Three Men in a Tub (1938) User Reviews (5)

Boat Racin' With The Little Rascals

[Ron Oliver · 7/10 · 17 May 2000]

An OUR GANG Comedy Short.

When Darla's affections turn from Alfalfa to Waldo & his miniature yacht, it's time to fight back. Challenging the verbose twerp to a boat race, Alfalfa skippers a floating contraption of his own, crewed by Buckwheat & Porky. Are these THREE MEN IN A TUB really up to the contest?

Not a lot of laughs in this little film. Waldo's persiflage & Darla's histrionics become rather annoying. Highlight: the three-duck power engine.

Three Men in a Tub was the first Our Gang short to showcase a rival for Alfalfa's affections for Darla

[tavm · 8/10 · 2 January 2015]

This Hal Roach comedy short, Three Men in a Tub, is the one hundred sixty-fifth entry in the "Our Gang/Little Rascals" series and the seventy-seventh talkie. Alfalfa is peeved that Darla didn't show up for the gang picnic, thinking she's taking care of a younger sibling. Then he sees her actually with Waldo in his boat! So he challenges him to a boat race. Hmmm, I wonder who wins and gets Darla's hand...This marked the first time Alf had a rival for Darla's affections and it's handled quite hilariously with the requisite clichés concerning fickle women, spurned lover, and arrogant rival. Darwood Kaye really shines as Waldo with his nonchalant attitude about his superiority. So on that note, Three Men in a Tub is worth seeing. P.S. This was the first of two shorts in the series directed by one Nate Watt. He had previously directed some Hopalong Cassidy westerns.

Some folks went bananas back in the 1900s . . .

[pixrox1 · 7/10 · 18 May 2018]

. . . over the nautical peril depicted during a seemingly endless bladder-busting flick titled TITANIC. Folks alive back then seemed to think that TITANIC was the best thing since sliced pickles. Obviously, few if any of these swill-slurping customers over-praising TITANIC had ever been exposed to the far superior THREE MEN IN A TUB. Romance, dirty tricks, reckless seamanship--all of the so-called "highlights" of TITANIC--are featured in spades during THREE MEN IN A TUB, and then some. Clocking in at under 11 minutes, this "Our Gang" outing features an economy of scale which efficiently provides ALL the thrills of "Mr. C's" six-hour snooze fest WITHOUT killing your whole evening. "Little Rascals" Producer "Roach" even manages to throw in a checkers lesson or two to frame Our Gang's adventure on the high seas. With its yawning chasms and unexpected abysses, "Lake Toluca" seems a much less hospitable locale than a placid North Atlantic broken up by only an occasional ice chip in its tea cup. Millennials who have yet to view either of these films can save themselves a lot of time and trouble by opting for THREE MEN IN A TUB over TITANIC.

Our Gang have a boat race

[Leofwine_draca · 5/10 · 19 March 2017]

THREE MEN IN A TUB is a late-era Our Gang effort which feels very much like the team are simply going through the motions, although it's not without merit in the slapstick stakes. The story sees the gang members interrupted by the arrival of a love rival, so they decide to challenge him to a boat race with outlandish consequences. It's simplistic stuff but has some nice little camera tricks to recommend it.

Barely adequate--the series is treading water.

[planktonrules · 4/10 · 3 February 2012]

The very nerdy and ridiculously adult Waldo is wooing Darla in his mini-boat in this episode. The gang naturally hate Waldo since he's a bookish rich kid and challenge him to a boat race--him and his fancy boat and them with their piece of trash homemade boat.

There's a lot to dislike in this episode of Our Gang. Like most of their later shorts, this one looks rushed and lacked the comedic touch of the earlier films. A few examples of the shoddy quality of this one includes the use of rather poor rear projection, the flag blowing the wrong direction on the boat (simple details like this should have been caught) and, inexplicably, bad overacting by Darla Hood. While she'd made quite a few shorts before this one, here she really hams it up later in the film. In addition, there just isn't that much comedy in this one.