Darla is mistakenly led to believe Alfalfa feels ashamed of her, so she turns her attentions to Waldo, the new rich kid whose father is an oil tycoon. The club's members try their hardest to break the two apart, eventually causing their beloved clubhouse to burn down. The boys catch Alfalfa in the company of Darla - "a girl!" Alfalfa isn't like his friends because he's in love with Darla, and unfortunately threatens the very existence of their "boys only" club. However, when the announcement is made, Alfalfa is nowhere to be found.
His best friend, Alfalfa, has been chosen as the driver for the club's prize-winning go-kart, called "The Blur", in the annual Soap Box Derby style race. MPAA rating: PG.The story begins with Spanky, who is the president of the "He-Man Woman Haters Club" with many school-aged boys from around the neighborhood as members.
A Universal release opens Friday at McClurg Court, Webster Place and outlying theaters.
Fields memorial nose-thumb.ĭirected by Penelope Spheeris written by Paul Guay, Stephen Mazur and Spheeris, based on the Hal Roach-MGM series "Our Gang" photographed by Richard Bowen edited by Ross Albert production designed by Larry Fulton music by William Ross produced by Michael King and Bill Oakes.
In the pantheon of recent scripts that deserved oblivion, but broke through anyway, "The Little Rascals" earns something special: Maybe the W.C. Even in this crowd, "Little Rascals" is a champ for sheer baroque nonsense. Macaulay Culkin and company may have a lot to answer for recently-not only his own movies, but the wave of ill-thought-out or silly kiddie vehicles "Home Alone" seems to have unleashed: "North," "Angels in the Outfield," "Getting Even With Dad" and the rest. It's the kind of empty gaudy show the misfit characters in Spheeris' good comedies might waste their time with. "The Little Rascals" is a nice-looking movie-shot in a nostalgic childhood haze by Richard Bowen-but watching it is almost numbing. So, what made her accept this horrible script-bereft of sympathy, humor and sense? (Or the equally horrible script of "The Beverly Hillbillies"?) She also establishes great sympatico with this young cast. Penelope Spheeris is a comedy talent, as she showed in films like the first "Wayne's World" and the "Decline of Western Civilization" documentaries. Depressing as it sounds, it looks as if the moviemakers were trying to make something about as good as a typical mid-'30s "Our Gang" short (only longer)-and thought their project was justified because it offered strong role models for 5-year-old girls. The filmmakers don't do much with the feminism either, besides staging a boy-hating, girl-hating ensemble song and foisting on Alfalfa some satiric "sensitive man" lines that might have gagged Alan Alda. Yet the new "Little Rascals," though it has a Stymie and a Buckwheat, doesn't do anything funny, surprising or fresh with the gang's multi-racial makeup. It was the same dopey humor used on everyone else. And though there were racist gags in the movies, they weren't mean. Black child actors Allen "Farina" Hoskins, Matthew "Stymie" Beard and Billie "Buckwheat" Thomas were all a part of the group, and their camaraderie with their white buddies was presented as unremarkable-not surprising perhaps, since some of the great childhood literary heroes of the period (Huck Finn, Penrod and Sam) all had pals of color, as well. Part of what keeps people interested in the pictures today-perhaps one reason for this pointless movie-is the fact that the gang was integrated. But what about their clothes? Or Alfalfa's cowlick? The moviemakers have actually succeeded in their toughest task: They've found plausible substitutes for boss Spanky (5-year-old Travis Tedford), poseur Alfalfa (9-year-old Bug Hall), belle Darla (5-year-old Brittany Ashton Holmes), Stymie (7-year-old Kevin Jamal Woods), Porky (4-year-old Zachary Mabry), Buckwheat (5-year-old Ross Elliot Bagley) and deep-voiced Froggy (7-year-old Jordan Warkol)-as well as bullies Butch (9-year-old Sam Saletta) and Woim (8-year-old Blake Jeremy Collins) and snobby rich kid Waldo (9-year-old Blake McIver Ewing, most talented of the troupe) along with two Darla chums, Heather Karasek, 5, and Juliette Brewer, 7 Petey the bull's eye dog and Uh-Huh (Courtland Mead)-whom I don't recall. What's its point? The boy Rascals-who for some inexplicable reason are dressed in exact replicas of the outfits of their '30s counterparts-are taught that their "He-man woman-hating" ways are a relic of a vanished era.
In fact, adults concocted this whole would-be feminist fable.