W.C. Fields: 6 Short Films - Criterion Collection

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Ten years elapsed between W.C. Fields's debut in the 1915 short "The Pool Sharks" and his role in D.W. Griffith's Sally of the Sawdust, but it didn't take long for Fields to become one of the all-time great screen comedians. This essential collection--the silent "The Pool Sharks" plus the five "two-reeler" sound shorts that established Fields's acerbic style--provides a comprehensive document of the comedian's work in progress. "The Pool Sharks" develops a routine that Fields created in vaudeville and later perfected on film, with stop-motion animation used here to realize the comedian's wacky luck at billiards. It's a clever appetizer, but Fields was a verbal comic, so the two-reelers are the full-course meal.

Like the Marx brothers' The Cocoanuts a year earlier, 1930's "The Golf Specialist" mines humor from high jinks in sunny Florida, where Fields is nearly upstaged by a stone-faced golf caddy. The classic "The Dentist," despite the later addition of strident musical cues, is presented in its entirety, including an oft-censored bit in which Fields tugs a molar from a woman who's wrapped around him in a highly suggestive position. "The Pharmacist" and "The Barbershop" are variations on the theme, allowing Fields to toss off bons mots and scathing sarcasm, but it's the anomalous "The Fatal Glass of Beer"--a hilarious send-up of Yukon gold-rush adventures--that proves an unlikely highlight. It's typically sour-pussed in its agenda, with a running gag (involving the line "It ain't a fit night out for man nor beast") that just grows funnier with each repetition. Fields's comedy wasn't fully developed here--he became masterful in later features--but 6 Short Films is crucial in demonstrating his rapid refinement of the vintage Fields persona. --Jeff Shannon

Description

W. C. Fields' prolific career placed him at the forefront of slapstick comedy. Gathered here are six gems that feature the comic genius at his peak: The Golf Specialist, Pool Sharks (silent), The Pharmacist, The Fatal Glass of Beer, The Barber Shop, and, of course, the notorious The Dentist. This unique collection will delight new generations of viewers with Fields' hilariously sardonic routines.

Customer Reviews:

W.C. Fields: 6 Short Films - Criterion Collection.......2007-08-15

I purchased this DVD for my wheel-chair bound older brother who by the way has become increasingly pickier about everything in his older age. He has seen all 6 shorts on VHS but as noted previously the quality wasn't up to his standards. Well, he loved the DVD, couldn't thank me enough. He tried to find W.C. Fields DVD at the local library and video rental firms, no luck. So not only did he like the quality, I really enjoyed the convenience of Amazon.com as he and I live about 100 miles apart and I only get to see him every month or so. Thanks for a quality service.

The City ain't no place for Women-Gals, but Pretty Men go Thar............2007-03-29

To look at W.C.Fields in the context of his contemporaries is to be amazed at the fame and popularity of a character that was really quite subversive: he smoked, drank, cursed, avoided hard work, lied, scammed, detested marriage and family life, abused underlings, and held every politically incorrect attitude imaginable. The Fields persona was irrascible, blustery, grandiose, and prone to wrong assumptions; all the while being harrassed by nagging wives, bratty children, an obnoxious public, disparaging neighbors, ungrateful employers, and a world of troublesome machinery. He found solace in alcohol, pretty assistants, and usually an adoring older daughter. And he was damn funny doing it.

At first glance, hard to imagine such a character being widely popular in America of the 1920's, 30's, and 40's, but only if one falls into the periodic tendency of a large segment of American culture (perhaps all cultures!) to view the past through rose-colored glasses, finding a piety and propriety that never really existed. There has always been a anarchic and revolutionary spirit in American life that contradicts that propriety and more often than not found its best expression in humor. From the earliest pamphleteers, through newspaper columns and the comics page, on to Mark Twain, Will Rogers and the great pantheon of comics, commentators and comedians this lively antidote to stuffiness, self-importance and conventional wisdom has thrived.

In short, W.C. Fields while completely unique and unorthodox, was one of a company of Masters (that includes the Marx Brothers and Mae West at their best) adept at mocking the notions of propriety and what we would call "political correctness".

Others have provided the outlines of these short films, and I agree that two or three are minor, but to my mind there are 3 classics here that shouldn't be missed: The Fatal Glass of Beer, The Barber, and The Dentist.

What can you say about the completely nonsensical, nearly surreal first film? Well, as a verse from Fields dulcimer-accompanied song explains after his son takes the Fatal Glass:

"He met a Salvation Army girl, and wickedly he broke her tambourine,
All she said was 'Heaven Loves You' and placed a mark upon his brow,
With a kick she'd learned before she had been Saved!"

That and the curiously well aimed "Pop!" of snow in the face that accompanies the phrase "Tain't a fit night out for man nor beast!". You either find that funny or you don't.

And so on for The Barber, with the most excruciating shave imaginable and the begging dog waiting for more "scraps". And The Dentist with Fields daringly suggestive struggle to pull Elise Cavanna's tooth, the blonde bitten by the Dachsund ("You're lucky it wasn't a Newfoundland dog!") and the bearded gent with the elusive mouth ("And a very pretty thing too!") and fleeing birds.

There are several golf routines, one naturally in the Golf Specialist ("Never mind where I told you to stand! You stand where I tell you!") and in the Dentist, that are classic as well.

I have read the criticism of the DVD presentation, but even if extraneous music is present on The Dentist, these are the best transfers I've seen to date.

The great thing about humor is you can't fake it. It's either funny to you or it isn't. That is what makes recommending comedy so futile. What slays me may leave you cold. I find Fields irresistible, and his wonderfully anti-social persona not only hilarious but timeless. For that, this collection is treasured.

"The Dentist" censorship.......2007-01-10

As has already been noted, "The Dentist" is largely sourced from some later reissue with added, completely unnecessary music and sound effects. While the notoriously naughty tooth-pulling scene has been put back in, at least two other more subtle bits of censorship remain:

1. When the female patient is moaning in the waiting room and the Fields' assistant is trying to get his attention, Fields originally says "Oh, the hell with her!" In this version, that outburst is covered (rather sloppily) with an additional patient moan.

2. When Fields walks off the golf course in disgust, he originally said "They can take this golf course and st..." (he doesn't actually finish). In this version, the line is simply blanked out.

Criterion Collection Stunk!.......2005-08-03

The above entitled collection was a real disappointment. Not at all what I expected and definitely not worth the money. Quite frankly, I was so disappointed I threw them in the trash. I know there has to be good W.C. Fields films out there, however W.C. Fields: 6 Short Films-Criterion Collection is not one of them

Bill Williams

Fields is an acquired taste.......2005-02-05

These short films starring W.C. Fields are, in their own right, classic comedies. Uneven, as some have pointed out, but classic in their own right. I believe that the problem some people have with Fields' sense of humor is that it is too dark and/or too adult for them. Fields was a spokesman for the common man, especially during the Depression. His comedy is subversive and sneaky. His complaining voice was recognized as the voice of the ordinary guy under the thumb of everyone and everything from his wife and mother-in-law, to dogs and children, to the rulers of the land and the very business he was in.

As a kid I did not "get" Fields at all. I didn't understand what he was doing, and I didn't think he was funny. I much preferred Laurel & Hardy (whom I still adore) and Charlie Chase whose humor was more obvious and accessible to me. I was annoyed by Fields' whining and complaining, didn't get the sarcastic asides, just did not like him at all.

As I grew older I began to understand what it was that Fields was doing. He was an original, a pioneer. From the late Sam Kinnison to Larry David and Seinfeld, there isn't a comic writer or performer who doesn't owe something to W.C. Fields. All the bitching and moaning you hear, especially from stand-ups, is nothing more than Fields brought into the modern era. He (and Mark Twain before him) spawned the sly and sarcastic wit of American comic dialogue long before it was commonly accepted or widely appreciated.

Make no mistake: Fields' humor masks real pain. What we hear in his whiny voice is the suffering of a man who can't catch a break to save himself. He is championing all the losers, the little guys, the nobodies, and if it sounds bitter at times, well...it is. I agree with some other reviewers here when they say that one must grow up and go through a certain amount of real-life experiences before Fields can truly be grasped and ultimately - if you're lucky - embraced. Otherwise you are better off with the Three Stooges and the Marx Brothers. Their worlds are completely unreal whereas Fields' world is all too real. It's a place to escape *from* not into, and what you hear from Fields' beaten-down characters is the sound of a man being dragged through a knothole backwards.

ekw

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