For Crimin' Out Loud (1956) User Reviews

RIP Shemp

[SnoopyStyle · 7/10 · 22 February 2021]

Larry, Moe, and Shemp are the Miracle Detective Agency. They get a call from Councilman Goodrich who fears for his life from his niece and her husband. They are up to no good and their henchman Nikko murders the councilman. The boys arrive looking for the councilman.

The camera is a good gag but it's probably the only big laugh in this one. This is a reworking of earlier shorts. There is some general good fun. It's a good Shemp Stooges short but Shemp would die before its release.

ONE OF THE LAST WITH SHEMP

[garyvannucci-99224 · 8/10 · 7 September 2019]

I WILL MAKE THIS SHORT (NO PUN INTENDED) BY THE TIME THIS WAS RELEASED IN MAY OF 1956 SHEMP WAS ALREADY LAID TO REST HE DIED NOV 1955. THE FIRST PART OF THIS SHORT WAS SHEMP WITH NEW FOOTAGE. THE LAST HALF WAS STOCK FOOTAGE TAKEN FROM THE STOOGES SHORT WHO DONE IT FROM 1949. HONESTLY I FEEL CHEATED WHEN COLUMBIA USE STOCK FOOTAGE, BUT IN THIS CASE I WILL GIVE THEM A BYE.THE SHORT DEPARTMENT HAD TO DO WHAT THEY HAD TO DO TO SURVIVE THE COLUMBIA. BUDGET AND HARRY COHN. I LIKE THIS SHORT, IT IS KIND OF A TRIBUTE TO SHEMP. REST IN PEACE SHEMP

Good Three Stooges short!

[Movie Nuttball · 10/10 · 13 October 2004]

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!

Another good Stooge short! Christine McIntyre is so lovely and evil and the same time is this one! Also in this one are Ralph Dunn, Barbara Bartay, Emil Sitka, and Charles Knight. The Stooges are very good and especially Shemp and Larry! There is a similar short like this one called Who Done It? This too is a good one to watch around Halloween time!

An OK detective comedy

[slymusic · 27 July 2005]

"For Crimin' Out Loud" is one of the very last shorts the Stooges made before Shemp Howard's sudden death in November of 1955. Jules White receives the directing credit here, although this short was practically a complete remake, using ample stock footage from a wonderful Stooge comedy directed by Edward Bernds, "Who Done It?" (1949). Hence, Jules White is only accountable for the new footage, and no wonder that Ed Bernds was displeased that many of his Stooge shorts were being chopped up and remade with White receiving sole directing credit. In any event, 99.9% of the new footage for this short occurs during the first several minutes as the Stooges are seen monkeying around at their detective agency. And this is where the major fault of the picture lies. Jules White was known for not being the Stooges' best director, largely because he forced too much unnecessary slapstick, especially in his later shorts of the 1950s. The opening scene at the Stooges' Miracle Detective Agency ("If We Solve Your Crime, It's a Miracle") contains a great deal of forced slapstick that slows down the pacing of the comedy, whereas Edward Bernds would ask Moe, for example, to quickly execute a slap and go right on to the next thing to keep a lively pace.

Once this new footage is out of the way, however, the comedy gets better, as we see some great highlights from the stock footage from "Who Done It?" Moe crushes Larry's hand with a desk drawer, and Larry's look of pain was never better. Moe grabs Shemp's accordion camera and unknowingly bashes the goon's head (the goon is played by Duke York, who played several other monster types in Stooge shorts). Shemp stumbles and flips after he swallows a poisoned drink. Moe slugs Larry and Shemp while the goon slugs Moe from behind. And the goon takes turns chasing Moe, Larry, and Shemp in the corridors, with Larry's reaction to the goon being the funniest ("Hey, what'd he say? YIKE!!!").

As great as this stock footage is, it is difficult to erase the memory of the forced slapstick in the opening new footage, and this unfortunately gives "For Crimin' Out Loud" the presumably bad reputation it has. But I'm of the belief that every film has its highlights. So if you do happen to catch the short on TV, try as much as you can to gain a few laughs from it.

It's not so bad you would want to cry, but not good either

[Horst_In_Translation · 4/10 · 5 March 2019]

"For Crimin' Out Loud" is an American live action short film from 1956 and the names White and Adler attached to this project maybe tell you already that here we have another Three Stooges work. It runs for approximately 16 minutes, so minimally shorter than their average when it coems to short movies and it is certainly one of their later works. Curly had died a while ago already and sadly when this was released Shemp had died an untimely death as well several months earlier. According to imdb, this is his final appearance. Like some other Stooges works, this one is far from a new film. It you take a look at the connections here, you will see it is no less then a remake of 3(!) other films, one of them being a previous Stooges short, but that is nothing unusual as tehy frequently recycled their own material for their later works. But in my opinion, this was not really necessary here. It is a crime story, in which they most interact (especially Shemp) with a femme fatale (if not with each other) when trying to solve the mystery of a disappeared wealthy man. I usually prefer the Stooges more when they get in the comedy through the dialogues, but this one here is very slap-stick focused and I know many like that too, which explains the high rating here on imdb, which is not too usual for the later Stooges shorts. Yeah i must say I am not a fan of the poking honestly and the violence that is not too serious thanks to funny sound effects, but still. They definitely made sure, comedy is king in here, even if a Frankenstein lookalike with a wild haircut is chasing them and the reason he looks so big has also to do with the Stooges being so tiny. And in the end, there is some gun shooting, but it is all relatively harmless. Contents-wise I am not sold here though and I give this one a thumbs-down. Only worth seeing for the very biggest Stooges fans, it is kinda fitting this is nowhere nearf their most known works, not even if we only count short movies.