Inexplicable decline in Fields's popularity.

I'm trying to start a big argument on here that this is a better car chase than BULLITT-whats your opinion

Fields isn't exactly the easiest comedian to like at first. I remember when I was about 11 or 12 being a big fan of the Marx Bros., Wheeler and Woolsey, maybe some Abbott and Costello. Fields? Not so much. But then asking a preteen to really grasp Fields is silly since his humor is very adult oriented.

He's not the most likable character, but if you watch more and more of his movies you see the complexity: At once a drunken reprobate, and also devoted father. At once a small town everyman, and also a flamboyant showman.

its explicable! Although Fields, himself, is talented, charismatic, and hilarious, most of his films flat out suck.

Just watched "YCCAHM" the other night for the first time in 20 years. He was amazing, but any scene without him had the structure and nuance of a 3 Stooges episode (without the Stooges). Truly painful. Again, Fields was great, but Charlie McCarthy's performance was "wooden".

Also, it appears like many of Fields scenes, lines, etc. were improvised. Not a complaint, but it indicate a lack of emphasis on narrative, plot, other characters, and would explain why scenes without him in his movies are so weak.

What the *beep* is a Chinese Downhill?!?

I took a big interest in old movies when I was a kid; and I always assumed that Fields was still huge. All the old Fields-related books I got from the library said he was more popular than ever. Now I find that's not true. His movies have a shockingly low number of IMDb votes: this one has only 482.

You're right. If DVDs had been available in the late-60s there would have been a huge demand for Fields. And if there had been an IMDb the votes for his films would have been in the thousands.


... Justin

It is a matter of marketing. In the sixties, the old Paramount comedies were relatively inexpensive for TV stations and film societies to rent. Thus, Fields, Mae West and the Marx Bros. got a lot of exposure. Add to this that many markets might only have three, four or five channels, thus when an old movie aired it might not have much competition -- the late news, reruns of shows from the 50s, maybe Johnny Carson. Likewise, groups on college campuses could rent the old black and white films cheap and still charge admissions that were low, but still turned a profit for whatever group that sponsored the screening.

Since then there has been an explosion in the number of TV channels available thanks to cable and dish, so you'd think that Fields, et.al., would get more exposure then ever. But instead, the competition to capture viewers is fierce. A cheap old black and white movie might get a decent audience, if there are only two or three other choices. But if that same film has to compete with stuff on 150 other channels, it might not have much of a chance. The great hope of cable television was that it would narrowcast; there would be so many channels that each could concentrate on one type of program and one type of audience. And it started out that way. But now, all the channels that were once unique and focused on one thing all are pretty much alike; USA, Bravo, TNT, Lifetime, etc., all show the same sorts of programs and even the same programs. How many channels have shown reruns of the "Law and Order" and the "CSI" shows?
When I heard that there was going to be a Comedy Central channel I was excited at the thought that it would be showing Fields and Marxes and West, but instead what does it show? Endless reruns of SNL.


And sadly, we have an entire generation of kids who won't even watch two seconds of a film unless it is in color. Worse, we have a generation who, when they think of a "classic" movie, they think of something like DIE HARD!