We can all agree that the original Stooges with Curly and Shemp will always be the best, but this at least tried to do something different. Did it work? That's up to the person watching, but it could have been much, much worse.
I think the biggest issue is that this doesn't seem like a traditional Stooges sketch (obviously), but what I mean is that it feels like you're almost watching two completely different movies. You have the Stooges and then you have a sci-fi movie. The Stooges are doing what they do best (even if the slapstick is toned down by this point in their career because of Karen's , they existed then too]) and the sci-fi is just doing sci-fi. It feels like it's to conflicting genres that don't meld together, like someone had an idea for a movie, but they didn't have enough to fill it and someone said "hey, let's throw in the Three Stooges" or the other way around. The sci-fi wants to be serious and the Stooges wants to be goofy and that just doesn't work well together.
It's well known that movies from this era always pictured the lead male characters as bull-headed with a "take what I want" attitude. You have to forgive them for this because that's what it was like when making these movies back then and it may seem sexist by today's standards (I'm not going any further than that). However, Dr. Ted Benson just needs to be smacked upside the head. Even by 50's movie standards, I thought this character was way out of line and the fact that the love interest, Dr. Ingrid, even fell for him was a slap in the face of everyone watching. I understand that none of the Stooges would have ended up with her (it's not their style), but I felt really uneasy watching his performance and the way he literally forces himself on her.
At a budget of $380,000 (only 3.5mil adjusted for today), it does have some rather decent practical effects, especially considering this is a Stooges movie and not a dedicated sci-fi movie we're used to from this era. While the giant spider is just a silhouette, it's at least convincing that it's really there on the ground with the other actors. There's a scene where the Stooges are made smaller and stuffed in a cage that was done very well and it was almost seamless from closeups to wide shots showing the difference in sizes. There is also a scene of Stooges doubles that appear on screen with the real Stooges and while I know matting techniques aren't really anything new, it's rare to see an actor playing his literal clone on the screen with himself at the same time (let alone three) in movies like this.
I can't say this would have worked better as a traditional Stooges sketch, but it was apparent that the writers didn't have much to work with and tried to pad out the run time by making many scene unnecessarily longer than they needed to be. Then party scene at the end is a perfect example, it just seems like it should have been half the length, but they kept drawing it out longer and longer. There are a few scenes where you will be wondering when it ends.
Overall, this was still a fun movie to watch, but it probably would have been much better if it had been done earlier in the life of the franchise.
I think the biggest issue is that this doesn't seem like a traditional Stooges sketch (obviously), but what I mean is that it feels like you're almost watching two completely different movies. You have the Stooges and then you have a sci-fi movie. The Stooges are doing what they do best (even if the slapstick is toned down by this point in their career because of Karen's , they existed then too]) and the sci-fi is just doing sci-fi. It feels like it's to conflicting genres that don't meld together, like someone had an idea for a movie, but they didn't have enough to fill it and someone said "hey, let's throw in the Three Stooges" or the other way around. The sci-fi wants to be serious and the Stooges wants to be goofy and that just doesn't work well together.
It's well known that movies from this era always pictured the lead male characters as bull-headed with a "take what I want" attitude. You have to forgive them for this because that's what it was like when making these movies back then and it may seem sexist by today's standards (I'm not going any further than that). However, Dr. Ted Benson just needs to be smacked upside the head. Even by 50's movie standards, I thought this character was way out of line and the fact that the love interest, Dr. Ingrid, even fell for him was a slap in the face of everyone watching. I understand that none of the Stooges would have ended up with her (it's not their style), but I felt really uneasy watching his performance and the way he literally forces himself on her.
At a budget of $380,000 (only 3.5mil adjusted for today), it does have some rather decent practical effects, especially considering this is a Stooges movie and not a dedicated sci-fi movie we're used to from this era. While the giant spider is just a silhouette, it's at least convincing that it's really there on the ground with the other actors. There's a scene where the Stooges are made smaller and stuffed in a cage that was done very well and it was almost seamless from closeups to wide shots showing the difference in sizes. There is also a scene of Stooges doubles that appear on screen with the real Stooges and while I know matting techniques aren't really anything new, it's rare to see an actor playing his literal clone on the screen with himself at the same time (let alone three) in movies like this.
I can't say this would have worked better as a traditional Stooges sketch, but it was apparent that the writers didn't have much to work with and tried to pad out the run time by making many scene unnecessarily longer than they needed to be. Then party scene at the end is a perfect example, it just seems like it should have been half the length, but they kept drawing it out longer and longer. There are a few scenes where you will be wondering when it ends.
Overall, this was still a fun movie to watch, but it probably would have been much better if it had been done earlier in the life of the franchise.