User Reviews

Back in the 1920s, Harry Langdon made some dandy comedies...mostly with Frank Capra directing. However, Langdon apparently wasn't very bright...and he left the studio to do films his way. His way was apparently code for 'dull', and the shorts he made post-Capra were pretty limp. Of all these, his last shorts were for Columia....and this isn't surprising as this studio made a habit out of hiring folks who were down and out. This was, believe it or not, true of the Three Stooges...who bombed in most of their shots with MGM. In addition, Columbia hired Buster Keaton and Charley Chase when they both were down-and-out....and this was true with quite a few other comedians of the era.

I've seen several of Langdon's shorts he made for Columbia and I'm gonna be blunt...they're mostly unfunny and dull. Is "Tireman, Spare My Tires" any better?

When the story begins, Harry picks up a lady hitchhiker. He recognizes her as a rich society lady and apparently she's traveling incognito--much like Claudette Colbert in "It Happened One Night" (incidentally, a film directed by Capra). It then gets very weird when a government worker stops the car and requisitioned the new tires for the war effort. Now it was true that new tires, new cars and the like were impossible to get during the war years....but I strongly doubt if folks just came to take the tires you already own off your car!

Through the course of the rest of the short film, the pair set up house--much like Gable and Colbert did in parts of "It Happened One Night". This sort of stuff was entertaining in the original film...but not funny. In "Tireman, Spare My Tires" it's also not funny.

So what we have here is yet another less than trilling short by Langdon. It's a darn shame, as he was capable of so much more but with pedestrian writing and direction, you can't expect much.

Runaway heiress. Louise Currie blackmails Harry Langdon into helping her run away.

There's little of Harry on display in this comedy. Instead, director Jules White has them reenact one of the standard gag sequences he would use time and again in his career, the one about preparing a meal from a recipe book, with the second half from an unrelated page. Harry underplays his reaction to the indigestible food and undrinkable coffee, allowing Miss Currie the larger reaction favored by White, for whom subtlety required loud sound effects and breakaway furniture. Other talented comics picking up a paycheck for wasting their time include Emmett Lynn and Bud Jamison.