Blondie Takes a Vacation? Well, it would seem the Bumstead family is actually going on that vacation they were planning throughout the entirety of Blondie Meets the Boss. Which suggests...this disposable, programmed B-movie franchise has actual continuity in it. I think someone in production actually cared about these movies! So let’s see how it turned out...
Once again en media res and opening credits and – You know, I’m starting to think that these standard previews and credits were not a part of the original theatrical releases. I think this series was later repackaged for television, reflected in these additions. Hell, Netflix even categorizes the series as “Television,” despite its pre-television date. So from now on I’m just going to ignore these introduction segments.
We begin with our proper opening, the paperboy opening, which is indeed the traditional opening for all films in this series. Inside the Bumstead home, married couple Blondie (Penny Singleton) and Dagwood (Arthur Lake) are preparing for a vacatio-oooooooxvczzzzzzzzzz...Okay, I just watched this stuporous movie, and now I’m expected to make myself care enough about it to mentally run through the whole thing again?!....Fine. Now, Blondie has a terrifying new hat, which provokes Tex Avery cartoon takes from the rest of her family, including Daisy the dog and Baby Dumpling (Larry Simms). It then provokes a standard marital spat with Dagwood.
Then Dumpling’s “friend” Alvin shows up, to satisfy series tradition – these things are genuinely formulaic. Alvin sophisticates quasi-philosophical platitudes at Dagwood, then exits the house without enduring any physical or verbal abuse from Dumpling. Whoa. Dumpling’s initial budding serial killer personality has eased off considerably, and since both of his parents have now been Flanderized into extreme buffoons, former psychopath Dumpling has become the all-knowing voice of reason, despite his scant four years on this Earth. And we’re what, like ten minutes in now? That means it’s time for Dagwood to trample the postman, satisfying that series tradition. The variation this time is the postman thinks it’s safe since they should already be on vacation.
And now they are on vacation, riding a passenger train off to – wherever. Well, the whole movie’s going to take place away from the usual setting, so we’d better get busy establishing some other characters, and maybe even...a villain. Indeed, random stranger Harvey Morton (Donald MacBride) grows inordinately antagonized by the Bumsteads’ general buffoonery (I dunno, maybe he just hasn’t become deadened to their antics through overexposure the way I have). Whatever, he’s the kind of bitchy problem-finder who whines publicly about others, forcing Daisy – and later even Baby Dumpling – to fall asleep in a pile of hounds in the baggage car. The Bumsteads meet another character, Jonathan Gillis (the meek Donald Meek), who we are actually supposed to think of as a formative psychopath – unlike Dumpling. This guy’s psychosis involves arson, as he starts his film-long task of collecting matchbooks.
So I shall briefly halt my plot examination to compare this film to the rest of the series. Already we are like a quarter of the way through this thing, and the plot is thankfully sane. However, there’s been no truly successful comedy so far either, odd because I felt the previous film rather triumphed at that. There’s a greater attempt made here at warming the cockles of our hearts, and even at doing drama. These are the things that a low-budget B-movie like this one should not aim for. They lose the cartoony qualities they excel at.
The Bumsteads finally arrive at the lake that’s so, so far away, and it looks just like the lake where Dagwood previously went fishing. They probably shot it at the same place. However, it’s not supposed to be the same lake, so let’s ignore that potential continuity snarl there. The Bumsteads try to get a room at the Lakeview Hotel, which the law of formulaic movies dictates is managed by the villainous Morton. He forbids the Bumsteads’ lodging, just generally because he’s a bad person. Having taken a shine to the Bumsteads, Gillis the fire-starter chooses to opt out of his own reservations as well.
The Bumsteads aimlessly wander around in the woods, long enough to slowly, slooowly deliver a single unworthy joke about pinecones. It’s shocking how often the wheels on this movie screech to a dead halt for really unsuccessful comedy. Maybe Blondie Meets the Boss was a fluke, or maybe I was unknowingly intoxicated while watching it, or something. Cornpone pinecone comedy out of the way, the Bumsteads finally settle at a hotel on the opposite side of the lake, the totally vacant Westview Inn. The elderly Dickerson couple sees them to their room. They are hard up for cash, so Dagwood straight up pays them for a week in advance – Okay, this is a two week vacation they’re taking, but are they really gonna spend the whole time uselessly lodged by this one boring lake?...Ah, it turns out a lot of people in the real world consider that a good vacation, so it must be my problem. I’d try to use my vacation, you know, traveling, not holing up at some vacated resort.
As we drag slowly past the movie’s half way point, the Bumsteads engage in the most minor, disengaging, uninspired hotel-based comedy possible. That is, I could not successfully identify a joke for about five minutes or so. Basically, contrived reasons force all of the family out of their room at the same time, at which point fire-happy Willis enters to drool madly and start a fire – in their fireplace, thankfully. The family all returns, and, in what little humor this movie has, they blame each other for having started said fire. Yeah, normal conversation would resolve this in the real world, but it’s a world-shattering occurrence in the realm of farce. Dagwood, for his part, is convinced that there must be a gh-gh-gh-gh-gh-ghost!...Sigh...It’s like an episode of “Scooby Doo” stretched out to feature length, minus the masked creature or the druggy subtext.
Though it’s still the middle of the night, the Bumsteads decide they shall spend the rest of their two-week vacation wandering aimlessly in the forest, thank you very much, one week deposit or no. These people are morons – though I think that was the point. They are only delayed in their departure when they overhear the Dickersons debating fiduciary (er, money) problems – if they cannot pay a huge sum to the bank by tomorrow, the wicked Morton shall claim ownership of their hotel. I have omitted the vast amount of land-based complications – every thirties comedy I’ve reviewed so far has been overly concerned with complex land law. It must’ve been a fad.
In an act of either great generosity or great foolishness, depending on your cynicism, the Bumsteads offer to help save the hotel. Not only that, but Dagwood shall to pay out of pocket for everything. And Dagwood shall take on all legal responsibilities as hotel manager, without any possibility for benefits. And they haven’t signed any contracts. This hotel is just like one giant broken vacuum cleaner to Dagwood, isn’t it? (That’s a reference to the original Blondie, by the way, concerning that film’s greatest flaw.) Risk everything, stand to gain nothing, all to dictate a proper plot line – and again forcefully stretch this thing out to 72 minutes.
These old family sitcoms are just premature television programs. The problem is that their stories are no more involved than those of most television sitcoms from the following decades, they’re simply three times as long. In the case of an underwhelming, lesser entry like this one, it means one thing: Boring! My goodness, I can’t imagine how an episode of “Arrested Development” would play out in thirties B-movie parlance! It would be four hours long, and every joke would be over-explained lest someone miss it. Also, the Hays people...
Next up is the best gag in this picture, which, not surprisingly, belongs to Daisy the dog. Come morning she dreams of the series’ traditional paperboy, an actual dream cloud hovering over her head – I like it when these movies adopt cartoon shorthand for their own purposes. Soon enough Daisy runs downstairs, only to slam into the front door, which lacks the doggie door of the Bumstead homestead. Daisy actually sees stars before her face, another nicely transposed cartoon technique.
The man Daisy finds at the door is Johnny, Willis’s guardian, who randomly chooses to stay there at the lake with Gillis, to keep his character active, and to provide occasional sideways references to Willis’s pyromania. Johnny sort of serves little point…Maybe an actor needed work.
Much of the next reel concerns the Bumsteads aiding in hotel repair. This is mostly an opportunity for various unrelated housework gags – and we all know that Blondie, the indentured pre-feminism wife, absolutely loves housework – it is her chief character trait. Daisy dries the dishes with her wagging tail – a decent gag. Dagwood repairs a frighteningly unsafe bus when Blondie proposes he head inside and fix a vacuum cleaner...Uh oh! Three movies in, and already they’re returning to that inexplicable narrative well known as vacuum repair. Either this is a long-gone running gag from the comic strip, or director Frank R. Strayer has some very odd fetishes. The result of Dagwood’s clumsy repair is the visual gag we should have gotten in the original Blondie – the vacuum inflates wildly, hovers over Dagwood’s head against all laws of physics, and then falls on him. I laugh...chuckle, actually. I rarely guffaw at these things.
Soon a great mass of people nears the hotel. All panic in the lobby as they await their new guests, and Dagwood scrambles to do something about his alarmingly frequent pantslessness – Throughout the series, Dagwood seems to remove his trousers at even the slightest opportunity. Being in the presence of an elderly couple you’ve known for half a day surely counts as an excuse for pants removal, why not? We’ve been set up for a decent comic routine, one where Dagwood tries to great guests while remaining behind chairs and desks to hide his pantslessness, only instead Dumpling arrives with Dagwood’s pants. Dang it! Now they’re actively cutting down potential humor as it arises! Also, the Hays people…
It turns out the people surrounding the hotel are the Dickersons’ creditors. Seeing as Dagwood is now legally entitled to bail them out, he gives over nearly all of his life savings. You see how stupid this plan to help the Dickersons was?!
Time is wasted a little more as Dagwood goes to the hiss-worthy Morton to ask for a mortgage extension, at which point he blows up a bus. I’m not kidding. The Bumsteads spend the remainder of their life savings getting Dagwood out of prison. If I didn’t realize the way these movies work, I’d be sort of worried for them now. As it is, I’m just waiting for things to end.
Meanwhile, Gillis is thinking that arson is a fine means of committing insurance fraud...
The Bumsteads are on their way home at night when first Daisy, then Dumpling get sprayed by a skunk, thinking it a “kitty.” The skunk then randomly runs into the AC ducting of Morton’s Lakeview Hotel. Because in all old cartoons (and movies based on old cartoons) skunks are always smelly, the mere presence of a skunk inside the ducts manages to send a righteous stink all throughout the hotel. Some actually funny gags follow, especially since the stench throws an ordered gathering of hoi polloi into a raving mob scene. Ah, I sense the earliest seeds that would one day fuel the “Slobs vs. Snobs” sub-genre here, dropped monocles and all!
Morton’s guests all storm from the hotel and head to the Westview Inn, notwithstanding the fact that the Bumsteads have taken Daisy and Dumpling back here, and therefore this place must be equally stinky. But no, the skunky smell has served its plot-mandated purpose, and is thus no longer with us. So it would seem that the Dickersons’ hotel is saved by this new business, except Morton suddenly shows up. He states that, since this hotel will be his at midnight anyway, he might as well just go ahead and run the show now. I don’t follow why he has the right to do this. It seems...illegal.
Because the screenplay dictates it, Dumpling has a momentary lapse in his usual common sense, and decides to head back to Morton’s hotel to look for the “kitty.” Yeah... Gillis also sneaks over to Morton’s, presumably to burn it to the ground. Ah, but you see, Morton himself has also snuck back to his hotel, and he in fact does burn it to the ground. Dumpling, the little John McClane in training, observes this act from within the AC ducts.
Back at Westview, the Bumsteads fret over Dumpling, who is missing for, like, the third or fourth time so far in this series. And that’s a conservative estimate. I’m going to start taking a tally of how often they lose him from now on, and consider what Child Services would make of it.
So Morton’s hotel is engulfed in flames, a typical Hollywood fire that is far more dramatic in appearance than a real fire, and yet somehow far less deadly. I used to fight fire, so this sort of thing always somewhat irks me. Gillis creeps around the burning structure, calling endlessly for Dumpling. This served as the preview scene on the DVD, and out of context it appeared far more creepy. Donald Meek has a certain molester quality about him. But no matter, Gillis rescues Dumpling (and Daisy) from the burning lodge. In a curious reversal of the mob scene from Frankenstein, a happy mob of hotel guests carries him back to the Westview while singing triumphantly.
We seem to have attained the genre-mandated happy ending here, except Morton is enough of a card-carrying villain to delay it. He accuses Dagwood of arson, under zero evidence or suspicion or anything, and of course Dagwood is such a spineless bimbo he’s just about ready to surrender when – Dumpling goes right ahead and accuses Morton. In a case of purely circumstantial accusations, who wouldn’t believe the sudden exclamations of a toddler? So the sheriff up and arrests Morton right then and there, and naturally Dumpling will never be called upon to act as witness in court or anything. (Sure, there were the insurance papers in Morton’s breast pocket, but still...)
Now we have the happy ending, with the Dickerson’s hotel saved. They offer partial hotel ownership to Dagwood, who has surely earned it. But we can’t suddenly have our main characters receive a financial windfall, not when there are 25 more movies to go! So we must have an artificial Snap Back, like so much of television and so little of cinema. This one is particularly artificial, as Blondie simply tells Dagwood to only accept the money they initially lost, and it will all be As If It Never Happened. At least when “The Simpsons” do this kind of thing it’s a joke.
And as the movie’s final punch line, Blondie dons her hideous hat. Ah hah hah...hah...Eh.
Blondie Takes a Vacation is not nearly as funny as Blondie Meets the Boss, but at least it makes sense, unlike Blondie. But it’s really just a programmer, a series, where the overall quality of the series matters far more than any individual episode. This is simply one of those stories, like so many TV sitcoms, where the characters momentarily leave their normal setting on some one-off vacation. Those are often some of the lesser television episodes, and this movie surely follows suit. Let’s hope Blondie Brings Up Baby returns the series to its normal suburban setting, and that the cartoony humor and storytelling of Blondie Meets the Boss can resume as the baseline for this franchise.
Related posts:
• No. 1 Blondie (1938)
• No. 2 Blondie Meets the Boss (1939)
• No. 4 Blondie Brings Up Baby (1939)
• No. 5 Blondie on a Budget (1940)
• No. 6 Blondie Has Servant Trouble (1940)
• No. 7 Blondie Plays Cupid (1940)
• No. 8 Blondie Goes Latin (1941)
• No. 9 Blondie in Society (1941)
• No. 10 Blondie Goes to College (1942)
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