effective is – the brother of famed child actor and later "Uncle Fester" incarnation Jackie – Robert Coogan (playing Sooky and actually top- billed during the opening credits, but rightfully listed below the protagonist when these are picked up at the coda!). Even cuter are the mongrels involved (which Sooky reasons are thus more "thoroughbred" than any pure breed!), around which the narrative partly revolves. The grown- ups are generally tyrannical (Skippy's health officer father – who intends demolishing the shantytown that is Sooky's home and to where his own boy frequently escapes), subservient (Cooper's mother) or just plain bullies (the local dog-catcher).

    The latter picks up Sooky's unlicensed dog, so he and Skippy scrape for money to pay for one and retrieve the mutt – even going so far as to do the old "puttin'-on-a-show" routine before a hostile audience of friends – but they are still too late to save it! Sooky is understandably crushed, and Skippy – indirectly blaming his dad for authorizing the putting-down of stray animals – withdraws to his room; in reparation, the father buys him a bike, which he immediately trades for a dog to give Sooky…but, upon meeting him, discovers his pal has already filled the void (albeit with a bulldog)! The film offers drama and sentimentality galore, but also a few undeniable comic highlights – particularly the accidental repeated smashing of the dog-catcher's car windshield (the second time round by Skippy's own father!).
    8SnoopyStyle

    really like the kids

    Skippy (Jackie Cooper) is the spunky son of stern Dr. Herbert Skinner who hates the poor and forbids him from returning to the poor side of town. Nevertheless, he goes back to the shantytown with his friend Sidney. He saves new kid Sooky from bully Harley Nubbins.

    I really like the kids. In fact, I like most of the kids and their amateurish acting. This is Our Gang or Peanuts. Jackie Cooper would get an Oscar nomination. I'm not sure if this film deserves Best Director. It's all about the kids and Jackie in particular. The movie is best when it's just the kids. I would like more of Sidney and Eloise. I even like the bully. Robert Coogan does try but he's mostly half step behind his older brother except for the last act. The story takes over at that point and hits the audience with a brutal turn. It takes the movie to another level.
    8bkoganbing

    A good set of values

    Paramount Pictures was one step from receivership until Mae West and Bing Crosby signed with them during the Depression. But this film I'm sure kept the wolf from the door for a little while. Skippy which is based on a popular comic strip of the day was the career role for little Jackie Cooper while he was a child star.

    Cooper was one of the few child stars to have a real career in front of and behind the camera and it was a long one. He also played a wide range of characters. Yet when his name is mentioned today the first thing that comes to mind is the little kid with the knickers and somewhat pouty, but with a good heart and a set of values that he did not get from home completely.

    Skippy is the child of town doctor Willard Robertson and Helen Bennett and he's a good kid at heart. But Robertson who's a fundamentally decent man doesn't want him playing with the kids on the other side of the railroad tracks. That's shantytown and there were plenty of them in America in 1931. Skippy is a film of its time although I'll bet that people who lived in those shantytowns did not part with the nickel needed to see Skippy, it was needed for important things like food.

    Robertson as director of the board of health also wants to clean the place up. But with scant regard for the people who live there. So when Skippy makes friends with a slum kid who lives there played by Jackie Coogan's brother Robert and his mother Helen Jerome Eddy and their dog it turns out to be a turning point in everyone's lives.

    With his decent, but thickheaded father and a mother oblivious to all except what's within the four walls of their home, Skippy grows up with an intuitive sense set of good values. It's what makes Jackie Cooper's character such an appealing one to this day.

    Skippy brought home a Best Director Oscar for Norman Taurog and a few other nominations. Taurog gets it for some superb direction for a flock of kid players who are the ones carrying the film. It musn't have been easy, but the results are great.

    Skippy is a film firmly within the Depression times it was made, but it has a universal family appeal to this day.
    7evanston_dad

    Much More Substantial Movie Than I Expected

    I didn't expect much from "Skippy." How substantial could a Depression-era movie based on a comic strip be? But I found myself really into this film. I watched it with my kids and we all really enjoyed it.

    It's dated for sure, and the precocious antics of the child actors will likely grate on some. But I liked some of the cultural subtleties in this movie that I found parallels for in our current world. Like the hypocrisy found in Skippy's parents, affluent, casually prejudiced people who think poor, underprivileged folk are deserving of medical care (he's a doctor) but not of basic kindness and empathy (when Skippy wants to go to the "other side of the tracks" his mom asks him if he wants to grow up to be like "those" people). Or the tendency of Skippy's parents to underestimate the complexity of a child's world and who dismiss a child's problems because they're deemed less important than those of adults (not to a child, they're not).

    Jackie Cooper is the rare child actor, especially from that time period, who's able to be truly winning instead of aggravating. He received an Oscar nomination for Best Actor for his performance, I believe the youngest actor to ever achieve that feat. The film was also nominated for Outstanding Production and Best Writing (Adaptation), while Norman Taurog won that year's Oscar for Best Director. I've read that he got Jackie Cooper to cry at key moments in the film by threatening to shoot his dog. What a guy.

    Grade: A-
    8xerses13

    Beyond Three (3) Handkerchiefs...

    SKIPPY (1931) has nothing to do with the Childhood of a certain obnoxious and whining 'Sports Commentator' on ESPN, whose arm waving and mugging for the camera is reminiscent of Benito Mussolini. Nor is it directly related to a similarly named (but excellent) peanut butter. It is a heart warming film about Children and their simple but important life forming adventures.

    The film centers around two (2) characters SKIPPY (Jackie Cooper) and his new found friend SOOKY (Robert Coogan). SKIPPY is from the right side of the tracks, SOOKY the wrong, Shanty Town, which SKIPPY finds far more interesting then his native haunts. Excellently directed by Norman Taurog, slighting neither the Child actors nor the Adult supporting cast, there is a fine morality lesson here showing the importance of friendship and loyalty, both in joyful times and in tragedy. It also shows the importance of parental understanding for Children's problems.

    Norman Taurog won the Best Directing Oscar for his sensitive handling of what could have become maudlin. Sad to say this film is seldom seen today nor its sequel SOOKY (1931). The film is appropriate today for Parents to watch with their young Children ages four (4) to eight (8) for it still has lessons of value to teach. After those ages in the 21st Century they will be to bored or cynical to care and that's a shame.

    Note for the Historical challenged, Mussolini (1883>1945) was a minor league Fascist dictator in the first half of the 20th Century. History has not been kind too his legacy. Nor will it be to his imitators, take note IL BAYLESS.

    P.S. Rewatched today on TCM (02/22/2011) to see if our review holds up, IT DOES! So our only conclusion from the negative votes is that these must be from 'kiss-asses' to SKIPPY 'Peanut Butter For Brains' BAYLESS or sycophants of the ESPN (Eastern SeaBoard Propaganda Network)! Neither attributes flattering to those voters! As for the Peanut Butter SKIPPY. It is our favorite, low fat, extra crunchy.

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    Storyline

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    Did you know

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    • Trivia
      To induce crying, Jackie Cooper was fooled into it by director Norman Taurog (his uncle, having married Cooper's mother's sister). Taurog yelled out, "Where's that dog? Just go shoot him!" (the dog was Cooper's own). Somebody got a gun with a blank in it, went behind the truck where the dog had been taken, and fired the gun. It worked, though a little too well. It took Cooper a very long time to stop crying, even after the scene was over and the director tried to kindly tell him they were just fooling; they only did that to get Cooper to cry for the scene. In addition, Cooper said he lost a lot of respect for his uncle that day; he seemingly never forgave him for this cruel stunt. Cooper's autobiography, published in 1982, was titled "Please Don't Shoot My Dog" in reference to the incident.
    • Quotes

      Skippy Skinner: Dog don't bury medals, they bury bones.

    • Connections
      Featured in Cœurs printaniers (1941)

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    FAQ

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    Details

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    • Release date
      • April 25, 1931 (United States)
    • Country of origin
      • United States
    • Language
      • English
    • Also known as
      • Pappas pojke på äventyr
    • Filming locations
      • San Bernardino, California, USA
    • Production company
      • Paramount Pictures
    • See more company credits at IMDbPro

    Tech specs

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    • Runtime
      1 hour 25 minutes
    • Color
      • Black and White

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