Product: Three Stooges (UK PAL Region 0)
Rating: 4.0
Comedy geniuses at work even though the product is stupidity
When I was a child, I laughed heartily at the antics of The Three Stooges. Their "bong `em on the head" slapstick antics were the right blend of sophisticated stupidity for children in the early sixties. Unfortunately, the advent of political correctness caused people to object to their style, arguing that it would influence children to duplicate it, with the potential to cause injury. Even at a young age, I considered this absurd; we never watched an episode of The Three Stooges and then mimicked their actions. We were smart enough to understand that what they did was not reality and considered the statements of the "do-gooders" to be an insult to our intelligence.When I watched this DVD recently, my attention was more on the movements and sequencing than on their actions. Proving once again, in comedy, even slapstick, timing is everything. If you watch them closely as they go through their routines, you can see the receiver(s) of the hit carefully repositioning their entire body before the "blow." Lengthier routines had to be carefully choreographed, for all three of them were in constant motion, with arms, legs and heads moving rapidly about. Add in the props and how they were to be used and you can appreciate how difficult it was to get the routine right.While the subjects of their routines were simplistic, "The Three Stooges" were comedic geniuses, still under appreciated for their skills in making the stupid funny.