Never do business with family, especially Edgar Kennedy's family. Not his real-life family, I'm sure they were good people. I'm talking about that family from Hell he was given in his RKO Average Man series that ran from 1932 until his death in 1948. I've seen a handful of these shorts, and while some are pretty good, others are just plain bad. While the one I'm reviewing here isn't BAD, it certainly isn't very good, and it's laden with moments that are completely removed from reality. Not to mention, it displays one of the WORST examples of utilizing stock footage I've ever seen, but I'll get to that later.
Our film opens with Edgar coming home in an unusually happy mood. This is because he's bought a new car, and he's going to trade in the old one. Brother suggests letting him handle the deal, as he thinks a splash of new paint on the old car could fetch five or six hundred, rather than the "measly" $200 Edgar would be getting for the trade-in. Like the big sap that he is, Edgar agreed to sell Brother the old car for $200 and let him try out his plan. You see, unlike Edgar, we already realize what a freeloading bum his brother in-law is, so naturally he wouldn't have two hundred simoleans on hand to pay Edgar. Now, you've heard of trickle-down economics (and what a terrible idea it was), but in the Kennedy household, they apply what I like to call Merry-Go-Round economics. It works like this: Brother needs money to pay Edgar, so he asks Florence for the money, and she gets it from Edgar's savings. Round and round we go, where we'll stop: when Edgar's broke. So, a somewhat reluctant Florence lends Brother the $200, which the dunce promises she'll get back with a $25 profit. To be fair with Florence for once, she does try to warn Edgar about what Brother had done, but of course, he won't listen. Speaking of listening, he gets woken up bright and early the next day by the three idiots doing amateurish repairs on the old car. But he wasn't the only one having to listen to that racket, as their next-door neighbor received a rude awakening too. Politely, Mr. Franklin went to the window and asked them to shut the hell up. Though, not in those exact words. So they move on to polishing... but, uh oh, that's not polish! That's paint remover! D'oh! Worse yet, the horn gets stuck (doesn't it always?) The stuck horn summons a very annoyed Mr. Franklin out to their driveway to apply a little "manual labor" of his own. He rips out the faulty wiring and ominously tells Brother to replace them before going back to bed.
As if things couldn't get any worse, Florence lets it slip about the $200, so Edgar chases brother around the car and hurls a hammer at him... only it misses and goes sailing through Mr. Franklin's window. Uh oh! So he returns the hammer by throwing it through the car's windshield. I bet Edgar wishes Laurel and Hardy were here, then we could rain some Big Business down on Franklin and his house. Anyway, Edgar decides to paint the car, which he does, all by himself, and then goes into the house to take a bath, while the rest of the family washes the windows. Just as he's filled up the tub, Edgar gets a phone call: his new car is going to be delivered later that day! How about that? Finally some good news. Sadly, it's at this point that the film begins to fall apart and things happen that have no rhyme or reason to them, and they only happen because Edgar HAS to fail, for no other reason than he's Edgar. It starts when he tries to take a bath: the water is so hot, he jumps around shouting in pain. That's not how water temperature works. In the time he went to answer the phone, even very hot water would've cooled down moderately. So unless he filled that tub with molten lava, that shouldn't have happened. But ol' Eddie tramples downstairs with his burned feet. He runs across the house, moaning and groaning. Good lord, this is not funny, this is pathetic. He goes into the kitchen and rubs butter... yes, BUTTER, on his feet to cool them off. But, you see, he does this for reason convenient to the plot. The gag writers here are so lazy, they had to resort to gimmicks like this. Again, this entire sequence is painfully unfunny, and so is what happens next: when Edgar tries to stand up, he goes slipping and sliding like he's on an ice rink. It's not funny, because it's contrived and was telegraphed moments earlier. Snap out of it, Kennedy, you're making a fool of yourself! And, of course, Brother gets the car horn stuck again, and that beckons a now livid Mr. Franklin to come storming outside. He rips some more wires out of the engine, prompting Mother in-law to rip the sleeve right off his robe. In response, Franklin rips off one of the headlights. Ooh, now we're definitely in Big Business territory. Unfortunately, what happens next isn't nearly as funny as that film. Here comes the whole reason why I wanted to talk about this short: so after Mother rips Franklin's robe in two, he gets in front of the car and pushes it down the driveway, and here it is: the WORST example of utilizing stock footage I've EVER seen! Look at that shot of the car going out into the street. First of all, that is NOT the same car! It's not even from the same decade! If you're wondering what this is, it's a shot from Edgar Kennedy's 1945 short film You're Driving Me Crazy. It happened when dummy Edgar borrowed his landlord's car and didn't set the parking brake when going to shut the garage, so it rolled down the driveway and out into the street. But look at it! The freakin' car takes off under its own power! It was a horribly executed effect in that film, and it's even worse here! WHY did they do this?? They couldn't film the car they had going down the driveway?? How? Why? That looks so BAD! Anyway, let's wrap this up: Edgar's new car gets delivered, and boy, she's a beaut! Mr. Lucas informs Edgar that the reason he could deliver it was so he could take his old car for a quick sale. Ha ha ha! Yeah, well, hopefully that sale is to a junk dealer. So in lieu of the $200 trade-in, he'd get a whopping $10 for it. Oh well, at least Edgar has his new car, and he and Florence can take it for a test drive. But, of course, the horn gets stuck, because that cheap gimmick hasn't gotten old yet. They book it before Mr. Franklin can lay a hand on the new ride, and because Edgar apparently doesn't know how to drive, he backs them right into oncoming traffic. The End.
To sum it up: this short is just plain silly. It's a classic gimmick: trying not to disturb a neighbor who is trying to sleep, but despite your best efforts, you constantly prevent his head from hitting that pillow. Like I said, the scene of Butter-Foot Edgar slipping and falling on the kitchen floor was stupid, as was his reaction to stepping in hot water. That was so cheap! I would love to know who's bright idea it was to insert that clip from You Drive Me Crazy. I hope that editor never got work again. But aside from those ridiculous moments, it wasn't that bad. It certainly isn't among Edgar's best shorts, but this one sort of ran out of steam towards the end. It's like they realized they were going to recreate Laurel and Hardy's film Perfect Day, so they tried to find an out. Either way, that film and Big Business were much better than this. I wonder if Edgar ever regretted leaving Hal Roach, because I think he would've been better off staying there and playing L&H heavies than going to RKO and constantly being the victim of a horrible family and virtually every other person he met. But, anyway, take this one for what it is: a mediocre, yet decent film.
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