Mickey's Rescue

Mickey Rooney is sore because it's the birthday of Billy Barty, his little brother, and Mickey has bought him a new trombone to play "Ach Du Lieber, Augustine" on; their parents have just given Billy to a couple who plan to adopt him. Fortunately Mickey and his gang figure they can find Billy by hook, crook or dangling him off a roof edge.

There are good-sized roles for Hattie MacDaniell and Spencer Bell in this one, but it's most remarkable for the fact that Mickey Rooney is 12 years old and shooting up -- as much as he ever would -- as are other regulars in the cast, Mr. Barty excepted. The time was ending for him to play the pint-sized tough kid from a comic strip. There would be one more entry in the series, and then Mickey would have to find worlds other than Fontaine Fox's Toonerville to conquer.

In this installment of the Mickey McGuire shorts, Mickey (Mickey Rooney) and the gang are excited because it's Billy's (Billy Barty) birthday. At the same time, however, rich folks have come to Mickey and Billy's mother to essentially buy him! They promise to take good care of him, though by the end of the story he's nearly killed and Mickey has to come to the rescue.

All in all, this was both weird and exciting to watch--even if the height of the building Billy fell off of kept changing! Worth seeing and cute...despite the ugly idea of rich folks taking away poor kids!

By the way, you see Billy playing the trombone in the film but he was too small to make the slide move. You cannot make the instrument work at all if this is the case...yet, oddly, it sounded perfect when playing "Ach Du Lieber Augustin".