Corn on the Cop

This film stars Harry Gribbon and Shemp Howard as two hobos. Despite Shemp being in the film and his having been one of the original Stooges *, this film is nothing like a Stooges film in style. There is no violence, slapping or punching--just a mildly interesting plot with two ne'er do wells trying to make a living. First, the hobos arrive in town by rail and then they go to work drumming up business for someone offering relief from foot pain. How do they do this? By smacking folks on the foot with their mallets! Overall, not a lot of plot and little to make this memorable but also little to offend. A very enjoyable but undistinguished short from Vitaphone.

Shemp Howard and Harry Gribbon are tramps who try to make money by selling "salve" that cures corns. Shemp gets customers by using a mallet to hit feet! But then a cop recognizes them from earlier and the jig's up! This was quite a funny short with Howard and Gribbon quite a team here. So on that note, I recommend Corn on the Cop.

This 1935 Vitaphone short gives Harry Gribbon top billing, but I expect it's probably given more attention today when it is seen for the presence of the lower-billed Stooge Shemp Howard. In reality they operate more as a team here. They have a good infectious chemistry as one here too, playing a pair of shameless hobos who have one to many run-ins after a confusion of identity with a particular police officer.

Gribbon and Howard feel very much like a charismatic Vaudeville double-act going through their business, and there is no shortage of Vaudeville-style fast-talking humor, puns, and shamelessly bad-but-great jokes ("Some hobos have just blown into town." "Yes, your wife said you were expecting some of your relatives").

The two hobos go into business selling a foot salve, and the ways they dupe people into buying it (often by sneaking under the street and hitting feet with mallets to convince people they have corns) and numerous, inventive, and fun, and account for much of the comedy.

When we leave the hucksterism and follow Gribbon and Howard home to where the officer's wife mistakes them for his nephews we have a somewhat more conventional and well-traveled farce plot, but it is still very well-handled, with appropriately sly performances.

Here there's good comedy, a winning pair of performances by the two lead comics, and a nice look into a 1934-era conception of the unscrupulous but winning hobos.