Wouldn’t it be better writing if Howard’s “stoogemania” was his subconscious trying to cope with his anxiety about marriage?
That would require more thought being put into the script than "How can we work in as much of this public domain footage as possible?"
@Lassi Kinnunen 81 I'm not saying THIS is in the public domain, the four short films featured throughout were. And since this movie was not made by Columbia, that's all they could use.
@Lassi Kinnunen 81 makes sense to me; never felt like Columbia really gave a damn about the Stooges until they realized what a goldmine they were sitting on.
@@christopherwall2121 that's true. Even when Columbia was making a killing from The Three Stooges shorts The Three Stooges themselves never knew how popular they really were!
My elementary school had a special night organized by the custodians called stoogemania. They played 3 stooges shorts for an hour and a half and showed little bits of obscure stooges trivia. It was lots of fun, I wonder if they still do it.
My school had Illinois Enema Bandit night. Strange that we weren't in Illinois. And Barry O was the original Illinois Enema Bandit.
Oh that sounds pretty nice. My school had a couple of the teachers dress up to do a Blues Brother night/charity concert. It's neat to know that there were other schools out there where the staff had some fun with, and shared their love for, things they were nostalgic for
@@donwayne1357 Obama was your president. It’s time to get over it and move on.
When a movie begins with a voiceover, a flashback *and* a theme song, you know you're in.for a terrible time.
Or something even more awesome than you could have ever believed, depending on just how bad it is
(60's Batman, Monty Python, Flash Gordon)
stand bt me started of like that and it is one of the greats in kid movies and i think sand lot also does that and i might be wrong i haven't seen it in a long time but i have a vague memory of the goonies also doing this so basically if it is not a children movie that is a good watch for adults as well then it might just hugely suck
Now I want a dystopian "Stooge Row" movie written and directed by John Carpenter that is basically "Escape from New York" only Three Stooges themed.
The "music video" style makes a lot more sense when you realize that MTV had just gotten really popular, so people started making feature films that were shot and edited a lot like music videos.
@Gabe Davis That was more like an anthology film than a proper narrative.
@@VicenteTorresAliasVits And Electric Dreams, which was directed by a music video director, no less.
Stoogemania was like watching bad 1970's public access television!
man... there needs to be a movie jail for shit like this. I had the rare honour of seeing Moe and Larry with Joe DiRita (I think) nearly 60 years ago when I was only 6. It was disappointing at the time because I didn't expect to see a trio of REALLY old guys smacking each other! I do recall them telling us not to poke each other in the eyes as they did!
Reminds me of the time my grandparents took us to go see Bill Nye and he didn't do anything kids would find interesting and it was basically an hour long lecture about physics or something. I fell asleep
They were all born within five years on either side of 1900. Their ability to keep acting with that physicality into the 60s is staggering.
I want to make a gritty remake of this movie.
Sounds like it would be one joke for ninety minutes on top of another joke for ninety minutes XD
@@gabe_s_videos But dark and serious, Like Jacob's Ladder.. One man's journey into madness. Stooge Madness!"
@@ComicBookGuy420 Just like how do you make a clown scary? #Joker
@@NickBarbieriandfriends Right, but again, this movie is already one joke, and what you're describing sounds like it's also just one joke. XD
"StoogeMania" sound like a Wrestling themed Three Stooge adventure
*Clears throat and steps up to the mic
"On his way to the Ring, weighing in at 110 pounds soaking wet,
he hails from Brooklyn NY
One third of the legendary Three Stooges
Mo Howaaard"
I never knew that they made a movie about a man who is obsessed with The Three Stooges! The plot would've been better as a sitcom episode than a movie.
I used to see this movie selling for like $10 at Kmart on VHS in the early '90s and I always wondered who would buy it.
This was one of those gawd awful things that youd see pop on cable now and then in the late 80s and think "what the hell was that crap?". Its an homage that would actually make someone hate the source material. This elevates the Farreleys Stooge movie to a masterpiece.
When an original clip is played: "Please don't go back to the real movie"
Seriously. This is the kind of cheap pandering garbage that I remember very distinctly from the '80s. A shame it's got those endearing songs what a waste.
Kinda funny how there really is a Three Stooges arcade game yet they didnt use it for this movie
Probably cause they didnt have the license. Thats why they used the public domain shorts.
The other funny thing is, given how laserdisc games worked, that "Stooges Lair" game was completely plausible. Especially considering that there were a bunch of them made which actually did just repurpose existing movie footage with some QTEs added in.
@@jasonblalock4429 Whomever did it, knew his LD games very well. Indeed plausible and believable, especially the overlayed 8-bit graphics for the on-screen score (Dragon's Lair had a separate VFD scoreboard).
If you we're to start reviewing failed pilots on Forgotten Failures, I recommend Where's Rodney? A Rodney Dangerfield sitcom starring a kid obsessed with Rodney Dangerfield.
I remember my parents didn’t let me rent this 30 years ago, I should go thank them now. Glad I stuck to the official Columbia VHS tapes.
Yeah, my Mom talked me out of renting it, explaining that it wasn't a Stooges collection. Ended up seeing it later when it got a slot filler showing on basic cable. She did the right thing.
A rare instance where parents prevented their kids from watching a film that was NOT inappropriate, but instead so lame and bad it would disappoint their kids. I at least respect what the film was trying to go for. @@mresturk9336
This looks like something that airs at 6am Sunday morning on Comedy Central in 1996
Chuck Workman actually won an Academy Award (for best live action short film) THE SAME YEAR that Stoogemania came out.
That's shocking.
The Oscar Curse strikes again.
Win an Oscar right after or close to when you make something you wish could be chucked into a volcano.
Remarkable how they watch most Shemp shorts but no one at the Stooge Loony Bin wants to be Shemp.
@@funnybone6149 Shemp got to do movies way before the others. He even got to be part of the extended Universal Monsters cycle. Hell yes I'd take Shemp in a heartbeat.
@@ComicBookGuy420 Joe Palma? I dunno, something tells me he didn't enjoy being Shemp.
Interesting how 3/4 of the public domain episodes are Shemp shorts. Shemp was an epic stooge in his own right! I think Malice in the Palace is my fave Shemp shorts because of that super dark skit with Larry, the cat, the dog and a cleaver... and Moe and Shemp being just horrified at what they Think they are hearing from the Kitchen. 🤫
Watching scenes from this felt like a fever dream
That his name is Howard is probably the most tribute this gives Moe, Shemp and Curly.. poor Larry.
I rented this movie back in the day and remember not caring for it but it stuck with me because I'm a stooges fan. Well, fast forward to 2006 when I picked up an Xbox 360 & PS3 and when it was time to create a gamer tag I remembered the title to this movie and thought it sums up my stooge passion and ever since then I'm the original and only Stoogemania for both accounts. If you ever come across me on an online game be sure to say "Nyuk Nyuk Nyuk!"
Oh my God, during the fake TV commercial. I died laughing. The little off camera whoop whoop whoop killed me.
9:43 There's Armin Shimerman aka Quark from DS9 or the Principal from Buffy the Vampire Slayer TV show. The one that got eaten by the giant Snake Mayor not the one Buffy got the hots for later on in the series.
The endless Pop Goes the Weasel looping in the background is maddening.
It wasn't Paramount who made it, it was Atlantic Releasing Corporation. Other works by them included Teen Wolf and Garbage Pail Kids: The Movie. They saw a particularly bad streak of bombs, including this, and would ultimately go out of business in 1989; after a series of acquisitions, the library of their films is now owned by Metro Goldwyn Mayer (hence why Teen Wolf the MTV series was coproduced by MGM Television.)
The forced sentimentality is even worse considering that the Stooges shorts were never really sentimental. That's one of the things that made them so funny.
Exactly! It's just silly fun. They were mostly just making silly cartoons in real life, with the extent of their depth being some political commentary in a few shorts from during the war.
Well, the casting is great though: Shredder, Ms Musso and Quark. Hell yeah!
I spotted Francis from "Pee-wee's Big Adventure" and Uncle Phil from "Fresh Prince." And the grouchy liquor store clerk from "Teen Wolf." And a pre-SNL Victoria Jackson as the nurse in the Stooge rehab.
Wow, I didn’t even realize that was Quark! I’ve never seen him with such long hair before haha
I had those 4 Three Stooges episodes on VHS when I was a kid. I probably watched them once a day. Lol
I’d love to see a video on the Three Stooges biopic that came out in 2000 on I believe AMC.
I remember taping that miniseries! and weirdest of all Mel Gibson produced it. Also it aired on ABC in my area (northern illinois) over two nights.
@@locnar1 I also remember that it was on ABC. And I remember that Mel Gibson produced it because they interviewed him on the news afterwards. I remember Michael Chiklis was Curly. He got his start playing Belushi in a biopic, which I think this channel covered. Man, it's crazy what sticks in tour head from when you were a kid. I always remember if something was on ABC because that channel always came in clearest where I lived. For some reason, despite living in Los Angeles, the low VHF channels, 2and 4, which were CBS and NBC respectively, always had weaker grainier signals but ABC 7 was always crystal clear. It didn't matter which TV I was using or whose house I was at in my neighborhood.
So they tried to do their version of those Looney Tunes package movies and it didn't pan out?
How did those movies pan out in the 80s? I remember hating them on cartoon network.
@@greysky1252 I really enjoyed them as a kid. They did well enough that they made at least three of them, not counting the "Bugs Bunny Superstar" doc from the '70s.
This seems like a real turd. Thanks for taking one for the team.
Looking at Chuck Workman's resume, he works mostly as an editor... so this project seemed like the perfect project (in a way) for him. That is, piecing together something from the clips, and wrapping it around a new story. The results, of course, speak for themselves. Another good video - keep it up!
In another lifetime a concept like this could have been really fun.
Stoogemania is nyuking wild like it has never nyuked before
The idea of shoehorning in Stooges clips into a loose narrative was already done all the way back in 1960 with the film "Stop, Look and Laugh." It's certainly not good, but it's a hell of a lot better than this considering it uses clips from a wide variety of stooges shorts.
Thanks for bringing that up, I just had a sudden flashback to seeing the trailer for that long ago on my aunt's VHS.
People would have probably preferred a documentary about the Stooges with clips to some ludicrous fictional story about a guy obsessed with the Stooges.
But that case they have more than four 3 stooges comedies to work with because Columbia made that film so they could use all the footage they want
I would love to see anything on the movie Penn and Teller Gets Killed
I totally forgot about that movie until a few months ago. I watched it once several years ago, forgot it, then one day while hearing "I Started a Joke" on the radio, I played it when I got home and saw references pointing towards Penn and Teller Get Killed. Most of the memories came back, which were very few, so I rewatched the ending and then remembered "what a weird, but fun movie, wish more people knew about it." I'd love to see Hats Off cover that one.
I've had that Stooge-maniac song in my head since I was a kid. Thank you so much for doing this video!
Long time Stooge fan, know a lot about their backstories. Thankfully, this is one that never crossed my path until now. Thanks for the research, happy it has been forgotten.
I remember this movie, when i was a kid we had it on vhs, used to watch it a lot
HOLY SHIITAKE! I remember this movie, i think i saw it like once when i was a kid, the one part that has always stuck with me over all this time was the clip where they tried to recreate that brideless groom scene with the piano, for YEARS i thought that this was just something i had dreamed up, but now i see that its real, THANK YOU Hats Off Entertainment! You are a legend!!!
There was a muffler shop in Stillwater, OK that had a customer lounge decorated with Three Stooges memorabilia.
My dad was a Stooge fan and had an old ex-rental VHS of this. Definitely remember it from my childhood and was very excited to see you cover this.
Your assessment is right. It's...not good.
I interviewed Mark Holton twice on my podcast, he told me a girl got her face cut with a sharp-edged pie tin during the graduation pie fight, the director was not easy to work with and his most cherished memory from the movie is hanging out with Mousie Garner until his death. When I interviewed Melanie Chartoff last week, she seemed like she was trying to get out of talking about it lol. Finally, Britt Bacon who sang the theme song told me he was trying to sing like David Bowie but it didn't work out that way lol. Great stories! I love my podcast!
Thank you. I was wracking my brain trying to recall the lost Three Stooges movie that I remembered discussing with my father in 1998. We were both Stooge fans, but he disliked knockoffs. I wanted to like it, but it wasn’t anything close, and I knew the 2011-ish remake was the second attempt to put other actors into the characters the stooges created, but I couldn’t find anything about an earlier attempt. This solved the mystery.
Have you seen *Return to the Batcave: The Misadventures of Adam and Burt* ? Now there's a Forgotten Failure, a TV reunion movie/biopic about the 1960's Batman TV series that could only use footage from the 1966 movie.
I bought the VHS of this about ten or twelve years ago. It was 50 cents at a video store that was going out of business and they were unloading everything. I've watched it once since I bought it. That was sufficient for me. I do display it near the bottom of Three Stooges memorabilia shelf though, just as a reminder that a movie can be so bizarre and so banal at the same time. Great review!
Finally, proof this movie exists!!! I've had the VHS for years now and it's such a fever dream
I'm sure Stooges fans will love this alleged comedy wherein their favorite franchise is framed as a cause of debilitating madness that ruins people's lives and gets them locked away in a psyche ward. Hilarious stuff.
I feel like I'm watching an episode of Family Guy with all these unrelated cutaways
I was insanely sick one night, I must have been about 10 years old. I had the TV on to try and distract me and this movie came on at like 2:00 in the morning. I swear that, until this video, I thought it was a fever dream.
I've been really wanting more people to talk about this film. The VHS of the movie has become a collector's item as it has never been released onto later formats nor is it available for streaming.
"Welcome to StoogeMania!!!" - Vince McMahon voice..
Thank you for bringing up this rare gem I never knew about this film
Josh Mostel, son of the great Zero Mostel. He's actually really talented. I first saw him as Herod in JC Superstar, most people know him as the Principal/Revolting Blob in Billy Madison.
I wonder how zero Mostel might’ve reacted if he saw this my god son what have you done insulting your pappy
I'd forgotten that this even existed! I saw this on cable back in the mid-90s when I was a teenager. I'm really liking this series...it reminds me of so many of the bad-ish films I saw on my parents old C-band satellite dish.
I have never heard of this film, I have to watch it right now.
"Thankfully, this movie is long forgotten." Awesome, thanks for reminding us.
There are a lot of actors I'm seeing in this I'm glad got a payday. But yeah, that narrative is a mess.
I saw Armin Shimmerman in this video playing the Larry lookalike. He played Quark on Star Trek Deep Space 9.
It's difficult to watch this video with "Pop goes the weasel" on loop constantly in the background. Why was that decision made?
"Sing of Song of Six Pants" was my first Stooges short.
Holy Geeze, it's Armin Shimmerman as the Larry Look alike (10:03) ! This week Armin Shimmerman has been popping up everywhere. I watched a rerun of The Facts of Life and he was on it and last night I watched the 1987 movie Like Father, Like Son and Shimmerman (and his real life wife Kitty Swink) were playing Sean Astin's parents!
Ever thought about covering the, Stop! Look! And Laugh!, film? It's another movie that uses Three Stooges shorts tied in to some kind of narrative to another story
The box art is by Drew Struzan, king of the movie posters. He also did some Stooges artwork for a bunch of collectible plates from the Franklin Mint.
Another great Forgotten Failure video! Great job!
the mail character sure looks a lot like the Revolting Blob
Paramount didn't produce the film- Atlantic Releasing/Entertainment Group did. Paramount had an interesting distribution deal with Atlantic Releasing where in exchange for the home video rights, they'd kick in some theatrical distribution money for Atlantic's product. The deal lasted from 1985 until May 1988, when Atlantic switched their video distribution to Media Home Entertainment. The last Paramount/Atlantic release was Stormy Monday in April 1988.
I remember watching this movie on TBS during a very famous, at least to me, Three Stooges marathon they had during the mid 90s. I recorded so much of that marathon on VHS. Fun times😄😂
Ahh the stooges, good or bad it is always magnificent
Bonus points for Quark portraying Curly
Thank you for ALWAYS bringing the content I signed up for!! You sir, are a light shining through all this darkness!! Please keep bringing us MORE 🙏 THANK YOU!
I didn't know "Sing a Song of Six Pants" was in the public domain, that's actually my favourite short
There is a better compilation that you ought to talk about. "Stop, Look and Laugh" from 1960, and directed by Jules White for Columbia Pictures.
That one resulted in a lawsuit from Moe, Larry n Curly-Joe since the footage was used without their permission!
I was convinced that this movie was a fever dream I had over twenty years ago. Thank you for proving me wrong.
This masterpiece is now on Paramount+ for us all to enjoy.
I always wondered why those four particular Stooge shorts were always distributed on the cheap by random video labels and when I got around to seeing this in '93 on a local LA station and with the Internet still a few years away I was curious to how and why this movie got made.
Hey! It's the guy who yells, "Hey! It's Enrico Palattzo!" in the Naked Gun! I think he was also the bully in Pee Wee's Big Adventure and the grown up brat from A League of Their Own.
Three Stooges addiction? Someone better call Dr. Howard, Dr. Fine, Dr. Howard, ya knucklehead!
This movie is on Amazon Prime instant video with your regular subscription right now. So out of print or not it’s very accessible.
Josh Mostel is great I could see a different execution of this idea working.
Josh Mostel, son of Zero, played King Herod in Jesus Christ Superstar.
He also played Max Anderson, the school principal with a hidden past as disgraced wrestler "The Revolting Blob" in Billy Madison 😄
@@teddyfurstman1997 That JCS movie is plagued by constant intermittent excerpts from the four public domain books of the Bible: Disorder In The Corinthians, Malachi In The Palace, The Ruthless Job & Sing a Song of Solomon.
Maaaaybe he was trying to oversell the movie and pull a "The Producers" like his dad?
@@kenlieck7756
Shadrach, Meshach, and Abendigo were the best lineup. Their fire skit was hilarious
Wow, I can just imagine how embarrassed the Three Stooges would be if they knew this movie existed. Like if it came out while they were still alive (Moe and Larry, at least), I can just see them being invited to the premiere, then being brought up on stage to receive applause, they would feel VERY awkward. Decades worth of work, blood, sweat, tears and eye-pokes all cultivating in some Stooge fanatic's low-budget wet dream. This makes the 2012 Three Stooges movie look like Citizen Kane.
I kept seeing this in the video store and my parents kept refusing to rent it. Probably for the best. Lol!
I actually have a suggestion for Forgotten Failures. Ringo (1978).
TV movie tie in to Ringo Starr's seventh album. Ringo Starr plays himself and his fictional half-brother. Art Carney and Carrie Fisher have roles, narrated by fellow Beatle George Harrison.
I've never heard of this movie. So I looked it up on Google. Apparently, the plot is loosely based on The Prince And The Pauper.
As of last year, this movie is now on Paramount+ thus bringing it into the spotlight (not by much though. I don't see many Paramount subscribers (myself included) that signed up for the streaming service just for Stooge Mania) since its VHS release
I like the cheesiness of the soundtrack. Sounds like discount Oingo Boingo circa 1983
Thats the guy Adam Sandler used to put in his early films. Billy Maddison, Big Daddy, etc...
@@pengwin_ Blank Check!!! Ha! I totally forgot about that movie till just now!
Young Howard is played by Joshua John Miller who is unforgettable as the weird kid in River’s Edge. And his dad is Jason Miller, who portrayed the priest in The Exorcist.
I remember watching those four stooge episodes on a dvd endlessly as a kid
Lol, the game "Stooges Lair" makes me want an animated Don Bluth film about the Stooges
The idea sounds good at first, but when you realize it's not by the studio that owns the Stooges' IP, and they're trying to get away with just four public domain shorts, it comes off as really bizarre and desperate
I recently rediscovered Morton and Hayes on UA-cam. Seems like it would be right up your alley for a Forgotten Failure.
That soundtrack is Eightiestastic.
Every single song sampled in this video sounds like it wants ever so desperatley to be "Hot Patootie"
This is an absolutely bizarre film. Fascinating, truly.
My dad has been the Stooges fan for years. I remember my mom got this for my dad for his birthday when I was just a kid back in the 80s man we watch the hell out of this movie my brother and I'm more than anyone else LOL haven't thought about this movie in years
That's Armin Shimerman, Quark from Deep Space Nine himself, as the fake Larry. I knew i recognised his face.
I came here expecting Moe to bodyslam Andre the Giant.
I would also have much preferred that.
that would've been amazing, i want someone to draw that
Andre would not have been able to withstand Mo's devastating eye poke
That would have happened in the sequel stoogemania III had it been made
😂