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"Even a worm will turn," per the depressive elephant. Morning at the Bissonette household, where shaving for the paterfamilias (W.C. Fields) means nearly slashing his own throat while sharing the bathroom mirror with a solipsistic daughter (Jean Rouverol). The missus (Kathleen Howard) harangues him until he cannot tell cigar from carnation, Junior (Tommy Bupp) contributes a discarded roller-skate. The clientele at his grocery store is scarcely better: "Kumquats!" is the irate shopper's cry, blind Mr. Muckle out of Los Olvidados (Charles Sellon) wields his cane like a wrecking ball, Baby "Blood Poison" LeRoy throws cans and triggers a molasses tide. "Would have to hit me right in the funny bone, too." Sinclair Lewis' George F. Babbitt among the Katzenjammer Kids, nothing less for the pure distillate of the Fieldsian cosmos. The centerpiece is "sweet repose" denied on the back porch, the protagonist in his pajamas enduring an encyclopedia of nuisances—a coconut rolling down each step of the stairs with a thump, a salesman looking for a certain colleague ("Carl LaFong. Capital l, small a, capital f, small o, small n, small g. LaFong. Carl LaFong"), a debate of ipecac versus syrup of quills courtesy of a couple of dingbats, the fruit peddler whose hawking brings out the shotgun at last. (All the three-story set is missing is Monsieur Hulot ambling through in long shot.) A relation's inheritance uproots the clan, the ride West includes a pit stop for a little song from the Cahauxin Hose Glee Club. Tomato splatter and cascades of crackers at the picnic that leaves behind a littered pastoral, though not before the jalopy mows down the Venus de Milo ("She ran right in front of the car"). The reward is a gallon of gin to go with drops of orange juice, a fair bet is that Ozu was an admirer. With Julian Madison, Tammany Young, Morgan Wallace, Josephine Whittell, Diana Lewis, Dell Henderson, T. Roy Barnes, Helene Chadwick, and Guy Usher. In black and white.
--- Fernando F. Croce |