Watch the Birdie

Customer Review: Funny snapshots from 1950

There are no less than seven different films entitled "Watch the Birdie," dating back to the 1920s. All of them concern photography. This Red Skelton edition was scripted by Ivan Tors, who would later create many famous disaster flicks and TV series like "Flipper" and "Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea." Keep a look out for a cameo by Jeff York-- he was a dead ringer for Li'l Abner when he played the Al Capp comic strip character in the 1940 movie, which also featured Buster Keaton as the strange little Indian, Lonesome Polecat. Keaton contributed some of his classic sight gags to "Birdie."



THE STORY: Red portrays three generations of Cammerons: Rusty, who manages his dad's photgraphic store, the father (Pop) and grandfather (Grandpop). Rusty tries to earn extra cash as a freelance photographer. A woman named Lucia (Dahl) who accidentally causes him to fall into the sea from a boat, becomes affectionate toward Rusty. She helps him make a go of the camera shop. Rusty soon realizes that Lucia's business manager (Ames) is embezzling her money via a housing project. When Lucia has Rusty take photos of the construction site to promote the project, he unwittingly captures proof of the scam.





As of 12/08, this movie is only available on VHS. YELLOW CAB MAN, a Skelton vehicle released the same year, is not yet on DVD, either.





Parenthetical number preceding title is a 1 to 10 viewer poll rating found at a film resource website.



(5.8) Watch the Birdie (1950) Red Skelton/Arlene Dahl/Ann Miller/Leon Ames/Pamela Britton (uncredited: Don Brodie/Lurene Tuttle/Jeff York)
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