I mean, it's nice to see Joe E. Brown playing a real character (meek, bookish, neurotic) instead of a gag machine, and Ruth Hall is charming, but Dorothy Lee's character is the real surprise here: they could have made her into a shallow, vain beauty, or an idiot, or a b*tch, but instead they made her intelligent and quirky; her "psychoanalysis session" with Brown is certainly the highlight of the picture. **1/2 out of 4.
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gridoon202420 July 2020
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vincentlynch-moonoi27 November 2014First, I have to disagree strongly with one of our reviewers who claimed that Joe E. Brown was "a minor film comic". Really? In 1933 and 1936, he was one of the top ten money makers in American cinema.
It's a tricky business introducing pathos into a film comedy. How much is too much? In this film the pathos outbalances the comedy...but it works. True, this is not one of Brown's funniest films, but it may be his most endearing portrayal -- a college botanist who is remarkably timid, especially around girls. Ironically, Brown was 42 when he played a college student here, but his real natural athletic ability made him seem far younger.
Most viewers probably won't recognize any of the other actors in the film, but they all do what they need to do to make this film so much more substantial than Brown's films even one year previous.
The film is humorous rather than out-and-out funny, but Brown's acting is probably better here.
I enjoyed it a lot! -
Joe E. Brown was the biggest comic of the late twenties/thirties with Harold Lloyd on the wane and Chaplin in semi-retirement. This is far from one of his best, though it has a Lloyd's "Freshman" feel to it. It has a shy boy/geek tells girl back home, he's a jock. Girl is coming over and he has to prove he's a jock. I remember a few laughs, cheap laughs that is, of the Adam Sandler variety. The trademark yodel/yelp of the star which he did in all his movies is fun when it's done. It has the lack of movement of early talkies and surprisingly, very perfunctory direction by Mervyn Leroy. All in all, 6/10. But I think kids will love it.
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mbrindell28 July 2011"Local Boy Makes Good" is a fine entry on Brown's resume.
As has been mentioned by other reviewers, this movie's subject matter has been covered better before (i.e., Lloyd's "The Freshman"); however, one should keep in mind that this movie is an early talkie, so it provides opportunities for gags that weren't generally available to earlier filmmakers, and Brown makes the best of these new opportunities.
Having come from the stage, Joe E. Brown is as much a verbal comedian as he is a physical one. Both of these comedic attributes shine in this film.
I am not a big Brown fan. I've always viewed him as a minor film comic, albeit near the top of the minor film-comedian list. He achieved film popularity during his middle age (he was nearly 40 when this early-in-his-film-career movie was made). No sooner had he got his movie career rolling along than it was time for the studios to move him out and bring in younger blood. Having said this, I enjoyed this film. It is a pleasant time capsule.
It is pre-Code, so be prepared for and enjoy the many saucy word games and rapid-fire, risqué repartee between Brown and the ladies.
And speaking of the ladies: They are a pair of knock outs to be sure. Lee and Hall acquit themselves in a fine manner.
One last word: If you want to truly appreciate Brown's contribution to Wilder's "Some Like It Hot," I believe you must acquaint yourself with his earliest films. "Hot" is not the movie to "discover" Brown's talents. It's done with "Local Boy," and films like it. -
Ron Oliver5 October 2003A LOCAL BOY MAKES GOOD when a shy botany student joins the University of Ohio's track team to impress the beauty queen he idolizes.
Comic Joe E. Brown does the best he can in this not-very-funny collegiate comedy, going over the same ground Harold Lloyd plowed to greater effect during silent days. It is not Brown's fault, the script is almost unrelenting in denying him any significant laughs. Not until the final sequence, when Brown must prove himself at the big track meet or forever live in ignominy, does he come into his element - with the help of a pretty girl's kiss and a strong shot of alcohol. Even the intensely annoying rear screen projection cannot destroy the fun of watching Joe ham it up.
Dorothy Lee, temporarily escaped from Wheeler & Woolsey, plays the girl of Joe's dreams. As ever, she is kewpie-doll cute and it is great to see her, but her role as a psychology student desperate to engage with Joe's emerging libido is rather bizarre and a bit risqué. Easier to swallow is lovely Ruth Hall, the coed who admires Brown in silence. Edward Woods is Miss Lee's bullying boyfriend who can't wait to dig his spikes into Brown's flesh. Edward J. Nugent plays the team captain who befriends Joe after witnessing his remarkable sprinting ability.
Movie mavens will recognize Maude Eburne as a sympathetic maid. -
planktonrules10 September 2011Although Joe E. Brown was pretty popular in the 1930s, I have never been a huge fan as too often his character has been pretty hard to like. Too often he played cocky characters--ones you really DIDN'T want to see have a happy ending. Films like "Alibi Ike" and "Elmer the Great" present Joe as a blow-hard--which is interesting, as these are two of his more popular bigger movies. Now this does not mean he always played this sort of guy--but it was very, very common. Here in "Local Boy Makes Good", fortunately, he's very likable--the sort of guy you pull for and want to succeed.
Brown plays a nerd. He's very bookish, loves botany and wears thick geeky glasses. Other college students make fun of him and girls pretty much ignore him. However, his quite world is thrown for a loop when two girls come into his life. His pen pal (Dorothy Lee), decides to come watch him at the next track meet. The problem, however, is that he's NOT an athlete and he lied to her about this to impress her. His new co-worker (Ruth Hall) obviously likes Joe but he doesn't notice. She likes him enough to try to help him and suggests he goes out for the track team. He's in big trouble because an errant javelin he threw nearly gores the star of the team. And when the star of the team chases him, he runs so fast that the coach is convinced Joe will be their next star. But, when the coach and players look for him, Joe hides--he thinks he's in trouble and they want to beat him up! Eventually, they find him and convince him they DON'T want to hurt him and offer to put him on the team. And, in the mean time, Lee arrives and helps them convince Joe to join. It seems that she's quick to forgive him for lying and is still quite impresses...even though he's a mild-mannered geek. Can Joe make good on the team? And, which girl will get Joe--the popular pen pal or the sweet co-worker?
Overall, this is a very enjoyable film. While it's not among the funnier films of the era, it is a nice film--with very likable characters. My only complaint is the scene following Hall kissing him--it did seem WAY overdone. Still, it's a nice little film from start to finish.
By the way, Dorothy Lee is a familiar face if you have watched some Wheeler & Woolsey films. This high-pitched lady appeared in nearly all of the team's films as Wheeler's love interest--and they sang a lot of duets together. She was quite cute, though apparently rather humble--as she once said she had no idea what people saw in her in these films! FYI--I just checked her biography and was surprised to see that she was married six times...yikes.
Also, while you might look at Brown and wonder why they cast him in the film in a role playing a star athlete, he actually was amazingly talented when it came to sports.
By the way, they were able to sneak one past the censors on this one. Again and again, Joe referred to a plant he was working on--the 'Zinnia Coptafeel'. I wonder how many people understood what he was saying here?! -
Oskado28 July 2003The plot, the budget, the playtime - even the slapstick - are modest in scope. As a result, the lead four actors and a camera with wonderful eye had what seems to me a "hands-free" opportunity to actually act and create a work with poetic charm. Joey and co-players are young, attractive, and exuberant, and share their humor with us across a gulf of seventy years. But that humor's consistently the stuff of which good comedy is made: incongruous play with high-tone ideas (Freudian dream analysis, botany), and characters battling their way through seas of foibles, inhibitions, mistaken word choices, vanities, and longings for things totally inappropriate.
From works like this evolved - to my mind - all the better comedies to follow, from My Friend Godfrey, to the Pierre Richard films, the best of Albaladejo and his superb team, Shall we Dansu, Woody Allen's best works, Mad, Mad, Mad, World, or films like The Loved One, or Christmas Vacation. This may be a low budget film, but its ideas are not cheap - they target a common, human soul riddled with weaknesses and self-doubts we all share. And wow! Did I like Joe E. Brown and his fabulous colleagues in Midsummer Night's Dream - what a treasure.
What a shame Hollywood all but dropped the baton - trading delicacy off in exchange for a bullying big-industry get-rich marketing clique to exploit ad tedium a totally different lowest common denominator. -
normvog29 July 2011Despite the other reviewer's opinion, as far as pathos goes, this is easily one of Joe E. Brown's best films, and easily outshines "The Freshman" (which, imho, was one of Lloyd's poorest films).
We've all been in situations where we're afraid of something/someone, and have to meet it, face it, if we are to move ahead in Life. Brown is the Every Man in this film, and we can all identify with him. (Much moreso than Lloyd).
Dorothy Lee & Ruth Brown are (as they would say in the 30's)"easy on the eyes", as well (!) and it's interesting to hear Lee talk about "sex", "libido", etc back then.