Dig That Uranium (1955) User Reviews (10)

Three Cheers for Bernard Gorcey, Raymond Hatton and Carl Switzer

[wes-connors · 5/10 · 28 March 2009]

In a noticeably well-performed (and uncredited) opening, former "Our Gang" member Carl "Alfalfa" Switzer (as Shifty Robertson) arrives at Bernard Gorcey (as Louie Dumbrowsky)'s ice cream parlor and sweet shop, after being "found" by Huntz Hall (as Horace Debussy "Sach" Jones). Promising they will be millionaires, Mr. Switzer sells Leo Gorcey (as Terrence Aloysius "Slip" Mahoney) and "The Bowery Boys" his uranium mine. The deed is placed in the senior Gorcey's name (as he put up the $500). Of course, the trio, plus secondary "Bowery Boys" David "Condon" Gorcey (as Chuck) and Benny "Bennie" Bartlett (as Butch), don't know they've been flimflammed - but, the land proves to be more valuable than originally thought…

This was the last appearance of Bernard Gorcey (father of Leo and David); sadly, he died following a car accident, just before the release of "Dig That Uranium". The elder Gorcey performs well herein, and had become the most valuable supporting player in "The Bowery Boys" series. Leader of the pack Leo Gorcey would only last only one more film, which was thought to be due to his father's death; however, it appears he might be having problems, even now (before "Crashing Las Vegas").

Carl Switzer (a murder victim in 1959) performs his opening so well, it's a shame he wasn't asked to work more often. Earlier, Switzer worked with present "Bowery Boy" Bartlett and former "Dead End Kid" Billy Halop in the "East Side Kids" imitation "Gas House Kids" gang. Raymond Hatton (as Hank 'Mac' McKenzie) and the rest of the cast provide more reasons to watch an otherwise mediocre movie.

***** Dig That Uranium (12/25/55) Edward Bernds ~ Leo Gorcey, Huntz Hall, Bernard Gorcey, Raymond Hatton

When You Buy From Someone Named Shifty

[bkoganbing · 6/10 · 22 January 2011]

Now granted that the IQ level of The Bowery Boys isn't stratospheric despite Leo Gorcey's sophisticated linguistics, but even Slip and Satch should know better than to buy a mine from somebody known as Shifty.

What could they expect from Carl Switzer as this Shifty character. Yet the boys pack up and go to the desert, financed of course by the ever hapless Louie Dumbrowsky with Geiger counter in hand looking for uranium.

Of course they run into the usual crooks led by Harry Lauter with henchmen Myron Healey and Tom Keene who are almost as bad as the boys are. They convince themselves that the Bowery Boys have a uranium strike and the guys have to go through the usual routines to win the battle, but lose the war because you know they inevitably go back to The Bowery and we see them hanging around Louie's Sweet Shop.

Which is what makes Dig That Uranium so poignant because this was Bernard Gorcey's farewell film, he was killed in automobile accident right after the film was made. But Bernard had one of his finest hours in The Bowery Boys series in a poker game with the villain where sitting in the middle of the bad guys he gets dealt a winning end when they start passing cards back and forth under the table not knowing he's a middle man.

Mary Beth Hughes is the femme fatale as she usually is and gets a chance to vamp Huntz Hall. Her most memorable leading man since Henry Fonda in The Oxbow Incident, I'm sure. Raymond Hatton is also in the film playing his usual desert rat prospector who aids the Boys in teaching them the ways of the frontier.

A really nice film for Bernard Gorcey to have as a swansong.

"Fellas, it looks like we're dissolved with an enigma".

[classicsoncall · 6/10 · 22 January 2011]

Well I don't know what it is about this Bowery Boys flick, but it seemed more entertaining than most to me. Maybe it had to do with the fact that it took place in the great outdoors where the Boys had freer reign to go up against the bad guys. But now that I sit here and think about it, there were a few elements in the picture that one might consider disturbing. For starters, there was Slip (Leo Gorcey) instigating that barroom style brawl that the rest of the gang (except Sach) joined in with. It ended with Slip lying on the hotel desk fairly well pummeled by one of the baddies. That didn't look like much fun.

The other was even more gruesome. It was near the finale when the Boys removed the 'Road Closed' sign and the bad guys went over the cliff, their car exploding into dust. The Bowery response wasn't much more than being glad their troubles were over. Yeah I know, I'm probably reading too much into it, but these pictures were made for a youthful matinée crowd, and this wasn't even a 'real' Western.

On the flip side, there were some pretty funny bits, starting with Sach's (Huntz Hall) one sided dialog with the big Indian (Paul Fierro) - "Solid, Red Brother"! Then there's the poker game where Louie (Bernard Gorcey) cleans house against the villains, using the old under the table card switcheroo. Funny that that bit was never used before; at least I haven't ever seen it done.

Western TV and movie fans ought to enjoy seeing Harry Lauter and Myron Healey teaming up here with older veteran Tom Keene as the trio of bad guys trying to steal the Old Daisy Mine from Louie and the Boys. But as far as old veterans go, you'd have to go some to top Ray Hatton, appearing here as Hank McKenzie from Old Cheyenne. A quick look at his film history leads me to believe that he just might be top dog with a little over four hundred screen credits. And that's what we know about!

Well this would be the next to last Bowery Boys flick; I just learned from other reviewers on this board that Bernard Gorcey died right around the time this film was released. Son Leo would call it quits after just one more picture, and the Bowery Boys franchise would be history. Though the films weren't great cinema, they did manage to entertain legions of fans throughout their heyday, fracturing more different film genres than anyone else I can think of.

Bowery Boys #40

[Michael_Elliott · 2 February 2011]

Dig That Uranium (1955)

** (out of 4)

Flat, unfunny entry in the Bowery Boys series has the group heading out West after buying an uranium mine and equipment. Once out there it doesn't take them long to discover they've been ripped off but three bad guys from town thinks they actually have uranium so the boys must try and figure a way out of the trouble. The fortieths entry in the series isn't a very good film and it's also a rather somber one when you consider this was the last one to feature Bernard Gorcey who would be killed in an automobile wreck shortly after this film wrapped production. In his final film he at least gets some decent moments including one flashback sequence where he gets to play a bartender. The rest of the film contains one recycled gag after another and none of them are very funny. The entire bit with the boys buying something that turns out to be fake has been down countless times and nothing new is done here. The entire subplot of running into bad guys has also been done countless times and nothing new is to be seen here. There's even a joke with their car having to drive backwards, which was unfunny in JALOPY and it's unfunny here. At 61-minutes the thing at least has a good enough of a pace to keep things moving well but the lack of laughs just kills this thing. Both Leo Gorcey and Huntz Hall sleepwalk through their roles as they both lack any real energy. Mary Beth Hughes who some will remember from THE OX BOW INCIDENT isn't too bad as the femme fetale and we get Raymond Hatton playing a nutty miner. DIG THAT URANIUM doesn't have a single fresh idea and it's a shame because with a little more imagination I'm sure they could have done something with the film. Anything would have been better than this.

Do you dig it!

[sol1218 · 6/10 · 23 January 2011]

***SPOILERS*** The "Bowery Boys" get themselves involved in a phony uranium mine out in the wilds of Panther Pass Nevada when they, with sweet shop owner Louie Dumbrowski financing it, buy this dried up silver mine "Little Daisy" from double talking shyster Shifty Robertson. Told by Shifty that the mine is loaded with uranium the boys together with Louie take off for Panther Pass to stake heir claim.

It's when the boys arrive at Panther Pass that they run into a bunch of local hoods Joe Hody & Frank Loomis who together with the owner of the only hotel in town Ron Haskell are determined to keep everyone out of there! They know about the uranium mine and want it all for themselves. The only trouble is that the boys Slip Sach Butch Chuck together with Louie Dumbrowski bet them to it by having the deed, from Shifty Robertson, to the place!

Running into old grizzled prospector Hank MacKenzie and his faithful mule Josephine the boys find out that the nearest uranium is very probably at the 509th USAF Air Wing, who's B-52's carry nuclear weapons, outside of Roswell New Mexico! It's then they finally realized that they've been had by the shifty shifty Robertson! But Hody Loomis & Haskell who've been tracking them seem to think that the "Little Daisy" mine is the real thing and plan to knock the boys, together with Old Hank, off in order the get their greedy hands on it!

Fast moving antics with the "Bowery Boys" getting involved not only with local tugs but the native Indians in the area who end up getting the "Little Daisy" mine, that has since been discovered to in fact be loaded with the radioactive stuff, when it's found out that their its rightful,through a treaty with the US Government, owners. That's not after the "Boys" with Old Man Hank put Hody Loomis & Haskell on ice by having them drive off a cliff in them trying to ice them instead. There's also a very funny dream sequence in the film involving Slip and Sach as the clad in all white good guys of the Old West the "Lonegest Arrangers" who cleaned up Pahther Pass back in the 1880's when it wasn't fit for any law abiding citizen to live in.

****SPOILERS**** In the end the Boys end up cleaning up Panther pass of the tugs that are there now but it's Sach, always the lucky stiff in the "Bowery Boys" movies, who ends up getting the girl. Even though the girl was at first mistaken for a Spring Wildflower that the very unlucky Slip, who turned her down, would soon live to regret!

P.S "Dig that Uranium" was to be the last "Bowery Boys" movie that Bernard Gorcey as Bowery sweet shop owner Louie Dumbrowsky would be in. Bernard died on Sptember 11, 1955 from injuries he suffered in a traffic accident some two weeks earlier, on August 31, 1955, when his car smashed into a city bus in downtown L.A. The film was also that last "Bowery Boys" movie that "Bowery Boy" Benny Bartlett, who played Butch, was to appear in.

"Uranium, here we come!"

[utgard14 · 6/10 · 5 January 2017]

The fortieth (!) entry in the Bowery Boys series has the gang heading out west to strike it rich with a uranium mine. Um...yeah. Had to be there, I guess. It's a silly premise but at least it's something a little different for the aging series that had relied on repeating plots for awhile. Leo has quite a few funny malapropisms and Huntz mugs for the camera the whole time. Most of the comedy, hit and miss, comes from these two (which is par for the course for the series). Carl "Alfalfa" Switzer plays Swifty, the Boys' old friend who sells them on the uranium idea to get the story started. This would be the last appearance in the series for two longtime cast members. Wallpaper Bennie Bartlett would leave and be replaced by Jimmy Murphy. Benard Gorcey, who played the lovable Louie and was the father of Leo and David Gorcey, would die in a car accident after this film. His death would lead to Leo leaving after the next entry and ultimately would lead to the end of the series as the 'magic' was gone without Leo and his father. Anyway, this is an enjoyable entry despite the sad trivia behind it. The cast all put in a good effort and the uranium plot is interesting enough.

A pretty good one.

[pmtelefon · 6/10 · 9 September 2019]

I neglected The Bowery Boys for many years. Shame on me. Their movies were funny. Even though "Dig That Uranium" is one of their later ones, it's still pretty good. It has quite a few laughs. Its very short running time (61 mins) is a big plus. "Dig That Uranium" was a nice way to kill some time on a Saturday morning. Honorable mention: the poker scene.

The Bowery Boys Go West

[richardchatten · 6/10 · 30 April 2018]

The title of the fortieth Bowery Boys picture acknowledges that they were now living in the Atomic Age, but that it's a worthless uranium mine rather than gold or silver that the boys are duped into buying has no bearing on the plot other than that they look for it with a Geiger counter rather than by panning for it.

The action swiftly leaves the Bowery, and the bulk of the film is shot in the great outdoors of the Hollywood Hills pretending to be Nevada; which provides visual interest, as does Mary Beth Hughes, who shows promise as a potentially enticing femme fatale, but is woefully underused despite fourth billing (and switches from Bad Girl to Good Girl when she reappears in the bizarre spoof flashback sequence that looks suspiciously as if was shoehorned into the film to bring the running time up to feature length). Fifth billed silent veteran Raymond Hatton has a far more substantial role as a resourceful old-timer; although Carl 'Alfalfa' Switzer as the aptly named "Shifty", who sets the whole plot in motion in the first place, curiously goes uncredited.

Louie should surely have known better than to buy the mine from a character called Shifty Robertson - but what am I saying? Fortunately the villains - although played straight by the impressive-looking trio of Harry Lauter, Myron Healey and a moustached Tom Keene (here using his later alias of Richard Powers) and ruthlessly shooting to kill - prove even more inept than the Boys themselves, even managing to lose at cards to Louie, before meeting a remarkably violent end at the film's conclusion which eerily foreshadows Bernard Gorcey's own death just after shooting wrapped.

Wonderfully Entertaining

[plwblj · 8/10 · 17 July 2008]

One of my favorites when it comes to the Bowery Boys Series...indeed it is poignant that this was Louie's last appearance as he died in a car accident.

The series would never be the same and neither would Slip; but Huntz Hall bravely soldiered on as he was an under-rated comedic talent.

This episode has a modern feel to it and a lot of things came together to make this one an entertaining piece in the BB canon.

CHARACTER ACTORS have a vital role here:Raymond Hatton shines and i like Myron Healey as the "heel"

Louie needs to be singled out as a terrific foil;he is diffused w\charm and feistiness !

It's breezy and just plain fun....

Aging Cast Gets a Lift

[dougdoepke · 2 February 2011]

No one expects rocket science out of these grade school dropouts. Still, their brand of lowbrow comedy survived, even into the age of TV, big screen Technicolor, and blonde sex goddesses. Sure, Leo's got a middle-age spread, while Huntz is hitting 39. So, calling them "boys" requires a bit of squinting. Then too, the gang has dwindled to just four aging delinquents, plus granddad Bernard (Louie). But, truth be told, DTU is a pretty funny entry, thanks to some good set-ups and location work, snappy dialogue, and a capable supporting cast. That Sach-trapped-on-a-real-ledge scene is particularly well done, where economy would usually employ a cheesy set.

Note too how the boys are after uranium and not gold or silver or even oil. There was a brief Cold War period when atom bomb uranium was the object of weekend prospectors instead of the more usual precious metals. A Geiger Counter to register radio- activity was all that was needed. I guess my only complaint is about the billing. Why fellow 1930's youth actor Carl (Alfalfa) Switzer isn't credited seems odd. He's got an extended speaking part (Shifty) that should merit listing in the credits, which might also have helped his faltering career. Although their comedy act may be tired, the boys still show a lot of spark, making this one of their better later features.