Have Rocket, Will Travel (1959)

Very disappointing...

Brilliant and touching

This is a must-see and one of the best documentaries - and films - of this year.

It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

This wasn't up to the standards of the shorts shown on TV. Moe just just wasn't himself - he seemed kind of bewildered delivering his lines - not his self-assured meaness. Larry was just fine. Joe DeRita didn't cut it at Curly Joe but he sure tried. Speaking of short I didn't realize how short they were. And it is a shame how they were shorted on earnings never being paid more than $20,000 a year each.If their movies ever came to my hometown I never saw them - it was the first time I had seen DeRita as a stooge. I wouldn't have liked the musical/singing numbers. Not very stooge like. The whole film seemed lacking and a far cry from the superior Abbott & Costello Go to Mars (even though it was Venus) made six years earlier. As Svengoolie stated "the Abbott and Costello vision of Venus was the preferred one."

The planet Venus is populated by energy…that and a lonely robot. Make energy, a lonely robot and a tarantula which shoots fire out of its fangs. Oh, don't forget a squeaky voiced unicorn whom the Three Stooges rescue when they discover it caught with its horn caught in a rock. How the boys get to Venus is pretty forgettable, but unfortunately, it takes them forever to get there. They are good hearted, however, determined to help kind-hearted scientist Anna-Lisa invent a fuel which will get the rocket tipped upside down outside their shack upside right and prevent her boss (Jerome Cowan) from firing her. In the process, they pop popcorn, discover that sugar makes a great fuel (especially when Moe drinks the fuel by mistake, thinking it's coffee), and turn the plumbing business back fifty years in an effort to find the key to the spaceship which fell down a drain. Kids of the late 1950's might have found this funny, but this wouldn't cure the A.D.D. of today's youth who would find this instantly idiotic. Robert Colbert, the hero of "The Time Tunnel" and the original patriarch of "The Young and the Restless", is pretty much wasted as a fellow scientist in love with the pretty Anna-Lisa, basically standing back observing the goings-on of the foolish Three Stooges whose comedy even 30 years after their first appearances together is violent and dated, especially when presented to a young audience. An attempt to bring slapstick in with three robot versions of the boys coming down to earth after harassing the shrunken ones on Venus just falls flat. Then, there's a fight started at a lavish social gathering to honor the returned stooges, crowned heroes, in the film's ridiculous finale. Joe DeRita is a poor substitute for the late Curly, and the title song is weak as well. Stick with the shorts. At least they are over within 20 minutes.

The Three Stooges had about the longest run of any act in the Short Subject field. As an act on their own (after Ted Healy),their career went from 1934 ("WOMAN HATERS") to 1958, when the last of the 2 reelers featuring Joe Besser as the third Stooge was released. It was just about then that COLUMBIA PICTURES decided to release their backlog to Television.After all, the Stooges were now out dated, has beens.Curly and Shemp Howard, who both gave so much energy to the act, were both now gone.Well, the shorts made it to local TV stations, and kids who had never heard of finger pokes and tearing out of tonsils rapidly became their greatest fans. Everyone was watching. All of a sudden, The Stooges were a hot item. Personal appearances,comic books, records, bubble gum cards and all sorts of other merchandising appeared on the scene.Ironically, the Stooges got no financial rewards for their old Columbia Shorts being shown on TV. But if it weren't for their timely release, none of the rest would be possible.Naturally, there would be more motion pictures, but the short subject field was really nothing by now. So, it was decided that "the boys" would go into feature films. The first, HAVE ROCKET WILL TAVEL was produced and played the neighborhood shows in 1959, in the Autumn I think.Well, when we saw the advertisements on TV, we (there were 5 of us Ryan Kids)let out a cheer. It was at our neighborhood theater, and it was Saturday. We went to the Matinée that day. Well, it was us and every other kid in the neighborhood at the Ogden Theater that day. The Stooges' comeback was in full swing now.As a Stooges'picture,it was both familiar and different. They had been in features before, but not as the starring act. They went through the sci-fi story well enough. The story did incorporate a lot of schtick from their old 2 reeler days. The 3rd Stooge was now veteran Burlesque Comic Joe DeRita (nicknamed 'Curly Joe') who bore some general resemblance to Curly Howard, who of course died in 1952. The story had a sort of romantic sub-plot between two of the professors at the space institute. (the female character called 'Dr. Ingrid', played by Anna Lisa a Scandanavian actress who looked sort of like a 'road show' Ingrid Bergman. They even had a short musical interlude, using a forgettable song.Oh well,at least it gave us a good time to slip out to the lobby and get some popcorn.When we left the show that Saturday, we were a little disappointed with Have Rocket Will Travel (the title a spoof of a popular western TV series of that day). Just about every kid thought that it could have been better.But, on the other hand, it was a new Stooges picture, and that was truly good news.Perhaps the greatest irony of this "comeback" film was that it is the first Stooges film that was made for the juvenile trade. Even though it was those kids who were responsible for the Stooges' resurgence, their previous movies were made for general audience viewing.

Have Rocket, Will Travel is a hilarious film starring The Three Stooges,Anna-Lisa,Jerome Cowan.It is directed by David Lowell Rich. The Stooges play janitors at a space research center that get blasted off into orbit. The film is fast paced and funny, but lacks on the Stooges trademark physical comedy that was performed from the 1920's from the 1950's. The Stooges film "The Three Stooges In Orbit" is similar to this because there is a comedy plot that has to do with science fiction and aliens. A "must-see" for every fan of the Stooges.