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This very early Three Stooges effort starts off differently than almost all their others in that the three don't know each other. Moe is a fight manager looking for boxer; Curly is a waiter and Larry a violinist. They all meet at this restaurant and when Larry starts playing "Pop Goes The Weasel," Curly goes nuts and punches everyone's lights out. Moe hires the two so he can get back into the fight game.

One day during some roadside training, they meet up with a pretty dame whose car is stuck in the mud. By playing the "Weasel" song, Curly lifts the car and solves the problem. She drives off as he jumps in the back seat!

The next scenes show newspaper headlines as "K.O. Stradivarius" (our hero Curly) beats all opponents and is now scheduled to fight for the championship.

The last bout is something to see: probably the goofiest fight scenes I've ever seen on film, which includes the great silent comics. Larry Howard ("Curly") was an underrated comic genius and shows it here early on in his career. It's the subtle things he does in this fight that had me laughing out loud.

In the early 1930s, the Three Stooges and their leader, Ted Healy, were signed to contracts with MGM. Unfortunately, this prestige studio had no idea what to do with them and their careers floundered. When you watch these films it's obvious why--they acted nothing like the Stooges! Sometimes they acted separately (such as in "Dancing Lady") and other times they were odd...but not the usual violent but lovable mugs. In their first short for Columbia, the formula still was missing--and the film was a musical! However, here in their second Columbia film, "Punch Drunks", the trio hit their stride and the film is pretty typical of their films from then on...at least while Curly played the third Stooge.

The film begins with Moe having a trio of angry boxers who hate him as their manager. But before they can pulverize him, Larry happens to be playing the violin and it just happens that the song he's playing turns Curly into a boxing maniac! So, after knocking out the three guys, Moe astutely signs Curly as his latest boxing prospect. See the film to see what's next.

Whether you think this film is good depends on you. If you hate the Stooges, it probably won't change your mind. If you are willing to watch them instead of screaming and running from the room (like my wife often does), then I think you'll enjoy their cerebral humor-- especially since it has a lot more energy than the usual short the team made. This is especially true for Larry. Even though he isn't boxing, in this one he ends up doing most of the work! And, a lot of it is genuinely funny--something that is NOT the case with many of their later efforts.

By the way, like almost every Stooge short, this one ended up getting remade. However, "A Hit with a Miss" stars Shemp Howard BEFORE he became a film Stooge!

In this early effort, rather than just watching the threesome run around and bash each other, there is genuine plot and character development. Instead of three barely distinguishable buffoons, we have three distinct characters interacting in an actual story line. They have a plausible initial meeting at a restaurant where Curly works as a waiter, Moe is a customer who discovers Curly's hidden boxing talent, and Larry the down-and-out musician who inadvertently plays the tune that sets Curly off. The plot device of having some stimulus turn Curly into an invincible destruction machine is reused in later efforts, most notably the mouse in the later "Moe, Larry, the cheese" routine, but they never really improve upon the use of "Pop Goes the Weasel" here. Larry is always at his best when he is able to play the violin in a way that fits plausibly into the plot, and Moe is actually sympathetic as the tough guy who takes the distraught Curly under his wing and makes him a success. The story is a real story, not just a loose string of slapstick antics; we actually feel tension and anticipation at the end as we watch Curly being beaten up by his opponent and wonder if and how Larry will find another way to play "Pop Goes the Weasel." Grade: A+.

"Punch Drunks" is a very good Three Stooges' comedy, with a typically silly situation leading to a lot of confusion and laughs. Moe is a struggling boxing manager who is eating lunch when he discovers that his waiter, Curly, transforms into a formidable fighter whenever he hears the song "Pop Goes the Weasel". Curly soon gets the chance to fight the champ. The fight sequence, cross-cut with Larry's frantic attempts to provide the needed musical accompaniment, is filled with laughs, and caps off a very funny short film. All three Stooges get the chance to perform at their best in this one.

The amazing thing to me is that Larry finds a man on a Truck with a record player playing Pop Goes The Weasel.The Record never ends and even when Larry crashes the truck through a brick wall the song is still playing at exactly the right spot. And Al Hill was a professional fighter albeit with a career than ended about ten years before this comedy. And Curly was the Butterbean of his generation,on a smaller scale. Look for Maxie Rosenbloom as one of the Fighters that Curly knocks out in the Cafe. And when we watch we love how the little shove that Moe gives Larry ends up with him being about ten feet away,head first in the stream. One of my Favorite Stooge Comedies!

Punch Drunk is The Three Stooges second short, though not exactly featuring the familiar slapstick that The Three would be famous for (they were still trying to get the hang of their humor at the time), it's still easily among the boy's best and most memorable.

The plot is insane, this short is actually one of the few (though not only) where The Stooges aren't together at the beginning (though by the end they become The Trio we all know). The plot involves Moe discovering Curly's boxing talent when Larry plays Pop Goes the Weasel on a violin, and decides to become Curly's manager, with Curly winning every game, until the two get to the championship.

The humor of the short comes from the insane wackiness of it. Stooge logic is at high in this short, especially compared to Woman Haters. Lots of slaps, lots of groins and lots of laughs (though at this time it was just something that Curly said by accident, instead of actually being written in the script).

Overall the short is a blast, definitely recommended.

One of the very early Three Stooges shorts is Punch Drunks which is unusual for later on because of two things. The boys play separate roles as opposed to being a trio though they're together in the end. And the worm turns as Curly takes after the other two, especially Moe as you would never see him later on.

Fight Manager Moe is taking his three fighters to lunch and they're having some serious negotiation. Curly is their waiter, Larry is an itinerant musician willing to play the violin for his supper. Remember this is the Depression. One of those serendipitous circumstances as the fighters are belittling Curly, Larry plays Pop Goes The Weasel and Curly becomes an unstoppable hitting machine.

This is a gimmick that was used a lot by movie comedians, Lou Costello in Mexican Hayride heard a certain song and irresistibly started dancing the samba for example.

Though the usual Stooge buffoonery is actually less than normal, the frantic climax makes up for it all.

What I'm reviewing here is the second short The Three Stooges made for Columbia and the first that established their characterizations once and for all: Moe is the bullying boss, Curley (that's the way his name was spelled at the time) is the childlike (and childish) innocent easily manipulated, and Larry is the one in the middle trying to just get along with whatever works for him. In this story written by all three, waiter Curley inadvertently becomes a boxer after fiddler Larry plays "Pop Goes the Weasel" at the restaurant Moe goes to when his fellow companions at the table get knocked out by the bald Stooge as the tune plays. I'll stop there and just say that the many gags as visualized by Lou Breslow provide enough laughs that make this short funny enough from beginning to end. Of special interest to me was finding out who plays the bored and sleepy bell ringer: Arthur Housman who usually plays drunks in the Laurel & Hardy shorts! He gets particularly highly amusing scenes whenever he gets one-upped by a boy that keeps throwing some food items to ring that bell before he gets to. So on that note, Punch Drunks gets a high recommendation from me. Oh, and seeing Curley bite his opponent's stomach made me think of when Mike Tyson did that to someone's ear and glad that's one thing a Stooge never did...

Pretty much on the same level of WOMAN HATERS (1934), though without the rhyming dialogue; ironically, the style of comedy seen here seems like a dry run for later Abbott & Costello efforts (with the comical prizefighting bout recalling that duo’s 1951 meeting with The Invisible Man)! Again, The Stooges consider female companionship as irresistible but essentially intrusive; Moe slaps his buddies around so often that one wonders whether anyone got hurt during the making of these films! An interesting twist here is that Curly’s combative skill is triggered by the playing of “Pop Goes The Weasel”; predictably, Larry’s playing of the song on his violin is made impossible during the decisive fight when Curly falls on top of him from the ring – thus causing Larry to run out of the arena to search for possible replacements (first coming up with a radio and then a truck fitted with a loudspeaker, which he drives through the walls of the building)!

The Three Stooges became independent in the summer of 1934 after the three broke away from their long-time manager and straight man Ted Healy. Inking a short-term contract with Columbia Pictures, the trio released their first 20-minute short film, May 1934's "Woman Haters," followed by July 1934's "Punch Drunks." Unusual for a Stooge film, the story was written by Moe Howard and refined into a working script by screenwriter Jack Chuett. Moe gave credit to himself, his younger brother Curly and acting partner Larry Fine for the story idea, the only one the team had ever composed from scratch.

"Punch Drunks" opens with each Stooge not knowing the other two, a most unusual introduction for them. Moe is a manager for three disgruntled boxers. He's having lunch with them when Larry, a violist who plays for food, walks in and opens his set with the song "Pop Goes The Weasel." The tune triggers the restaurant's timid waiter Curly into a frenzy. He proceeds to knock out the three boxers as well as the restaurant owner. Moe sees a golden opportunity. Gathering the two strangers, he has Larry play the song on his violin at ringside while Curly easily clobbers his opponents on the boxing circuit, sending him upwards in the ranks towards the title.

"Punch Drunks" established several firsts for the Stooges. Curly is first heard saying he's a "victim of soycumstance (circumstance)!" a phrase he uses to defend himself. When Curly gets excited hearing "Pop Goes The Weasel," he voices "woo-woo-woo" for the first time, which he'll use in future Stooges' films whenever he gets overly hysterical. "Punch Drunks" sees Curly agitated by either a song, a smell or a sight of something that will send him into a violent spasm, a pattern he'll use repeatedly. The film also exhibits Larry's talents on the violin, an instrument he took up as a child to strengthen his arms after he sustained an injury.

Like many Stooges' films where injuries occurred during filming, "Punch Drunks" proved no exception. Curly suffered a bloody nose and a cut lip when actor Al Hill, his boxing opponent named Killer Kilduff, was wailing away at him. In another sequence, Larry steals a truck broadcasting "Pop Goes the Weasel" over its loudspeakers. While he drives away, character actor Charles King, standing on the the back of the truck, was sent sprawling onto the pavement. King suffered a broken leg. In a rarity for a Stooges' film, Moe hits someone other than Curly or Larry. This occurs when one of his assistants gives Curly a rubdown in the ring between rounds, which causes Moe to smack him on the back of the head.

The title for the Stooges' second short was originally called 'A Symphony of Punches.' It was changed to "Punch Drunks" to reflect how a fighter is hit so many times he's stumbling like a person who has had too much liquor. The plot was later redeveloped by the Stooges, one with Shemp and another with Joe Rita in a feature film. Columbia Pictures prized the 1934 short so much the studio included a clip of it in Eddie Murphy's 2003 "Daddy Day Care." And the Library of Congress gave "Punch Drunks" the honor of being the only Three Stooges' film to be permanently preserved by its United States National Film Registry.

This, the 3 Stooges' second short for Columbia, is my all-time favorite. Perhaps it's because it's the only one that they themselves wrote. This was the first film to have the Stooges' famous "cure" for a tapeworm ("Four pieces of burnt toast and a rotten egg."). It also truly showcases Larry's violin-playing ability. The sight of Larry running down the streets looking for something playing "Pop Goes the Weasel" are hilarious. However, there were a bit of dangerous bits that came from this short: The actor playing Killer Kilduff actually bloodied Curley's lip and nose. The man on the truck that Larry takes to play "Weasel" broke his arm when he fell off the truck. Also, I think the ending has been cut, at least in the prints that I've seen. The ones I've seen show at least three or four other men stretched out in the ring with Kilduff at the end of the fight. Yet, no explanation of how they all got there. I'm thinking that PUNCH DRUNKS had a similar ending to the later GRIPS, GRUNTS AND GROANS, but is now cut for some reason. Has anyone ever seen the uncut version of this short? I'd really love to see it that way.

It's an early short for the Three Stooges. Moe (Moe Howard) is a greedy boxing promoter. While he's eating at a restaurant, poor musician Larry (Larry Fine) working for soup plays "Pop Goes the Weasel". Waiter Curley (Curly Howard) goes nuts and punches everybody. Moe has the brilliant idea to promote Curley as his next fighter while Larry plays the music.

It's early and this represents a lot of firsts for the guys. The production is not always the slickest. The guys do not start out together. However there is nothing funnier than the guys' slapstick. Curly has a field day doing the boxing. Larry does a bit in the water and pulls out a fish. It's not the sharpest but it is hilarious.

Yes what power what might when Larry plays "Pop goes the weasel." on the fiddle something pops inside of Curly so that he can K.O. everyone around. Curly as the result of this even get's The name of K.O. Bossey. You should even just watch and enjoy this for yourselves time after time to know what power and what punch it packs. This is The 2nd Three Stooges feature of their series of Columbia Pictures Shorts as well as outside of their time with their old time Boss of Ted Healy. I first recall seeing this in The Wintertime of 1972 and shortly after the New Year too. There first of course is "Women Haters."But others elsewhere on this site of IMDb think that this feature of Punch Drunks is there first feature and no wonder because it's got The best recognition.

Coitainly, Stephen "Steve" G. Baer a.k.a."Ste" of Framingham,MA,USA

What a great classic by the Three Stooges! This episode is mainly by Curly. In the beginning he is just an abused waiter, he takes too much from everyone. When Larry walks in just looking for some money by playing in the restaurant that Curly works in, he starts playing "Pop goes the Weasel". Curly has a snap reaction to the men he is serving, including Moe, and beats them all up. Moe has discovered Curly's talent as a boxer and wants to make money off of him, and he brings Larry along as the second helping hand. Eventually, this leads Curly to the big championship for boxing.

From one Three Stooges fan to another: Brilliant! 9/10

Moe discovers Curly's unknown boxing talent when he knocks out the Champ at a restaurant when Larry plays "Pop Goes the Weasal" on the violin. Moe becomes Curly's manager, and they win every fight, with the help of Larry. At the championship game, though, Larry's violin breaks.

The script for Punch Drunks was written by the Stooges, credited as "Jerry Howard, Larry Fine and Moe Howard". According to Moe, the initial treatment of the script was originated by Moe; on its strength, the studio decided to produce the Stooges' next film sooner than scheduled. The comedians released 190 short films for the studio between 1934 and 1959.

For anyone not familiar with the Stooges, this makes for a great introduction. Moe is not at his meanest, but Larry and Curly are doing their thing to the fullest extent. This was the height of slapstick comedy in the 1930s.

This second short subject by The Three Stooges is the first outstanding one, and easily one of their very best of all! Pretty much playing individual characters, Moe is a fight promoter down on his luck eating lunch at a restaurant one day when he sees that a violin player (Larry) whose uppity musical rendition of "Pop Goes the Weasel" has a profound impact on a dopey waiter (Curley) -- the tune instinctively makes him go berserk and beat customers up! Seizing the opportunity for success, Moe enlists Larry and Curley on his team to make millions by promoting Curley as his sensational new fighter. As far as Stooge comedies go, this is choice stuff - and funny throughout. **** out of ****

Right from the start with Larry is fiddling the "weasle" tune that vibrates Curly to k.o. everyone in sight and then Moe grabs Larry by the hair saying "Come with us we're now a corporation."Then all of the scenes of Curly winning a by a k.o. and This is even how Curly get's the name of K.O. Bossey for his boxer's name.

Contrary to many people's beliefs this is their second short subject feature while the first is Women Hater's.

Yes these are the features that hey did without their boss,Ted Healy

Coitainly,Stephen "Steve" G. Baer a.k.a."Ste"of Framingham,MA.USA

Have seen this episode over and over for more than 40 years and still remains my favorite Stooges short. Seems however, that some editing has been done in the end of the film where a bunch of guys are knocked out in the ring with no apparent reason. Curly knocked them all out but this footage seems to have been lost over the years. Anyone with a copy showing this action has a real treasure! Funniest parts are when Larry is serenading girl and Moe pours a bucket of water over his head. Moe crashes big wooden radio over Larry's head. Larry drives truck away with guy standing in back. Guy falls out onto street an actually breaks his arm in real life. Larry catches fish while standing on his head in a swamp.

Punch Drunks (1934), is a great start for the Three Stooges. With their first short, the baffling Woman Haters (1934), in their rearview mirror, Moe, Larry and Curly came out of the gate swinging, with this, their second film, Punch Drunks (1934). This short-subject captures the true essence, of what made the Three Stooges legendarily famous. In this film, they are young, energetic and deliver this fresh take on satirized boxing. It is a plot formula they will use many times later, with each incarnation of the third stooge. The boxing plotline is seen by every new generation of audiences, who followed them through the decades. Curly plays Stradivarius the boxer, who gets his anger from hearing Larry play "Pop Goes the Weasel" on his fiddle. The boys get mixed up with crooked gamblers and Curly must win the fight. We also get to see some of Larry's fiddling skills.

8.5 (B+ MyGrade) = 8 IMDB.

One of their best, written by Moe, but credited to all three, this was the first filmed piece where they could finally show off their talents properly. This would set the foundation for all the shorts that followed.

Having gotten out from under Ted Healy, this was their second Columbia short, but after a musical, tnis was pure comedy gold. As if they believed, "if you want something done right, do it yourself," thus they wrote this masterpiece, which laid the blueprint for all that followed. Even a few Curly gags and sayings were used in this, and many more shorts. Larry had a rare opportunity to really show off and not just be Moe's punching bag. Odd was the opening musical titles which obviously pre-dated the Stooges regular theme.

Curly plays a gentle and passive waiter. Who is bullied by a fight promoter(Moe)and his friends. And a strugling musican(Larry) plays Pop Goes the Weasel, and something snaps inside Curly, he becomes a mean fighting machine, and beats up the guys who were bullying him. But when Larry stops playing Pop Goes the Weasel Curly becomes gentle and passive again, and does not remember a thing. Moe sees the next champ in Curly and trains him. With Larry along for the ride. A Stooge classic. The funniest boxing scenes ever. Its Moe larry and Curly at there best.