{"id":37024,"date":"2022-04-01T20:53:35","date_gmt":"2022-04-02T00:53:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/?p=37024"},"modified":"2022-04-01T20:53:35","modified_gmt":"2022-04-02T00:53:35","slug":"the-bootleg-files-have-badge-will-chase","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/2022\/04\/01\/the-bootleg-files-have-badge-will-chase\/","title":{"rendered":"The Bootleg Files: Have Badge Will Chase"},"content":{"rendered":"

BOOTLEG FILES 797:<\/strong> \u201cHave Badge Will Chase\u201d (1959 8mm one-reel excerpt from \u201cAbbott and Costello Meet the Keystone Kops\u201d). <\/p>\n

LAST SEEN:<\/strong> On YouTube.<\/p>\n

AMERICAN HOME VIDEO:<\/strong> None.
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\nREASON FOR BOOTLEG STATUS:<\/strong> It fell through the cracks. <\/p>\n

CHANCES OF SEEING A COMMERCIAL DVD RELEASE:<\/strong> Nope.<\/p>\n

Long before video cassette recorders invaded living rooms in the 1970s, movie lovers who wanted to replay their favorite films at home would purchase projectors and screens and create their own private cinematic viewing experience.
\n<\/p>\n

Consumers who purchased the Bell & Howell 8mm film projectors from Sears Roebuck & Co. in the late 1950s and early 1960s would receive free demonstration reel that could be used for a test run. According to film historian Ted Okuda, that demonstration reel was \u201cHave Badge Will Chase,\u201d sold under the Castle Films banner.<\/p>\n

If \u201cHave Badge Will Chase\u201d doesn\u2019t sound very familiar, that\u2019s because there was no Hollywood film by that name. Instead, this was a new title given to the climactic excerpt from the 1955 \u201cAbbott and Costello Meet the Keystone Kops,\u201d which Castle Films licensed as standalone footage sold in a one-reel format for the home movie audience.<\/p>\n

\u201cAbbott and Costello Meets the Keystone Kops\u201d is, quite frankly, one of the duo\u2019s least interesting films. The premise is certainly intriguing \u2013 set in 1912, the pair play suckers who are conned into buying the Edison movie studios. They track the flim-flam man who tricked them to Hollywood, where he is impersonating a Russian director. Abbott and Costello get work as stunt men in the silent movie industry while trying to apprehend the con artist.<\/p>\n

By the time this film was being shot, Abbott and Costello were clearly played out. The 58-year-old Abbott and the 49-year-old Costello seemed too old and lethargic for the rigorous slapstick required for a film of this nature, and neither man seemed enthusiastic about the screenplay they were forced to perform \u2013 film historian Jim Mulholland, in his definitive text \u201cThe Abbott and Costello Book,\u201d complained that this work was a \u201csuccession of tired sight gags\u201d until the film\u2019s final chase sequence, which is the basis of \u201cHave Badge Will Chase.\u201d<\/p>\n

In this sequence, Abbott and Costello come from playing police officers in a film to catch the man who conned them (Fred Clark) and his lovely accomplice (Lynn Bari) robbing the safe of the studio\u2019s president. As the crooks get away in a stolen car, Abbott and Costello spot the actors who played Mack Sennett\u2019s Keystone Kops in their costumes and mistakenly believe they are real cops. The Keystone Kops and Abbott and Costello engage in a wild chase to pursue Clark and Bari that include hair-raising encounters with an oncoming train, a construction site and bakery truck full of pies.<\/p>\n

The chase sequence is the best part of the film \u2013 it has speed and imaginative humor that is conspicuously absent from the rest of the production. Director Charles Lamont clearly studied the classic Keystone Kops film to approximate the camerawork and editing needed to pay proper tribute to the old-school chase. And the stuntmen at Universal-International who doubled as the Keystone Kops did a marvelous job. The film also has a merry musical score that mirrors the on-screen shenanigans \u2013 Henry Mancini was an uncredited contributor to the score.<\/p>\n

But oddly, the sequence fails to click when Abbott and Costello are on the screen. The studio clearly would not take the risk of having their stars in dangerous stunts, so they were filmed with a too-conspicuous rear projection \u2013 at one point, Abbott\u2019s shadow can be seen on the rear projection screen. The comics also seemed vaguely bored with their duties and never give the impression that they are in the scene, but instead are just going through their paces.<\/p>\n

\u201cHave Badge Will Chase\u201d was released in both a silent format with intertitles filling in for the missing soundtrack and a sound version that kept the intertitles even though they were not needed. While it was not top-tier Abbott and Costello, this short film was among the most popular of their comedies in Castle Films\u2019 catalogue \u2013 and copies can still be located for sale online.<\/p>\n

\u201cHave Badge Will Chase\u201d is not on any digital home entertainment, but a decent copy can be found in an unauthorized upload on YouTube, and it makes for a pleasantly mindless seven-and-a-half minute distraction.<\/p>\n