The Little Rascals was the greatest kiddie entertainment starring kids. Sure there’s going to be stuffy child education experts bemoaning the crass comedy and humor based on stereotypes. Admittedly jokes that would be considered extremely racist in today’s culture. Perhaps they were a bit uncomfortable half a century when they were produced. But you must over look those uncomfortable moment to realize that these shorts showed us a world were race didn’t matter. During a time when there were “white only” bathrooms, Hal Roach dared to let black and white children play as equals. At its core, this theme subverted the dumb jokes. Maybe they threw in a couple blackface jokes in order to keep the Southern theater owners happy. When these screened theatrically, blacks weren’t allowed to watch a movie from the floor seats in numerous cinemas. Could these racist moments have distracted the Southern censors from noticing the racial harmony message? The Little Rascals: The Complete Collection does its best to restore the shorts to their original lengths without the scissors of nervous academics snipping away the politically incorrect moments.
The Little Rascals: The Complete Collection does not contain every short done with Alfalfa, Spanky and Buckwheat. For over a decade Hal Roach produced the Our Gang shorts featuring the kids. In 1938 he sold the entire unit to MGM (the distributor of the shorts). They kept the series going for 52 more titles. The MGM shorts are not nearly as fun as Roach’s version. They were too talkie and stuck us with Froggie and Robert Blake. Roach distributed his 80 talkie shorts to television, but couldn’t use the Our Gang title. So he renamed them The Little Rascals. The later MGM shorts would be packaged as Our Gang. They were considered a downgrade by most of the kids on the school bus. This box set contains all 80 shorts that were part of Roach’s TV package.
“Small Talk” was the first foray into sound for Roach’s juvenile cast and the transition shows. The kids are constantly looking confused since no longer was the director talking to them as the camera rolls. They also had to remember their lines. The cast is extraordinarily raw in their performances, but the antics save the show. The kids are once more orphans. Little Wheezer gets adopted by a rich woman who doesn’t seem to care about snagging his sister Mary Ann. The orphans sneak off to visit their old buddy and cause major havoc around the socialite and her rich friends. Naturally everything plays out right as Wheezer gets reunited with his sister. “Railroadin'” reminds us that trainyards are not playgrounds. Chubby and Joe hijack their dad’s locomotive. It’s a rolling disaster on the rails as they have no clue how to stop the engine. “Lazy Days” has Farina doing his best to take the day off. He comes with ingenious ways to avoid getting up.
“Free Eats” introduces Spanky McFarland to the world. He, Stymie and the other kids are invited to a rich woman’s house for a party that promises a basket of free food to take back to their folks. Her husband is running for office so it’s a great ploy to snag a few votes. However this charity event goes wrong as two midgets sneak into the party disguised as kids. They’re staging a jewel heist. It’s up the kids to stop the crime. Spanky was such a hit that the next film was “Spanky.” This one was butchered over the years as they removed the Uncle Tom’s Cabin play. But that’s back.
Alfalfa arrives in “Beginner’s Luck.” During a talent show, him and his brother sings “Coming Around the Mountain.” The focus of the episode is Spanky getting forced into showbiz by his mom. He wants his friends to heckle him off the stage to put an end to it, but then he changes his mind. He wants to win for the sake of a shy girl whose family needs the prize money. Can he get the gang to tone down? The duo of Spanky and Alfalfa would dominate the series. Sometimes they were friends. Other times they were rivals. Most of the rivalry circulated over their courtship of Darla. In a strange weird twist, Buckwheat might also be the first truly androgynous movie star. When he was introduced, they had him playing a girl. He was Stymie’s sister in “For Pete’s Sister.” Later he develops into a boy. The series got away with more weirdness than anything featuring adults.
Thankfully Bill Cosby never followed through with his threat to buy the Our Gang shorts and burn them. Farina, Stymie and Buckwheat weren’t on the same sophisticated level as his Cosby kids. But the Our Gang trio were extremely important in shaping the view of race relations in the eyes of the youth. Stymie often played the ringleader of the diverse group. Their adventures let us know that we can live and play together. That race didn’t have to be an issue. The uncensored nature of The Little Rascals: The Complete Collection should warn you that these shorts shouldn’t be used as babysitters. An adult should watch these with the kids to explain what’s really funny and what was considered funny all those years ago. The last thing you need is to have you child come home with a black eye from attempting to sing in black face.
The Shorts
“Small Talk,” “Railroadin’ ,” “Boxing Gloves,” “Lazy Days,” “Bouncing Babies,” “Moan and Groan, Inc.,” “Shivering Shakespeare,” “The First Seven Years,” “When the Wind Blows,” “Bear Shooters,” “A Tough Winter,” “Pups Is Pups,” “Teacher’s Pet,” “School’s Out,” “Helping Grandma,” “Love Business,” “Little Daddy,” “Bargain Day,” “Fly My Kite,” “Big Ears,” “Shiver My Timbers,” “Dogs Is Dogs,” “Readin’ and Writin’,” “Free Eats,” “Spanky,” “Choo-Choo!,” “The Pooch,” “Hook and Ladder,” “Free Wheeling,” “Birthday Blues,” “A Lad an’ a Lamp,” “Fish Hooky,” “Forgotten Babies,” “The Kid From Borneo,” “Mush and Milk,” “Bedtime Worries,” “Wild Poses,” “Hi’-Neighbor!,” “For Pete’s Sake!,” “The First Round-Up,” “Honky Donkey,” “Mike Fright,” “Washee Ironee,” “Mama’s Little Pirate,” “Shrimps for a Day,” “Anniversary Trouble,” “Beginner’s Luck,” “Teacher’s Beau,” “Sprucin’ Up,” “The Lucky Corner,” “Little Papa,” “Little Sinner,” “Our Gang Follies of 1936 ,” “Divot Diggers,” “The Pinch Singer,” “Second Childhood,” “Arbor Day,” “Bored of Education,” “Two Too Young,” “Pay As You Exit,” “Spooky Hooky,” “Reunion in Rhythm,” “Glove Taps,” “Hearts Are Thumps,” “Three Smart Boys,” “Rushin’ Ballet,” “Roamin’ Holiday,” “Night ‘n’ Gales,” “Fishy Tales,” “Framing Youth,” “The Pigskin Palooka, “Mail and Female,” “Our Gang Follies of 1938,” “Canned Fishing,” “Bear Facts,” “Three Men in a Tub,” “Came the Brawn,” “Feed ’em and Weep,” “The Awful Tooth” and “Hide and Shriek.”
The video is 1.33:1 full frame. The transfers vary depending on age and source. The early ones are really rough looking. The shorts that were notorious for questionable material appear to have been taken from rare collector prints rather than the vault negative. Perhaps this is a case that the powers that controlled the series at the time wanted this moments to disappear? Quite a few transfers were taken off the Blackhawk films versus the MGM negatives. Purists will be shocked, but average viewers won’t mind. A majority transfers look much better than when they appeared on your local UHF channel. The audio is Dolby Digital mono. Sound is also at the mercy of the prints. The early titles are rather scratchy. But if you care about the mayhem, you won’t be too disturbed.
Video Introductions (1:05) on each DVD is a small talk from surviving cast members.
The Silent Theatrical Shorts (1:20:45) includes “Dog Heaven,” “Spook Spoofing” and “Barnum & Ringling, Inc.” When they say silent, they mean it. They didn’t even try to put any music over the images. You might want to have your iPod playing a selection of dixieland jazz during the shorts. “Dog Heaven” is not for the weak of heart since it opens with Pete the dog hanging himself. It’s a convincing piece of cinema. There are commentary tracks from Richard Lewis Ward on “Spook Spoofing” and “Barnum & Ringling, Inc.” He wrote a history of the Hal Roach Studios. He gives plenty of details in his lecture.
The Story of Hal Roach and Our Gang (29:00) is a documentary that covers the filmmaker and the child actors. Roach knew Mark Twain. He got his break at Universal pictures as a cowboy that advised Western productions.
Rascals and Racial Issues (7:05) discusses the black characters in the shorts. For all the racial stereotypes and jokes shown in the shorts, it is still a series that dared to have black kids seen as equal to white kids. Dickie Moore talks about his relationship with Stymie.
Catching Up with the Rascals (57:45) has talks with Dickie Moore, Jean Darling, Jerry Tucker, Annie Ross and RIch Sapphire discussing Spanky. Dickie is married to Jane Powell. They relate their early lives to acting and if their childhood resembled the life of Our Gang.
The Little Rascals: The Complete Collection is a hilarious time capsule. In one boxset is everything you once rushed home to watch in the afternoon. These were the kids who knew how to have fun in any old junkyard. They cared about playing together. While racial jokes peppered the humor, but none of the gang were racist.
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Genius Products presents The Little Rascals: The Complete Collection. Starring Farina, Spanky, Stymie, Buckwheat, Darla and Alfalfa. Boxset Contents: 80 shorts on 8 DVDs. Released on DVD: October 28, 2008. Available at Amazon.
