The Bank Dick (1940)

As I understand it, W.C. Fields spent at least most of his career playing henpecked drunks. Believe it or not, "The Bank Dick" is the first of his movies that I've ever seen; and I really liked it. Fields plays Egbert Souse - with an acute accent on the E - a bored family man never too aware of his surroundings. One day, he accidentally stops a bank robber but is only too happy to take credit for it. So they make him a security guard.

Throughout parts of the movie, I wasn't sure whether it was going to be as funny as I usually like (and there was a scene portraying a black man in a manner that wouldn't be allowed nowadays), but it was quite entertaining overall and the whole chase was certainly beyond a hoot. I suspect that they had a lot of fun filming it. Moreover, one might interpret Fields's as a look at America's aspirations of getting out of the Depression (that's pure conjecture, so don't quote me).

So, having seen this movie, I understand what W.C. Fields's brand of humor constituted. One can see why Warner Bros. animation department liked to caricature him as a manipulative pig in some cartoons. Worth seeing.

Fmovies: a source of strange joy, even in its quiet and failed moments. great moments mostly mumbled and underplayed so that the film seems so humble and so unaggressive, unlike most comedies now which would wring your neck if they could...Fields' before-its-time irony and self-consciousness about moviemaking is revealed in a throwaway line during the car chase at the end...in the midst of all the obviously speeded-up film and projection effects, Egbert Souse deadpans "you're going to make me have an accident....." I'm almost ready to move into Lompoc, with its Spanish-Americo chili parlor, and, I hope, "rivers of beer flowing over your grandmother's paisley shawl...." and, apparently, absinthe is still available....

This movie is so brilliant, it is almost sad that Fields did not make more movies than he did. As 1940 approached, he actually was doing his best work but was in deteriorating health through his death in 1946. This movie was all written and done under Field's supervision and a masterpiece it is.

The all time funniest scene in movie history, in my opinion, was when he gets the bank examiner, J. Pinkerton Snoopington drunk and sick and brings him back to the hotel he was staying at. When he allegedly falls out the window and Field's comes running down the stairs to retrieve him was so brilliantly executed, it's amazing. He moves the camera to the far side of the lobby which allows you to get the full view of him running down the stairs. While the content of this humor may seem ordinary, it was filmed and executed brilliantly and is forever etched in my mind as the single most funny scene I can think of in movie history.

The Bank Dick fmovies. THE BANK DICK (Universal, 1940), directed by Edward Cline, from an original story and screenplay by Mahatma Kane Jeeves, better known as W.C. Fields, stars none other than W.C. Fields in his third of four comedies for Universal, a classic in the sense of it becoming his most famous and admired works next to IT'S A GIFT (Paramount, 1934). Unlike YOU CAN CHEAT AN HONEST MAN (1939) where Fields loses screen time in favor with a ventriloquist act of Edgar Bergen and Charlie McCarthy; MY LITTLE CHICKADEE (1940) in which he divides his time with Mae West; and NEVER GIVE A SUCKER AN EVEN BREAK (1941) where he steps aside in favor for the singing of the teen-age Gloria Jean, THE BANK DICK is pure Fields from start to finish. As the head of a household of a dysfunctional family, with Fields playing the henpecked husband on screen for the last time, the supporting players consists of a fine assortment of character actors who can be just as funny as Fields himself and not draw attention away from him.

As for the story, set in the town of Lompoc, the focus obviously is on Egbert Souse, accent over the final "E" (W.C. Fields), an unemployed husband who spends much of his leisure time smoking cigarettes and hanging around the local bar, The Black Pussy Cat Cafe, as well as coping with Agatha, his wife, (Cora Witherspoon), Mrs. Hermisillo Brunch, his mother-in-law (Jessie Ralph), Myrtle, his adult daughter, (Una Merkel) and Elsie Mae Adele Brunch, the obnoxious youngster, (Evelyn Del Rio). Of the members in his family, only Myrtle, his eldest, understands him. Aside from being a character herself, she's in love with the hayseed Og Oggilby (Grady Sutton), a bank teller who later encounters a couple of robbers at his window and forced to hand over a large sum of money at a point of a gun. When their getaway car is taken away, the crooks make a run for it. Chased by the police, one gets away while the other is found by Souse seated on a bench nearby, making him a hero for "capturing the crook." In gratitude Souse is awarded a job as a special officer by Mr. Skinner (Pierre Watkin), the bank president. In order for Oggilby to earn enough money to marry Myrtle, Souse arranges for him to invest the bank's money on Beefstake Mines Stock, which finds Souse spending much time preventing the visiting bank examiner (Franklin Pangborn) from looking over the books to find a shortage. More complications occur when the bank gets robbed again with Souse being forced to take the driver's seat in another exciting car chase from the police.

Supporting players enacting under oddball names include Shemp Howard (Joe Guelpe, the bartender whose whistle to "Listen to the Mockingbird" entices Souse to follow him to the bar); Richard Purcell (Mackley Q. Greene); Russell Hicks (J. Frothingham Waterbury); Jack Norton (A. Pismo Clam); Bill Wolfe (Otis), with Jan Duggan, another favorite of the Fields stock players, once again doing a funny bit in a wonderful cameo set in the bank. While Al Hill is credited as Filthy McNasty in the credits, he is called Repulsive Rogan in the final story. As for the support provided by the diversified Una Merkel, her performance is unlike the assortment of starlets, ranging from Mary Brian, Judith Allen or Constance Moore as Fields' daughters playing their roles in a more serious-minded and caring fashion. Merkel provides her role with comic flare and free-spirit. She and and Grady Sutton (in his final Fields comedy) certainly make a perfect odd couple.

THE BANK DICK ma

This is a wonderful example of classic comedy from the late vaudeville era. Fields is brilliant in spite of the fact that he's far past his prime. The story is fun and timeless. I saw it years ago, and I have watched it a couple times since I got my DVD last week. It's a movie worth having on your shelf.

This is the second best Fields film (after It's a Gift) and it's similar in that it casts Fields as the lovable drunk with an absolutely hateful family. From the almost surreal episode directing the movie to the eye-poppingly ridiculous chase scene, this one is pure comic entertainment. One side note: it's sad and not a little scary how bloated and tired the Great Man looks in this compared to just six years earlier when It's a Gift was released.