Synopsis
Sach learns that he has inherited a farm in rural hillbilly country, and when he and the Boys arrive there, they find themselves mixed up with a hillbilly clan named Smith who'll shoot anybody named Jones, plus a gang of bank robbers.
1952 Directed by William Beaudine
Sach learns that he has inherited a farm in rural hillbilly country, and when he and the Boys arrive there, they find themselves mixed up with a hillbilly clan named Smith who'll shoot anybody named Jones, plus a gang of bank robbers.
Finally, hillbillies! The Bowery Boys enter the land of Hicksploitation. This is definitely funnier than Child Bride but not as great as Sassy Sue.
This does do a decent enough job having enough going on that it doesn't get weighed down by the Bowery Boys at a certain point, with this having both a hillbilly family and a group of bank robbers to keep tings a bit more interesting than it would be just on its own. That said, it doesn't do too much that actually feels particularly memorable or interesting in that regard. It ends up falling on the high end of 2 stars for me.
It's amazing how much mileage the Bowery Boys could get out of the most threadbare plot ideas. In this case, the New York knuckleheads travel to rural Kentucky, where one of Huntz Hall's distant relatives has left him a "plantation" (actually a broken-down shack). The guys get mixed up in a Hatfield/McCoys-type feud with a bunch of hillbillies played by the likes of O.Z. Whitehead, Dorothy Ford and Elizabeth Russell, then tangle with a bank robber (Lyle Talbot) who was shot during a heist and wants to hide out at their place. The best part of Feudin' Fools, as with most films in the Bowery series, is the duo of Leo Gorcey and his diminutive papa Bernard. I also find…
As the number of Bowery Boys comedies reached into the third dozen, Monogram needed new settings for the films, if not new plots. FEUDIN’ FOOLS sends the Boys from the Bowery to the Deep South, where Sach (Huntz Hall) has inherited a rundown farm from an uncle. When he arrives with Slip (Leo Gorcey), Chuck (David Gorcey), and Butch (Bennie Bartlett), he discovers that his family, the Joneses, have been feuding with the hillbillies next door, the Smiths, for generations.
Director William Beaudine takes the picture precisely where you would expect from gags about the city boys milking cows to the country cousins chugging moonshine liquor. And, of course, there’s a sexy hillbilly girl named Elly May (!!) played by…
I appreciate the fact that the third act happened because the writers needed a third act to happen.
Huntz Hall inherits a dirt farm and the Bowery Boys get involved with a Hillbilly feud that has run for generations. Lyle Talbot shows up as a gangster and there's lots of fun face-slapping. Good stuff.