Dreaming Out Loud (1940)

Director:

Harold Young

Writers:

Robert Hardy Andrews (writer)
Howard J. Green (writer)

Release Date:

30 September 1940 (USA)

Genre:

Comedy

Tagline:

THE FAMOUS RADIO STARS... Answering the demand of 20,000,000 fans!

Plot:

Lum and Abner work at a general store in Arkansas. There they get involved in some misadventures with the locals.

Cast

Chester Lauck	...	Lum Edwards
Norris Goff	...	Abner Peabody
Frances Langford	...	Alice
Frank Craven	...	Dr. Walter Barnes
Bobs Watson	...	Jimmy
Irving Bacon	...	Wes Stillman
Clara Blandick	...	Jessica Spencer
Robert Wilcox	...	Dr. Kenneth Barnes
Donald Briggs	...	Will Danielson
Robert McKenzie	...	Constable Caleb Weeunt (as Bob McKenzie)
Phil Harris	...	Peter Atkinson
Sheila Sheldon	...	Effie Lou Stillman
Troy Brown Jr.	...	Washington

Also Known As:

Money Isn't Everything (USA) (working title)

Runtime:

81 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (RCA Sound System)

Company:

Jack Votion Productions Inc.

Movie Connections:

Followed by So This Is Washington (1943)

Soundtrack:

Dreaming out Loud

Let's see what they're up to in Pine Ridge

A mandatory delight for all fans of Old Time Radio for a variety of reasons. First off, for its eponymous stars, but along with them, several bonuses. First, there's Jack Benny's bandleader Phil Harris playing–slightly against character–a slick-talking "big city" salesman in a role that's brief enough to be considered a cameo. The beautiful 27-year-old Frances Langford serves as the story's love interest and croons the only tune, the movie's title. Hard to believe she was only six years away from playing the harridan Blanche opposite Don Ameche in the hilarious The Bickersons series. And finally, outside the OTR world, we have Dorothy Gale's immortal Auntie Em, Clara Blandick. The movie itself is a sterling testimony, as both an homage and an obeisance, by Hollywood to rural America in the 1940s. Lum and Abner stand as legitimate grandpappies to Andy Griffith, in its both Sheriff Andy Taylor moral rectitude and Deputy Barney Fife's whiny braggadocio. Our heroes, Lum Edwards and Abner Peabody, portrayed by real-life creators Chester Lauck and Norris Goff, are aged to Gandalfian proportions, though they were all of 38 and 34, respectively, and protested occasionally in the radio program that they "weren't all that old." A few L&A names familiar to OTR fans are spoken here, but the characters presented are an acceptable alternative vision of the long-running radio series. Like the title implies, this Pine Ridge is a dreamland where kindness defeats badness effortlessly, death is never in vain, and 'progress' equals salvation. Stylistically, the movie creaks a bit. The opening titles are clumsy and antiquated. Brief establishing shots present Pine Ridge, Arkansas as a suspiciously lumpy venue, less like eastern U.S. flatlands than a California studio back lot. The film is occasionally blurry and the soundtrack muffled–it could benefit with a good restoration. Still, any true OTR fan will be 'inneresed,' if not delighted, in seeing what the old boys are up to. This film is the only one of the seven Lum & Abner films currently available to Netflix subscribers.