Have Badge, Will Chase

So just finished watching my first film of this project, "Have Badge, Will Chase" with Abbott & Costello. 200'/ Standard 8

First a little background information. The reason I chose this one first is because "Have Badge, Will Chase" is like the cartridge COMBAT to the Atari 2600. It's the film that came with the projector back in the day.

And I should also run down my preference hierarchy for the old comedy teams. The Marx Brothers are at the top, followed by the Three Stooges, who were incredibly good at what they did. Then we get down to Abbott & Costello. Maybe they were good for the time, and they do have some strong bits, but they really do nothing for me, and finally Laurel & Hardy, who I just have a hard time believing anyone found funny ever. ( I have some films of  L & H, I'll get to those in weeks to come.)

On to the Movie:

I don't know if this was a short, or part of a bigger movie, but at least I was able to follow the story, what there was of it. A & C were actors dressed as cops, who walked in on a real robbery. It was all just a throwback to the Keystone Kops and was just, as you could probably figure from the title, just a big chase scene. One of the weird thing is that A & C weren't even on the main vehicle doing the chasing. While the Paddy-wagon chased the villains in Keystone fashion, A & C were chasing behind on a motorcycle.

I'm not sure when the movie was made, so it's hard to say how far from the original Keystone Kops they were, but I do know A & C were way past Keystone Kops time.

Other interesting things to note is in the beginning,  Lou just standing there watching the one of the thieves sneaking up behind Bud. Didn't even try to act distracted or anything. And Lou adjusted his hat while unconsciously falling down.

Intro

I am a collector of 8mm films. These are the cartoons, comedy shorts, and feature film digests that were the only way to watch the things you wanted in the 50s, 60s and 70s. I have about 200 titles, and have decided that I'm going to watch every one of them and post my thoughts on them on this blog. I should be able to get through about 3 or 4 a week.

I have purposely acquired a pretty varied selection, trying to get films from all types of genres. I'm a typical Sci-Fi nerd, so I skew pretty heavy that way, but I have made an effort to get a bunch of styles.

These are all silent and nearly all black and white. I have both super-8 and standard 8, but I try to stick with super-8.

Not all of these films are good. In fact, for most of the Feature film digests, if you haven't seen the full movie, these digests are near incomprehensible. You see, These reels of film last only 8 to 12 Minutes. If it's a cartoon or comedy short, that's not that big a deal, but try cutting War & Peace down to 10 minutes, and if you don't know the story, Good luck figuring out what's what.

I'm going to try and do them in no particular order. I mean, to some extent I will. I won't try watching Conquest of the Planet of the Apes before watching Beneath the Planet of the Apes, I might even make a week of all 5 movies, but I'm not going to burn one genre out before another.

So, I prepare for this endeavor and will be starting tomorrow with Abbott & Costello in "Have Badge, Will Chase".