Tillie and Gus (1933)

 Tillie and Gus (1933)

A veteran couple of swindlers get called to collect an inheritance which by the time they get there from Canada and China (where they were supposed to be doing missionary work) turns up to be nonexistent; and instead of victimizing the other couple (with baby and pet duck,) named in the will (as they initially planned,) they find themselves helping them win a steamboat race.

Hardly one of the classic W. C. Fields films this is nevertheless an OK, if somewhat generic effort whose racing element might even have even been borrowed by Ford's Steamboat Round the Bend (1935).

Fields would do much better in his more personal, domestic settings, but here he gets to do a little bit of dexterity work even if no outright juggling (with a coin, a vase, his cane, etc.)

In this story his character escapes being hanged; encounters an ex-wife whose murderous intent doesn’t last very long and who is most helpful conning a group of card sharks; deals with the corrupt lawyer behind it all; mixes paint in a silly scene which doesn’t really make sense since any sane person would know not to do what he does based on rapidly told instructions; guides thru a steamboat inspection; sabotages the rival steamship; etc.

‘Racy’ Pre-Code humor includes a radio where switching stations juxtaposes voices to create humorous and even slightly naughty messages and double-entendre dialogue like "Well, don't forget, Lady Godiva put everything she had on a horse!"

The film fails mostly because it’s comprised of a loosely tied series of sketches changing direction once they are done and culminating in the race. The bits themselves are OK, and the gags are properly set up and delivered, (a bathtub stopper, the identifying plate over a door, a hole in a lifeboat, etc.) but the film never feels like a thematically unified whole and never becomes more than the sum of its parts.

With Alison Skipworth, Baby LeRoy (whose charm is as dependent on the kid’s natural charisma as much as it is on careful editing and ADR,) Julie Bishop, and Clarence Wilson.

The on-demand DVD has no subtitles or extras but looks and sounds just wonderful.