TrueJoshNight Truly Dreadful Film

Mjeteconer Just perfect...

Tayloriona Although I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.

Rosie Searle It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

fredcdobbs5 I don't mind parodies at all--I loved "The Producers" and think "Springtime for Hitler" is terrific--but the people who did this travesty hadn't the slightest idea of what a parody was. This schizophrenic little short doesn't quite know what it's supposed to be--it bounces from slapstick comedy to musical numbers to (somewhat) serious comments on the brutal chain-gang system, and fails miserably at all of them. The lead "comic", someone named Jerry Bergen, was someone I had never seen before and, hopefully, won't see again. As bad as this short is, he makes it even worse, and with his incessant mugging, shouting and forced slapstick he manages to combine the worst excesses of Jerry Lewis and Jim Carrey into one annoying and talentless little twerp.If there's anything that could be even remotely considered to be a bright spot, it's a bevy of scantily dressed chorus girls doing a Radio City Rockette-type production number in the prison's chow hall--don't ask--and there's an amusing bit where the prison authorities track down the escaped prisoners not with large bloodhounds but with small poodles. Other than that, this atrocity has absolutely nothing whatsoever going for it.

Edgar Allan Pooh . . . will strike many as being in poor taste. Some have said that the "Springtime for Hitler" portion of Mel Brooks' THE PRODUCERS crosses a line by indirectly lampooning SCHINDLER'S LIST. Since CHAIN GANG gave Adolf Eichmann and his Nazi cronies many tips from the government of Georgia (the U.S. Southern state--NOT the former part of the U.S.S.R.) for the planning of Auschwitz and the other Death Camps a few years later, this Vitaphone live action short--which segues from actual CHAIN GANG footage into the most gonzo-style mocking of America's Fascist Past--is akin to lampooning Kiddie Porn. Adults should be smart enough to know that you just don't do it! The only useful purpose to which 20,000 CHEERS FOR THE CHAIN GANG can be put in a 21st Century World is to help separate the sheep from the goats (as in the middle portion of A CLOCKWORK ORANGE). After suspects have had their eyes taped open, they would be forced to watch the Paul Muni feature first. That would be followed by this travesty of bad humor. Any suspect who emitted a single snicker, titter, or chuckle during CHEERS would then be locked up for life. Society must rid itself of such Sociopaths!

Brandt Sponseller This is a 20-minute long spoof of I Am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang (1932), directed by Roy Mack and starring Jerry Bergen. It is now available on DVD as an extra on I Am a Fugitive.Because this is also a Warner Brothers production, Mack actually begins with a shot, under the titles, from I Am a Fugitive--of the chain gang working along a curved dirt road on a hill. It segues right away to the main character's existence in the chain gang, and spoofs the scene of James Allen's (Paul Muni) escape. Bergen's character, also named Jerry, runs through the woods with three other men. Instead of bloodhounds, the prison guards run after them with poodles and a Lassie-like collie. Eventually, state officials are scheduled to visit the chain gang facility to make sure that everything is kosher. The warden implements "a few changes". The changes are very amusing, as they turn the prison into more of a resort/country club.20,000 Cheers for the Chain Gang is best watched immediately after I Am a Fugitive. Many of the funniest scenes work because of the changes they make to the original film. However, there is a hilarious original "soda song" (which I would suspect might have been spoofing an early theatrical commercial) that supplies our heroes with the straws they will need for hiding in the swamp, and later on, 20,000 Cheers becomes something of a vaudeville review.At times, 20,000 Cheers plays a bit seriously--I didn't know anything about it when I first started watching it and thought it might have been just another chain gang film, and some of the musical performances are fairly serious. But the straighter moments are just as enjoyable, and they help emphasize the comedy. Quite often, the humor depends on gradually pulling serious material more and more towards absurdism.The only downside to this short is that there's not more of it. It's good enough that a feature length spoof of I Am a Fugitive would have worked well.

Daniel Ocean A wonderful and often funny look at the life in a chain gang. Worth checking out if you could find it anywhere. It was well acted, nicely directed, and pretty interesting in its humorous look at Chain Gang farm under inspection.