Sympathy (1933) Review: My Jaw Hurts Just Watching This

Is Sympathy worth watching today? Honestly, yeah, but only if you have a high tolerance for people yelling at each other in that specific 1930s 'fast-talking' style. If you have ever had a migraine or a broken bone and someone tried to make it about their own 'anxiety,' you will feel this movie in your soul. People who want a deep plot or high-budget sets should probably just skip it.

It’s a Vitaphone short, which usually means two things: the sound is a little bit like a gravel grinder and the acting is dialed up to an eleven. Fred Sumner plays the lead, and his face is doing a lot of heavy lifting here. He looks legitimately miserable. I don't know if he actually had a toothache during filming, but I wouldn't be surprised if the director just poked him with a needle right before the camera started rolling.

The whole thing starts in a bedroom, and the lighting is... well, it's 1933. It looks like they had one lightbulb and a dream. Fred is moaning about his tooth, and his wife (Wynne Gibson) comes in. She doesn't bring him ice or medicine. Instead, she brings a whole lot of drama. She starts talking about how seeing him in pain is just *destroying* her nerves. It’s hilarious because it’s so annoying.

I found myself thinking about Wife Savers while watching this, mostly because of how the domestic dynamic is played for these broad, loud laughs. But where that movie feels like a romp, this feels like a nightmare you can't wake up from. Every time Fred groans, someone else enters the room to tell him to be quiet or to offer some stupid advice.

The Dentist Scene is Actually Terrifying

Eventually, they get him to a dentist. The dentist’s office looks like a place where dreams go to die. There is this huge, clunky chair and tools that look like they belong in a garage. Harry Shannon plays the dentist, and he has this disturbing energy. He’s way too happy to be pulling teeth. He keeps talking about his own problems while he’s got his hands in Fred's mouth.

There is a specific shot of the pliers that made me pull my own blanket up to my chin. The camera lingers on the metal for just a second too long. It’s not 'visually stunning,' but it is effective. You can almost smell the antiseptic and the old dust in the room. I’ve seen some weird stuff in The Face in the Dark, but nothing as scary as a 1930s dentist with a bad attitude.

The supporting cast is a bunch of 'pals' who show up at the office. I think one of them is Alan Goode, but they all kind of blend together into one big, noisy entity. They are all wearing these heavy wool suits and hats indoors, which always looks so uncomfortable to me. One guy keeps slapping Fred on the back. Why would you slap a man with a toothache? It’s so senseless it becomes funny.

• The nurse just stands in the corner like she's waiting for the movie to be over.
• The sound of the drill (or whatever that buzzing was) is high-pitched enough to make your dog bark.
• Fred’s pajamas are remarkably well-pressed for a man who has been rolling around in agony.

There is this one moment where the wife starts crying because the dentist told her to wait in the hall. She makes this face—this weird, scrunchy 'poor me' face—that is so over-the-top. It’s a great bit of character work, even if it makes you want to throw a shoe at the screen. Wynne Gibson was really good at being 'too much.'

I noticed that the editing is a bit jumpy. Like, one second Fred is in the chair, and the next, he’s suddenly half-conscious from the gas. It feels like they lost a few feet of film or just didn't care about the transition. It gives the movie this hallucinatory vibe. It’s like you’re suffering through the fever dream with him.

If you’ve seen Motor Trouble, you know how these shorts love to take a simple problem and just escalate it until everyone is screaming. Sympathy does that perfectly. It’s not about the tooth. It’s about how much we all suck at actually being there for each other when things get inconvenient.

The ending is a bit of a letdown, I guess. It just kind of... stops? Most of these Vitaphone things don't have a big climax. They just run out of time and roll the credits. But there’s a final shot of Fred finally getting a moment of peace that feels earned. He looks like he’s aged ten years in ten minutes. I felt that.

One more thing: the hats. There is a lot of hat-handling in this movie. People taking them off, putting them on, clutching them. It’s like the actors didn’t know what to do with their hands if they weren’t holding a fedora. It’s a small detail, but it’s all I could look at during the scene in the waiting room.

Is it a masterpiece? No. Is it a fascinating look at 1930s 'cringe comedy' before that was a term? Absolutely. It’s better than London if you're looking for a quick laugh, though that’s not saying much. It’s just a weird, loud, sweaty little film about a guy who needs a better dentist and a much better wife.

"I don't want sympathy, I want a pair of pliers!" - Not an actual quote, but basically what Fred's face is saying the whole time.

Anyway, if you find it on a DVD of 'pre-code' shorts or some dusty corner of the internet, give it a go. It’s short enough that even if you hate it, you haven't wasted your whole afternoon. Just make sure your own teeth are in good shape before you hit play, or you'll be cringing the whole way through.