Hot Ice (1955) User Reviews

A little strange, but OK

[slymusic · 31 January 2006]

"Hot Ice" is a so-so Three Stooges short directed by Jules White. It is a remake (or, if you prefer, ripoff) of two previous Stooge shorts from 1948: "The Hot Scots" and "Crime on Their Hands," both directed by Edward Bernds. This remake utilizes ample stock footage from these two shorts as well, and the most interesting thing about "Hot Ice" is the blending and overlapping of the new and old footage.

There are a few scenes that make this short stand out (if you haven't seen it, don't read any further). The gorilla wrestles with Muscles (Cy Schindell) and Dapper (Kenneth MacDonald) as they prepare to operate on Shemp (stock footage from "Crime on Their Hands"). When the Stooges search a handbag belonging to a seedy-looking young lady (Barbara Bartay), they find all kinds of burglar tools, but they don't find the Punjab diamond and assume the woman is cleared! (new footage). And the end of this short is sick, as Moe and Larry operate on Shemp to retrieve the Punjab diamond after he swallows it a second time (new footage).

"Hot Ice" is not nearly as good as "The Hot Scots" or "Crime on Their Hands." But it IS rather interesting to watch and see how the story lines from the original two shorts fit together to create the remake.

Good one!

[Movie Nuttball · 10/10 · 14 June 2004]

The Three Stooges has always been some of the many actors that I have loved. I love just about every one of the shorts that they have made. I love all six of the Stooges (Curly, Shemp, Moe, Larry, Joe, and Curly Joe)! All of the shorts are hilarious and also star many other great actors and actresses which a lot of them was in many of the shorts! In My opinion The Three Stooges is some of the greatest actors ever and is the all time funniest comedy team!

This Three Stooges short is an excellent one. Kenneth MacDonald and Christine McIntyre are good together in this one and also in their separate scenes. Cy Schindell was also good. The Stooges are as funny as ever! There is another Three Stooges short very similar like this one called Crime on Their Hands which it has an alternate ending.

Vindication for Joe!

[ftgplus4 · 4/10 · 22 December 2006]

If anyone thinks the quality of 3 Stooges shorts took an immediate nose dive when Joe Besser joined the team, they haven't spent enough time with some of the later Shemp-era shorts. For the most part, it's not that these are inherently bad -- it's that they're cheap reworkings, with much reused footage, of other (generally better) Shemp shorts from just a few years before.

This is a badly edited, badly dubbed reworking of the far superior "Crime On Their Hands", with some footage also taken from "Hot Scots". There is some newly shot footage which tries to bridge the occasional gap. For the most part it succeeds, even adding one fairly funny part (taking stuff out of the woman's purse), but it includes some of the tendency toward lame explanatory dialog that would later help bring down many Besser-era shorts. And the new ending is one of the most unpleasant in Stooge history. (Additionally, note that the new footage causes one really obvious jump cut in which Shemp's jacket abruptly goes from unbuttoned to buttoned.)

Skip this one in favor of "Crime On Their Hands", or at least see that one first.

Another cut and paste Shemp short, and one of the worst...

[GrigoryGirl · 4/10 · 13 September 2023]

These later Shemp shorts (not including the infamous "fake Shemp" ones) are an arduous affair to watch and often depressing. This is one of the worst. It's not that it isn't funny. There are scattered laughs, but most of this short is stock footage from other Stooge shorts, and just a few minutes (around 3 minutes) of new material. It's not even a "real" remake. It's just the original film with a few new minutes added in. I feel like I'm being ripped off when I see these shorts. Granted, the budgets for the short film division at Columbia was being cut back drastically at the time, and was eventually eliminated by the late 1950's, but still, they should have done better than what they did here and on other shorts.

Stooges have done better

[Horst_In_Translation · 4/10 · 26 August 2015]

"Hot Ice" is a Stooges short film starring Moe, Larry and Shemp. It was actually one of the last of their films starring Shemp who died shortly after this came out. Curly had already died a couple years earlier. The title of this short film is not really Stooges specific as usually the description in the title fits the trio somehow. Here, they are at Scotland Yard and run into a group of criminals of course. Especially Shemp gets into serious trouble. But apart from that, the rest is the usual formula. Writer and director have worked on many Stooges movies. Same goes for the supporting cast. The film runs as always with their short works approximately 16 minutes and was done in black-and-white. Unfortunately, the comedy in here is again more mayhem than smart and genuinely funny. Lots of stupid punching humor. All in all, not among their best works. Thumbs down.