Rags Ragland

(On Cable TV, September 2022) I’ve gone about this Whistling series all wrong—I first watched the last entry Whistling in Brooklyn, then made my way back to the second film Whistling in Dixie, and am now just watching the first, Whistling in the Dark. Ah well—it’s not as if they have a strong sense of narrative continuity. As with the rest of the series, we have Red Skelton mugging for the camera as a radio show writer/host known for murder mysteries featuring “The Fox”—a reputation that lands him in troublesome circumstances when a cult kidnaps him so that he can formulate the perfect murder. It’s all rather entertaining—at least if you’ve reached some kind of tolerance for Skelton’s shameless showboating. What I liked most about this entry is that it eventually becomes a comic early-1940s techno-thriller: one of the showcase sequences late in the film has the protagonist repurposing a radio’s wiring to make a phone call (frantically rearranging the wires every time they want to hear what the other party is saying), and getting on the air of a radio show as a way to reach someone on a plane somehow listening to the show. It’s convoluted, charmingly dated and yet still a pretty clever example of comedy writing tapping into the time’s high technology. Skelton, significantly, plays “The Fox” as a smarter-than-usual character for him, while his companions are also entertaining in their own way. We see the origin story of a few characters in later films (most notably Rags Ragland’s thug character becoming an assistant in the sequels) and having Ann Rutherford as the female lead is always fun. Whistling in the Dark wasn’t made to be a great movie—it was a Skelton vehicle more than anything else, even if I suspect that the screenwriters had fun bringing back a few early-1930s horror clichés in watered-down format. (There was an earlier version of the same story in 1933, albeit Skelton-less.)  The result in no cinematic classic, but it’s fun to watch, and Skelton is very tolerable even for those viewers who usually find him irritating.

(On Cable TV, August 2022) Red Skelton remains a divisive comedian, and Whistling in Dixie finds him doing what he did best—for better or for worse. The second film in a trilogy of “Whistling” amateur sleuth comedies featuring him as a radio writer/actor known for criminal mysteries, it leaves the New York City area of the first and third films. A trip down south for his wedding gets sidetracked when there’s a mystery to solve at a military academy with a Confederate past. Skelton is clearly in his element here, blending irreverence and zingers while the rest of the cast does their best not to stand in the way of his showboating. It’s a watchable but not overly impressive affair until the third-act climax, in which Skelton’s physical comedy skills are showcased in a long and crazy barn fight sequence featuring two twin brothers (one evil, one reformed) and a cavalcade of physical gags. Ann Rutherford is always worth a look, but Rags Ragland isn’t always tolerable as the twins. Whistling in Dixie is not that good, but it’s decent enough to watch, and the climactic sequence makes up for a multitude of duller moments.