The film was still a fun one that will make you laugh and have you leaving the theater feeling like you just stole something valuable and got away with it.

After playing with our expectations, this turns out to be a very different sort of film.

Close shines in drama with strong language, adult themes.

One of the film's great tricks is that, for a time, you think it will go down a rabbit hole of unrealistic glorification.

While a variety of color processes were developed before this film came out in 1934, they were either experimental and never really used in commercial films or they were primitive two-color processes. The two-color process made for a color-ish film. Since the color strips were orange-red and green-blue, the color tended to be mostly tones of greens and oranges...and many colors in the spectrum simply looked orange or green (or some shades similar to this). However, "Service With a Smile" is a true color film...using the newly developed Three-Color Technicolor...a color process licensed to only a few studios such as Disney (and no other full color cartoons could me made until this contract expired) as well as Warner Brothers/Vitaphone. While the colors are very intense and a tad garish, it does look color and has purples, yellows and other colors not possible with previous processes employed on commercial films. I think much of the garishness is actually NOT the fault of the film but the color choices--and the guy who developed this color process made the studios agree to employ his ex-wife as a color consultant...and she may well be the reason the colors are so intense.As for the film, Leon Errol stars in it as Walter Webb, a guy who owns a service station. It soon burns down and when Errol is asked by his insurance adjuster to describe his old business, he describes it in insanely lavish terms--and you see a HUGE ultra-modern station filled with gorgeous ladies in beautiful uniforms attending to customers. It's ludicrously fancy and deluxe! The overall effect is silly but also mesmerizing due to the color! This is a very important movie historically. While the studio's first Three-Color film, "La Cucharacha" came out first, this short has the distinction of being the second film using this process from Warner. It's also is more entertaining and looks a bit nicer than "La Cucharacha". Well worth seeing...especially for some of the nutty production numbers...especially the eye-popping one near the end with the ladies in bathing suits dancing about the Walter Webb sign!

Service with a Smile (1934) *** (out of 4) Leon Errol plays a gas station owner who gets a call in the middle of the night saying his piece of junk station has blown up. Knowing he's going to get the insurance money, he decides to make his status out to be something much better than it actually was. Errol tells a story about a neon lights station being ran by chorus girls. SERVICE WITH A SMILE comes from Vitaphone, features a familiar comic and best of all is in glorious 3-strip Technicolor. There's no question about it but the Technicolor is the reason to check out this two-reeler. Those familiar with these early color films know that the quality of the color is usually very high as long as the materials are good and thankfully they're terrific here. Just check out the sequence in the bedroom with Errol gets the news. The color on his pajamas just jumps right off the screen as do the beautiful looking blankets on the bed. The colors of the room just leap right out at you and this is especially true once we get to the fantasy sequence with all the red neon and the girls. The music numbers are also fairly good and a lot of credit goes to the set designer for making everything look so good. Errol gets a few funny lines here but mostly he's just introducing the music numbers and the girls but hey, there's nothing wrong with that!

I've always had a problem with Leon Errol as a comedian. Although he had a big reputation from his years with the Ziefeld Follies, the payoff somehow never lasted with him as it did with fellow Ziegfeld comics W.C.Fields, Ed Wynn, Fanny Brice, and Will Rogers. He did have an active performing career up until his death in 1951, but there was no single film performance of his that stands apart. Fields (who appeared with Errol in NEVER GIVE A SUCKER AN EVEN BREAK and another earlier film) had at least four film performances that were worth while. Rogers was in a slew of early films directed by John Ford. Wynn was able to switch, in his old age, to a series of fine dramatic performances such as THE GREAT MAN and THE DIARY OF ANNE FRANK. Brice had less success in film, but she did appear as herself in THE GREAT ZIEGFELD, did a sketch with Hume Cronym and William Frawley in ZIEGFELD FOLLIES, and had stunning success as "Baby Snooks" on radio. Errol did have talents - he had a "rubber leg" dance routine that he used in many films (to the point that it becomes somewhat tiresome after awhile). He also had a long series of shorts, similar to the ones done by Edgar Kennedy. But Kennedy somehow managed to vary the story lines in his shorts, sometimes fighting with his troublesome in-laws, sometimes with his neighbors, sometimes trying to reclaim valuable lost property, and sometimes trying to do some relatively simple chore that is complicated by all kinds of side issues. Errol's shorts constantly stuck to his trying to leave his wife and house to go out on a toot alone or with his friends (a theme occasionally - and I reiterate, "occasionally" - by Laurel and Hardy too). It was like he couldn't think of anything else. Later, when he was co-starred with Lupe Velez in the "Mexican Spitfire" comedies, he added his playing Lord Epping, which disguise makes up the confusions of the plots of those films. One can say that Epping is his star turn, but it is a feeble one for all that.It is with some relief that Errol's appearance in this film is different. As Walter Webb, Errol plays a gas station owner with a sense of humor. He's constantly telling cornball jokes. He leaves his business with his mechanics, and goes home for the day. That night he happens to get a phone call and is told his gas station has burned down. He is desolate, but his wife (Marie Wells) reminds him that they bought a large insurance policy on the business. As a result Errol decides to put in a claim for serious losses that will enable him to build the gas station complex of his dreams.It's quite a place, with dozens of chorus girls as mechanics, and assisting a dating service as well as an attached 19 hole golf course. They serve lunch to waiting customers (one complains at the cost of repairs and lunch - $1.65!). Jalopies are turned into fancy new cars by the staff. There is even a store that sells various gadgets to make car travel better (like a mallet to knock out back-seat driver). The film has a nice rhythm in it's humor and musical numbers, and it's color (this short was an early showing of the three color Technicolor method that was used in the 1930s). By the end of the film, it's all been quite enjoyable. The conclusion is a final, unexpected joke - one that Errol finds hard to laugh at.For being one of the few Leon Errol shorts that was amusing, and for it's production values, I give this short an "8" out of "10".

Someone was foolish enough to give Leon Erroll technicolor and a decent budget, so he spent it. You don't see chorines wearing purple any more, and more's the pity, say I. Erroll milks the gags for all they are worth.