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How High Is Up?

  • 1940
  • Approved
  • 17m
IMDb RATING
7.8/10
600
YOUR RATING
Moe Howard, Larry Fine, and Curly Howard in Three Missing Links (1938)
SlapstickComedyShort

The stooges are the 'Minute Menders', three tinkers who live under their car. The boys decide to drum up some business by punching holes in the unattended lunch boxes of some workmen. When t... Read allThe stooges are the 'Minute Menders', three tinkers who live under their car. The boys decide to drum up some business by punching holes in the unattended lunch boxes of some workmen. When they're caught in the act, they escape and accidentally get hired as riveters on a new buil... Read allThe stooges are the 'Minute Menders', three tinkers who live under their car. The boys decide to drum up some business by punching holes in the unattended lunch boxes of some workmen. When they're caught in the act, they escape and accidentally get hired as riveters on a new building, working on the 97th floor. Their ineptitude and lousy workmanship screw up construct... Read all

  • Director
    • Del Lord
  • Writer
    • Elwood Ullman
  • Stars
    • Moe Howard
    • Larry Fine
    • Curly Howard
  • See production info at IMDbPro
  • IMDb RATING
    7.8/10
    600
    YOUR RATING
    • Director
      • Del Lord
    • Writer
      • Elwood Ullman
    • Stars
      • Moe Howard
      • Larry Fine
      • Curly Howard
    • 13User reviews
    • 3Critic reviews
  • See production info at IMDbPro
  • See production info at IMDbPro
  • Photos3

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    Top cast15

    Edit
    Moe Howard
    Moe Howard
    • Moe
    • (as Moe)
    Larry Fine
    Larry Fine
    • Larry
    • (as Larry)
    Curly Howard
    Curly Howard
    • Curly
    • (as Curly)
    Bruce Bennett
    Bruce Bennett
    • Workman with Leaky Lunchpail
    • (uncredited)
    Edmund Cobb
    Edmund Cobb
    • Construction Foreman
    • (uncredited)
    Vernon Dent
    Vernon Dent
    • Mr. Blake
    • (uncredited)
    Marjorie Kane
    Marjorie Kane
    • Pedestrian
    • (uncredited)
    Johnny Kascier
    • Street Worker
    • (uncredited)
    George Lloyd
    George Lloyd
    • Workman
    • (uncredited)
    Sam Lufkin
    Sam Lufkin
    • Workman
    • (uncredited)
    Charles Phillips
    • Workman
    • (uncredited)
    Cy Schindell
    Cy Schindell
    • Workman with Blake
    • (uncredited)
    Victor Travis
    • Pedestrian
    • (uncredited)
    Duke York
    Duke York
    • Workman
    • (uncredited)
    Bert Young
    • Workman
    • (uncredited)
    • Director
      • Del Lord
    • Writer
      • Elwood Ullman
    • All cast & crew
    • Production, box office & more at IMDbPro

    User reviews13

    7.8600
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    Featured reviews

    10jhaggardjr

    Screamingly funny

    "How High Is Up?" is another explosively funny Three Stooges short. Moe, Larry, and Curly find themselves working on the 97th floor of a not yet completed skyscraper that's currently under construction. Ineptitude and slapstick follow. Big, big, big laughs in this one.
    10Movie Nuttball

    Good Three Stooges short! Hilarious!

    The Three Stooges has always been some of the many actors that I have loved. I love just about every one of the shorts that they have made. I love all six of the Stooges (Curly, Shemp, Moe, Larry, Joe, and Curly Joe)! All of the shorts are hilarious and also star many other great actors and actresses which a lot of them was in many of the shorts! In My opinion The Three Stooges is some of the greatest actors ever and is the all time funniest comedy team!

    One of the most hilarious Three Stooges shorts is How High is Up? In this short are Vernon Dent, Cy Schindell, and Bert Young. The acting by these actors are good especially by Dent, and Schindell. There are many funny scenes here that I think most Three Stooges fans will love! In My opinion this one of the most different Three Stooges shorts. I recommend this one to all!
    10tcchelsey

    THE 97TH FLOOR!!!!!!

    Nearing to BIG 50. The Stooges 48th classic comedy short, and really, really trippy stuff. Let's put it this way -- had this been real life, these guys would have been TOAST.

    This one is terrific. Absolutely. Moe, Larry and Curly get hired(?) as riveters on the 97th floor(!) of a skyscraper under construction. Director Del Lord's super camera work gets you paranoid at times, it seems so real. Curly, without fail, is the menace to society here, messing things up big time for Moe and Larry, not to mention nearly having them all fall off the building! There's always food around -- because these guy are hungry all the time -- and watch for the sausages, mistaken for rivets? The best gag.

    Their hot tempered boss, Mr. Blake, is played to the hilt by Vernon Dent, the guy all us kids loved to hate. Look for actor Bruce Bennett as one of the workmen. Bruce would go onto appear in many Warner Brothers film classics, like TREASURE OF SIERRA MADRE.

    BEST comes at the end -- the Stooges use parachutes to escape the 97th floor!

    Beautifully written insanity by Elwood Ullman, one of their best writers. Notes indicate the aerial shots of the building were filmed at the Empire State Building in New York City.

    Thanks so much to METV for running these oldies Saturdays non stop. Always on dvd, remastered Columbia box set. Generally boxed by decades, 30s, 40s and 50s episodes.
    7StrictlyConfidential

    How Far Is Down?

    (*Curly quote*) - "Did you see where I landed!?"

    Without even a moments notice - The ever-adaptable Stooges make a U-Turn and immediately switch careers from being incompetent "Minute Menders" (at a nickle-a-hole) to that of being 3 of the best riveters who ever riveted a rivet.

    Now high up on the 97th floor of a skyscraper still in its early phase of construction - We find Curly frantically dealing (as best he can) with his deep-rooted acrophobia (a fear of heights). While Moe (right on cue) dishes out the face slaps, eye-pokes, and insults as only he could possibly deliver them.

    All-in-all - I'd definitely say that (without a doubt) 1940's "How High Is Up?" ranks right up there as being the Three Stooges engaging in some of their better moments of classic slapstick comedy from yesteryear. (Nyuck! Nyuck! Nyuck!)
    8bkoganbing

    Larry The Riveter

    In a year when defense plants were starting to crank out material for war and employment was near full capacity, there were three guys who couldn't find work. I think you know who they are.

    Ten years earlier the sight of Moe, Larry, and Curly sleeping under their truck no one would have noticed or bothered them. But in 1940 a cop tells them to move and they have to move even without repairing their flat tire on the truck with a salami. Don't ask about that one.

    Anyway the boys in eluding some other working stiffs whose lunch pails they punched holes in, they get themselves hired as construction workers with Larry serving up hot rivets as a specialty. Don't ask about what Moe and Curly do with them.

    With seeing the Three Stooges in How High Is Up doing construction, no wonder the women of America rose to the challenge and Rosie the Riveter was born. After seeing the boys why couldn't women do a better job.

    But not in comedy, this is one of the best Three Stooges shorts ever.

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    Related interests

    Leslie Nielsen in The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad! (1988)
    Slapstick
    Will Ferrell in Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy (2004)
    Comedy
    Benedict Cumberbatch in The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar (2023)
    Short

    Storyline

    Edit

    Did you know

    Edit
    • Trivia
      In the scene in which Curly is hit on the head with a rubber hammer when he is stuck in the sweater, if you look closely, Larry cracks up and laughs at the last BONK! on Curly's head. When Curly says, "Don't mind ME! DON'T MIND ME!!" He stares up at Moe, in which Moe starts to crack up as well and hides his face from the camera. Then the scene is cut to a close up.
    • Goofs
      Larry breaks character when Curly shouts the line, "Don't mind me! Don't mind me!"
    • Quotes

      Moe: [sarcastically] Three of the best riveters who ever riveted. Why didn't you tell them you were a groundhog?

      Curly: Listen, you laugh when you say that!

      Moe: HA, HA, HA.

      [slaps Curly]

    • Connections
      Edited into Stop! Look! and Laugh! (1960)

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    Details

    Edit
    • Release date
      • July 26, 1940 (United States)
    • Country of origin
      • United States
    • Official site
      • YouTube - Video
    • Language
      • English
    • Production company
      • Columbia Pictures
    • See more company credits at IMDbPro

    Tech specs

    Edit
    • Runtime
      • 17m
    • Color
      • Black and White
    • Aspect ratio
      • 1.37 : 1

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