They Stooge to Conga

This is one of my favorite Stooge shorts. I especially love it when Moe disguises himself as Hitler and does a flawless imitation of the "little sign painter". The boys showed that they were doing their part for moral in the dark days of World War II.

In this short (another the Stooges did that makes blatant fan of Hitler), the Stooges are fix-it men who are assigned to repair the wiring at a mansion which is actually the hideout of a group of Nazis. The Stooges are their usual inept selves particularly when they try to find the trouble by sending Curly to scale a telephone pole resulting in some of the most violent scenes ever filmed by the Stooges (Moe and Larry apply a pipe wrench to Curly's nose and press his nose against a revolving grindstone; Curly accidentally stabs Moe in the scalp, ear, and (gulp!) eye (shudder!); Moe burns Curly's rear with a blow torch; Curly is electrocuted by the wires to the point where they can light up a light bulb by sticking it in his ear). Eventually, though, their ineptness leads to victory on their behalf when they destroy the house, foul up the Nazi's directions over their air radio, and generally render the Nazis incapable. Very funny stuff, if you can stomach the over-the-top violence in this one (the spike in the eye bit repulses almost everyone who watches it). RECOMMENDED

The Three Stooges come back in this short after a 2 year absence from the Natzi parodies. This time though, they don't play dictators, they play fixers. They are hired to fix a doorbell, but un-beknonst to them, the employees are spies. Plenty of laughs, especially the wire sequence in the house. One of the Stooges funniest. Note- look for Lloyd Bridges as a telephone man (one of his first roles). A+

This short contains the most violent gag in Stooge history. The spike from Curly's shoe goes into Moe's eye! How could Del Lord and Hugh McCollum allow such a gag? This was more in the style of Jules White. I would like to note that these "violent beyond any doubt to be funny" gags are really few and far between in the Three Stooges canon. They did make 190 short subjects for Columbia! The other over the top violent gags I can think of consist of the following: the wire, nose, ear gag in "Pardon My Backfire", the bellows gag in "Corny Casanovas", the Christmas lights down Moe's throat gag in "He Cooked His Goose", and "Half Shot Shooters" almost in its entirety. It must be noted that it was not the Stooges shorts alone that engaged in cruel comic violence. These kind of gags can be found in other Columbia short comedies, especially those directed by Jules White. Lest we forget, Stan Laurel had a cruel, violent streak in his comedy as well.

In 'They Stooge to Conga' we see Moe, Larry and Curly as three fixers. They can fix anything. A woman calls for them, she wants her doorbell fixed. The men start working but instead of fixing anything they mess up the entire house. We also learn that the house is actually the secret headquarters for some Nazis.

The stooges think the broken doorbell is a wire problem. After the house is a complete mess, they go outside to see if there is a problem with the wires there. They mess things up again, and a lot of people are not able to make telephone calls. Around this point they discover who they are dealing with.

This is a very funny short, although it is a little slow in the middle. The scenes outside with a climbing spike are a little too graphic, I think. The start with the wires and the ending with Moe impersonating Hitler make up for that. A very nice Three Stooges short.