Ma and Pa Kettle (1949)


Ma and Pa Kettle (1949), aka The Further Adventures of Ma and Pa Kettle
The first of the Ma and Pa Kettle movies with them in the title finds Pa Kettle winning a prefabricated, near science-fictional home-of-tomorrow in a slogan writing contest.
All Pa (Percy Kilbride) wanted was a new tobacco pouch, and he's not happy in their new digs; but Ma (Marjorie Main) insists that their new living conditions are good for the children, (there is a subplot about the invention of a chicken hatchery which mirrors and supports this idea.)
Tom (Richard Long), their oldest son, finds romance with the writer of an article (Meg Randall) reporting the results of the contest.
Most of the utra-light comedy is based on the set-in-their ways Kettle family having to deal with ultra-modern technology intended to make life more convenient but actually doing the opposite. The Flintstones often dabbled in the premise, but Tex Avery did it best.
Funnier are the antics of the Kettle's arch-nemesis (Esther Dale) and her mother.
Pa is accused of stealing the slogan, thereby disqualifying him, but all ends well.
At the time there must have been a large number of people who still remembered a simple, rural, pre-WWII life and identified fully with the Kettles turning the series into a long-running hit.

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