Three Loan Wolves (1946) User Reviews

Needed More Of The Crooks To Compensate For Curly's 'Absence'

[ccthemovieman-1 · 6/10 · 27 May 2007]

"Here Today, Pawn Tomorrow" reasons the pawnshop sign where our three guys - Curly, Larry and Moe - have a shop. A little kid enters the store and wonders what's the story here as all three guys claim to be his father. They tell him the story, so we are flashed back into time, and the story begins with......

Moe beating on Larry for buying a fake bass fiddle. Then, the tough guy who sold him that cardboard "instrument" comes back looking for protection money. Curly tries to show him how tough he is, but he isn't. However, he accidentally knocks the guy out. Then he and Moe go out to lunch. Moe actually calls him Curly. I don't remember hearing that too often. It's usually an insult, never just "Curly." Maybe Moe felt sorry for him because, in real life, this was one of Curly's last shows as he had suffered several strokes. It wasn't long afterward that he was gone for good, sad to say. Anyway, Larry is left alone in the story and the next thing you know, there's a baby left in the place, courtesy of a "babe" who looked the class film noir brassy blonde.

How the guys handle trying the pacify the crying little baby is the bulk of the second half. Curly was in this episode, but at the same time, was about "absent," because you could tell his energy level wasn't the same. He gave it a good try, however.

Overall, it winds up just fair, to be honest. They could have done so much more if they involved the crooks more, and Beverly Warren but it's mainly just Moe hitting on the two other guys and Larry (called "Apple Head" a few times in here) getting the brunt of it. Because Curly wasn't physically up to par, we couldn't enjoy his normal great humor. Larry is okay, but he's no Curly.

Little Orphan Eggbert....

[simeon_flake · 8/10 · 18 April 2007]

For years I've wondered if there was a more ungrateful cinema brat than the wiseacre kid from this short film. After all our stooges did raising this little chump when even his own mother apparently didn't go to any great lengths to find him, and what kind of thanks do they get--a triple slap to the kisser; and a slap that must have been edited before its initial release, but still noticeable despite the rough jump in the film.

At any rate, I'm looking over the cast credits and "Eggbert" was apparently the boy's given name in this story. "Eggbert Howard" or maybe "Eggbert Fine Howard"... with a name like that, maybe the kid had a right to be ticked?!

I rate this one higher than most, perhaps because I have bad taste (I've been told so a few times) or more likely I just think Larry owns in this episode. "The bag left me holding the babe."

Stooges Jr.

[SnoopyStyle · 7/10 · 20 March 2020]

Larry, Curly, and Moe tell their son of how he came to have three fathers. The guys inherit a pawn shop from their uncle. Hoodlum Butch McGee comes in to collect money for the gashouse protection society. Curly accidentally knocks him out. Molly and Butch are hiding from the cops. She's holding her sister's baby to throw them off. The criminal duo decides to leave the baby in the pawn shop.

I'm not a fan of gunplay with the Stooges. This one goes the next step by giving it to a baby. Larry seems to have a bit more to do in this one. He gets a few scenes by himself. Curly is probably struggling to carry his weight at this point. He still has a few good wacks in him. Otherwise, this is a solid Stooges short.

One of the weaker Three Stooges short with Curly

[stooge60540 · 11 July 2001]

As most shorts with Curly when he was sick, this was pretty weak. The plot deals with the Stooges telling their adopted son a flashback story of who his real mother is, and how they found him. Not only was the plot weak (the "baby" theme was never one of the Stooges' stronger recurring themes). What's really strange about this is that Larry and Curly's roles appear to have been switched. Larry is the star of the short and gets most of the attention and lines, and Curly hardly has any lines and is pushed into the background. This was strange - it's usually the other way around. I'm guessing Larry and Curly's roles were switched because Curly wasn't up to following the original script. While Larry has some funny lines here, I don't think that he can really carry a short by himself. He's a lot funnier as the middleman, and he's had better shorts where he's shined (FUELIN' AROUND for example), and a lack of Curly in this short is too noticeable. Not a great short.

Daddies

[bkoganbing · 6/10 · 17 May 2020]

Thius is one of the few if not the only 3 Stooges short where where the story is told in flashback. Young Jackie Jackson is wondering how he wound up with Moe,, Larry, and Curly as fathers. Not as good as Ted Danson, Tom Selleck and Steve Guttemberg to be sure.

Back in the day the boys ran a pawn shop hey get muscled by a protection racket gang. These guys should have known better than mess with the boys who handle it all in Stooge style. In it all the leader's moll leaves her infant son as she flees.

The fight with the gangsters is appropriately hilarious.

Good Three Stooges short!

[Movie Nuttball · 10/10 · 28 October 2004]

The Three Stooges has always been some of the many actors that I have loved. I love just about every one of the shorts that they have made. I love all six of the Stooges (Curly, Shemp, Moe, Larry, Joe, and Curly Joe)! All of the shorts are hilarious and also star many other great actors and actresses which a lot of them was in many of the shorts! In My opinion The Three Stooges is some of the greatest actors ever and is the all time funniest comedy team!

This is a good Three Stooges short. Tiny Braur plays a good part and he and the beautiful Beverly Warren make a good couple. She also performs very good! Also appearing in this one is Joe Palma. The Stooges are all good and the baby scenes are good. This one is similar like the other Three Stooges short with Curly called Sock-A-Bye Baby which is just as good. I recommend both of them to Three Stooges fans!

Weak late-curly film, but Larry shines

[jimtinder · 5/10 · 17 June 2003]

The Stooges, in flashback, tell their son how he came to be adopted by them. In the flashback, they are pressured by a protection racket to come up with protection money -- or else. In the usual Stooge chaos and confusion that follows, Larry is left to care for the gun moll's baby! What will the Stooges do?

"Three Loan Wolves" is among the dozen Stooges films from 1945-46 that clearly shows Curly Howard was not a well man. During this time he had some highs where he seemed like the old Curly ("Micro-Phonies") and lows where his strength was at a low ebb. "Three Loan Wolves" falls into the "low ebb" category. Curly's voice croaks and crumbles; listen to how muffled and congested his voice sounds when he says "Watch me!" as he uses the punching bag.

Due to Curly's illness, Larry gets most of the screen time, and to his credit, he shines. Larry's comedic talents are put to the test in his first featured Stooge role, and he comes through admirably. It is obvious that Larry's role was written for Curly, but Larry is able to handle it with his own distinct panache.

There is a disturbing scene in the film where Curly allows the baby to teethe on a loaded pistol. Clearly these Stooges are not capable of raising a child!

An interesting short, notable only for Curly's illness and Larry's featured role. 5 out of 10.

Curly should have been allowed to rest and recover.

[maxcellus46 · 3/10 · 10 December 2005]

This is a perfect example of what I consider to be exploiting someone. Here it is that Curly has already had several mild strokes and yet because of "contractural obligations" he is forced to work. The Stooges should have sought out a real sharpie lawyer on this one. For me this is a painful short to watch in that we're looking at someone who in all the other earlier shorts is so full of life and literally steals every scene and now appears to be just part of the staging and unable to do any of his old stuff. Harry Cohn of Columbia must have been a real "nice" guy to work for. A real sweatshop type of slave driver. The actress Jean Arthur summed it up pretty well when she remembered the day her contract at Columbia was through. She said, "Now I'm free!"

Curly's speech was impaired

[wobsaxoshin · 3/10 · 7 June 2006]

I agree that curly was forced to use comedy routines when he was ill having had at least one previous stroke(April 1945).His speech was impaired and he appeared to have difficulty getting out every word.He also didn't appear to be using his right upper extremity very well and appeared a bit befuddled.Even in March 1946 Curly needed extensive medical attention for his hypertension and we all know what happened May 6th,1946.This was also Harold Brauer's first short with the stooges. It appeared as though Larry Fine had taken some of the comic burden off Curly's shoulders and he was very funny,but Curly's performance was just sad.Despite this the short was not that bad on the whole;though it appeared to drag a bit and trick photography was used but surprisingly no old stock footage.

How the Stooges became dads

[Horst_In_Translation · 4/10 · 17 January 2018]

"Three Loan Wolves" is an American black-and-white 17-minute live action short film from 1946, so this one is from right after WWII and already over 70 years old. It is another collaboration between Jules White, Felix Adler and the Three Stooges, at that point still in the formation including Curly, even if his exit wasn't far away anymore and you could see it when watching him. This is one of the rare occasions where a Stooges short through the use of flashbacks (actually the entire film is a flashback) takes place within several years as we find out where the little boy is from that we see with the trio early on and at the very beginning. I must say though that this framework added almost nothing for me and I have no idea whey they decided to include it. Everything in-between is tolerable, but not memorable by any means either. As a whole, this is another short film that is fairly forgettable from start to finish and the writing simply isn't good enough to make any impact at all, even if the cast manages to elevate the material at times. Only worth seeing for the very biggest Stooges/Curly lovers. Everybody else can skip it and they won't be missing much. I give it a thumbs-down overall.

The star here is Larry!

[slymusic · 23 May 2005]

"Three Loan Wolves" is a fairly weak Three Stooges short, made the more painful to watch because of Curly's poor health at the time. BUT because he and Larry switch roles, Larry really gets his opportunity to shine through! When given the chance, Larry could be absolutely hilarious in his own right. Actually, I'm not sure that "Three Loan Wolves" is the first Stooge film in which Larry had the lead role; he also seems to be the central part of the story in the Stooges' first Columbia short, "Woman Haters" (1934).

Highlights from this short (DO NOT read on if you have not yet seen it) include Larry playing his own guitar rendition of "The Old Oak and Bucket," which causes Moe and Curly to cringe with embarrassment. Then Moe smashes the guitar on Larry's head, and as he does so, water emerges from the guitar's body! Larry shrieks, "Where did the water come from?!" Moe replies, "From 'The Old Oak and Bucket'!" Then Moe discovers that Curly purchased a fake double bass (a "bull fiddle" in colloquial terms) for the Stooges' pawn shop. Larry also receives his share of smacks and belts from Moe and Curly at the film's conclusion.

One final point: I wholeheartedly agree that the scene involving the infant sucking on a loaded pistol is the one scene in "Three Loan Wolves" that was done in very bad taste and surely caused parental outrage.