Ein ausgekochter Junge

In order to understand that movie, you have to speak good German, otherwise you don't grasp the subtleties. MacIntyre obviously neither speaks German well, nor does he understand the nature of this comedy. His depiction of Brahmaputra, the hypnotist, is characteristic of his failure to understand the bizarre humour of the plot. Choosing the name Brahmaputra is the first hint at the absolutely silly, gauche nature of that role. Of course, if you have an Indian hypnotist in a movie, you don't choose the name of one of India's biggest rivers as his name. When you have a Chinese, you don't call him Yang-Tse, when you have an Englishman, "Thames" would sound equally silly. The choice of the name and the awkward make-up are to signal to the audience that this character is absolutely mediocre, a quack, without any integrity. What has also escaped MacIntyre is the light Saxon accent of the "Indian" hypnotist. If you know Germany, you know that the most reliable means to ridicule a character is to make him speak that East German dialect - it will send Germans into uncontrollable bouts of laughter. - And that is only one example of the nuances which you have to recognize watching this film.

Many European actors who fled the Nazis brought their talents to Hollywood, usually in supporting roles due to the limitations of their European accents. Siegfried Arno was a star in German comedies who went on to a respectable career in Hollywood as a character comedian in small supporting roles.

'Ein Ausgekochter Junge' ('A Young Good-for-Nothing') has Arno in a lead role, speaking his native language. This film demonstrates Arno's talents more fully than most of his Hollywood work; unfortunately, it also shows he's not all that talented.

Arno plays Ignaz Fischbein (literally, 'fish-leg'), a hapless shop assistant in Herr Strohbach's couture salon. The bank holiday weekend is coming, and Strohbach plans a nice holiday for himself and his wife (so he claims) at a Bavarian inn. He orders Fischbein to make the travel arrangements, then sends him out to make a delivery to a woman named Rolly-Polly, who does a cooch dance at a local carnival.

Also at the carnival are a couple of newlyweds: sexy young Mitzi, and her hulking hubby Paul, who drives a beer truck. While Paul makes a delivery, Mitzi wanders onto the carnival's midway.

At the sideshow, Fischbein stops to watch the performance of Brahmaputra, a Hindu fakir. Or maybe a faker: Brahmaputra is played by a German actor (Albert Paulig) in heavy pancake makeup. The makeup job is so bad and so obvious that I assumed Paulig was actually playing a German who is *pretending* he's a Hindu. No; apparently the character is a genuine East Indian, but the Germans who made this movie weren't able to find an authentic Hindu actor for the role. Or they didn't bother.

Brahmaputra demonstrates his mystic powers by mesmerising Fischbein and Mitzi, and hypnotising them to believe they're newlyweds on their honeymoon. I thought at first that Fischbein and Mitzi were going to *pretend* to be hypnotised, so that they could rush off for a dirty weekend together and claim afterwards that they'd been brainwashed. No; Fischbein and Mitzi are genuinely convinced that they're married. Mitzi sees Rolly-Polly's frock and thinks it's her own trousseau. Fischbein finds the railway tickets he bought for Strohbach, and he assumes that these are the tickets for his own honeymoon with Mitzi.

So, Mr and Mrs Fischbein, travelling as Mr and Mrs Strohbach, end up at the Bavarian inn just in time to bump into Strohbach and his wife ... except that she isn't really his wife; she's his mistress Evchen. Meanwhile, Paul shows up with the hypnotist, determined to break up the Fischbein 'marriage' and reclaim his wife.

There's a lot of shouting and overacting. Buried under the argle-bargle is some genuine humour, but not much. I was intrigued to see the Hungarian actor Charles Puffy in this film: he had a respectable career in Hollywood during the late silent-film era, but returned to Europe when his accent put paid to his career in talking pictures. Puffy, a very large and unappetising man, is funny here as a political hothead. The camera work and the soundtrack music are better than I'd expected. I'll rate this movie 5 points out of 10.