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Cult Review
Senior Film Conservator
You should probably watch this if you have a soft spot for those old 'Our Gang' style shorts where children are allowed to play with high-voltage electricity and heavy machinery. If you can't stand the sound of 1930s child actors screaming at each other in a gravel pit, you are going to absolutely hate this one.
I found this because I was looking into Mickey Rooney's early stuff, back when he was still doing the Mickey McGuire series. He’s about twelve here, but he has the face and energy of a forty-year-old longshoreman who just lost his pension.
The whole thing is about Mickey and his gang trying to build some kind of 'master mind' radio machine. It looks less like a scientific invention and more like someone dumped a bucket of copper wire over a pile of trash.
Billy Barty is in this too, playing Mickey’s little brother. He’s tiny, maybe three or four years old, and he spends most of the time looking confused or getting knocked over.
Honestly, the way they treat the kids on these sets makes me nervous. There is a scene where a kid gets 'electrocuted' by the radio, and the way he shakes and falls feels a little too real for a comedy short.
The pacing is kind of a mess. One minute they are arguing about a girl, and the next they are basically domestic terrorists with a homemade spark gap transmitter.
I love how 1930s movies always make the outdoors look so dirty. Everything is covered in a layer of actual soot and dust.
You can almost smell the coal smoke and the stale air through the screen. It doesn't feel like a movie set; it feels like they just found some kids in an alley and told them to start hitting things with hammers.
The dialogue is fast and mostly consists of insults that don't really make sense anymore. Mickey calls someone a 'big stiff' and it’s treated like a devastating burn.
There is this one shot where Mickey is looking into the camera while explaining his plan. His eyes are wide and he looks slightly unhinged, like he actually believes he has invented the future of communication.
It reminds me a bit of the frantic energy in All Wet, where the slapstick feels slightly dangerous. Nobody is safe, not even the dog.
Speaking of the dog, there’s a pup in this who seems very concerned about the amount of yelling. I spent most of the middle section just watching the dog in the background to see if he was okay.
The actual 'Master Mind' device is a total letdown if you’re looking for sci-fi. It’s just a box with some knobs that makes a loud buzzing sound.
But the payoff—when the radio actually starts working and causes a bunch of slapstick chaos—is actually pretty funny. It’s the kind of physical comedy that feels slightly painful to watch.
One of the kids takes a tumble into a tub of water that looks like it hasn't been changed since the Hoover administration. It's gross and great at the same time.
If you've seen Rooney in The Red Mark, you know he can actually act. Here, he’s just being a professional loudmouth, which he was very good at.
The ending just sort of... happens. There’s no big moral or a clean wrap-up.
Everybody just kind of stops yelling and the credits roll. It’s abrupt and weirdly honest about how kids actually play.
It’s not a masterpiece, but it’s a weirdly fascinating relic. It’s twenty minutes of 1933 that feels like a fever dream about a junkyard.
I think I liked it more than I should have. Maybe it’s just the charm of seeing Mickey Rooney before he became a 'prestige' actor.
He was always better when he was just a scrappy kid in a flat cap. 🤷♂️
IMDb —
1924
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