A Masterpiece!

A Major Disappointment

I wanted to like it more than I actually did... But much of the humor totally escaped me and I walked out only mildly impressed.

It's funny, it's tense, it features two great performances from two actors and the director expertly creates a web of odd tension where you actually don't know what is happening for the majority of the run time.

Curly Howard (Curly), Moe Howard (Moe), Larry Fine (Larry), Stanley Blystone (Sergeant MacGillicuddy), Vernon Dent (portly diner), Harry Semels (Captain Burke), John Kascier (soldier), Eddie Laughton, Lew Davis, Bert Young, Heinie Conklin, Lynton Brent.Director: JACK WHITE. Screenplay: Clyde Bruckman. Photography: Benjamin Kline. Film editor: Charles Hochberg. Producer: Jules White. Copyright 27 April 1936 by Columbia Pictures of California. U.S. release: 30 April 1936. 2 reels. 19 minutes.COMMENT: This extremely dark comedy ranks as a most unusual entry from the Stooges. For once, the violence seems real, not play- acting. The sergeant here is not just your typical gruff disciplinarian, he is a really sadistic, cot case; while the Stooges are not well-meaning, likable bunglers, they have been brutalized into becoming uncaring killers. "I hope that shot didn't hit the pool room," Moe casually remarks after accidentally firing off a cannon into the army camp.Also, most untypically, the movie makes a political statement. These three men, like tens of thousands of other veterans, have been literally left to starve by both an uncaring government and hostile fellow citizens. Earlier, our "heroes" clearly identify themselves as Jewish which, although totally accurate, is to say the least, quite extraordinary."Half Shot Shooters" is certainly a product of its time. The movie's implications did not escape the Australian censor who not only removed the ending completely but made at least three or four significant cuts that reduced the running time to less than 16 minutes.

Yes this is The worst Three stooges movie serial that was ever made.It's depressing both for how because they're poor and hungry they do accidentally rejoin the Army after 17 years as another reviewer pointed out and because they as you'll see why they do so as well as because they end up with the same horrible Superior Soldier in charge of them again.Without giving too much away this ends just as sadly as it starts off,stays this way in the middle,and ends this way too.Any time I see the title of the feature when it's on with the other Three Stooges Features on my Local Station of mytv-38(as it's currently addressed and as it's always been whether as TV-38 or UPN- 38 was always the #1 watching Stooge station in all of the Nation.)I just turn off the TV for 20 minutes and do something else.(10/12/2015)Now just to add to this today and since 2 months ago my Mom,Mary and I were watching this and the other 3 Stooges Features on mytv-38.The only funny used over dialogue is when Larry said "You know I've been thinking" Then Moe said to him "Every time you think you weaken the Nation."But I wasn't going to turn it off while she was watching it but this still doesn't change my opinions as to how it's depressing all the way through and is still the worst one.In a Latter Feature it's Shemp who said What Larry said above and then Moe said that same ending quote.Truthfully,Stephen "Steve" G. Baer a.k.a. "Ste" of Framingham,Ma USA

Perhaps one of the more controversial stooge shorts, regardless of who was 3rd stooge. I've seen many take issue with this one--in particular, the character of Sergeant MacGillicuddy played by Stanley Blystone; the argument being that the violence he dishes out on the stooges is too real.I think I can see where those views are coming from--but, I've always looked at MacGillicuddy as being a more extreme version of the already cartoonish stooges. Besides, some of the pain he dishes out on the boys is just plain funny--i.e. the punch that Larry gets after he kisses Blystone on the cheek.And there are just too many funny moments in this short for me not to give it a passing grade--maybe the best of them all being the stooges free-wheeling destruction with the cannon--which leads to another moment that a lot of fans take issue with; the ending with the Sarge blowing the stooges away.Maybe I'm weird, but that scene never fails to crack me up--especially that slo-mo pan to the smoking boots. Overall, "Half-Shot" is one of the best by the stooges during a time period (1936) where they never turned out a bad short.

Half Shot Shooters (1936) ** 1/2 (out of 4) Seventeen years after the end of WW1, the Three stooges find themselves poor and hungry so they accidentally sign up for the Army to cause more trouble. There are a few gags here that work but most of them miss. One of the best gags has Curley pulling his shoe up and another has the three firing off a canon, which hits their Admirel's boat.Now available on Columbia's 2-disc set, which features over 20 shorts, all digitally remastered and looking better than since they were originally released.