I haven't linked to a Soundie for a while so I'd better explain what a Soundie is…or was. Soundies were the 1940's equivalent of music videos except they were black-and-white and shot on 16mm, and in many cases, the songs were written and filmed just for a soundie and not released on records. You had to go to a bar or restaurant to see and hear them. And I think I'll just crib the next paragraph from Wikipedia…
The films were shown in a coin-operated "movie jukebox" called the Panoram, manufactured by the Mills Novelty Company of Chicago. Each Panoram housed a 16mm RCA film projector, with eight Soundies films threaded in an endless-loop arrangement. A system of mirrors flashed the image from the lower half of the cabinet onto a front-facing screen in the top half. Each film cost 10 cents to play, and there was no choice of song; the patron saw whatever film was next in the queue. Panorams could be found in public amusement centers, nightclubs, taverns, restaurants, and factory lounges, and the films were changed weekly. The completed Soundies were generally made available within a few weeks of their filming, by the Soundies Distributing Corporation of America.
This particular Soundie was shot in 1942 and it stars Harry Langdon, who was briefly one of the great silent comedians. His career took a big nosedive around the time he took creative control of his films and many see a clear cause/effect situation there. But his career did crash and he spent the rest of his life appearing in cheaply-made comedies and sometimes writing for Laurel and Hardy or other folks who were having the kind of career he'd once had. He died two years after this film was shot. This is not him at his best but it's kind of a neat little short…
