Hot 888 Mama . . . of caring for one or more young kids suddenly thrust upon them. MILK AND MUSH is one of the most helpful films ever produced to explain exactly what to do when you find yourself in such a situation. Say you're a guy who's just finished a 30-year stretch in the state pen, and you get paroled in time to go bar-hopping during Happy Hour. Suppose that you then have the further good fortune to run across a willing lady who's not particularly choosy when she's in her cups, and you hit it off for an hour or three. Since you do not yet have a place to stay in the outside world, she kindly invites you to her home. However, the fly in your ointment pops up the next morning, when she's running a little late getting ready for another day of work under the Golden Arches, and there seem to be about a dozen Pre-school kiddies running around loose underfoot throughout her double-wide because their regular sitter has the flu. What to do? Mom wants to know if you're "good with children?" You don't want to disappoint on your first day out of the slammer, so you reply "Uh-Huh?" and Mom says "Bye, then, see you at six." How do you kill the next eight hours? What if the little tykes get hungry? Why not clobber two owls with one rock, MGM suggests, and feed these Little Rascals MUSH AND MILK?

Horst in Translation (filmreviews@web.de) "Mush and Milk" is an 18-minute live action short film from 1933, so this one is already way over 80 years old. It features all the child actors from the 1930s known as "Our Gang" or "The Little Rascals" who were among the biggest stars during the early years of sound film back then in the United States. Of course, it is a black-and-white movie. I have seen some of these films from the same series and I am not very impressed at all. Story-wise, it was a pretty weak film and the desperate attempt to rush in a touching story (as it happens so often with "Our Gang") did not work out at all. The director is Robert F. McGowan and he worked on many of these Rascals short films. The star here is probably George 'Spanky' McFarland and that's fine as he is probably the only somewhat funny approach. The music is nothing special this time, a song performed by one of the Rascals is even very painful to listen to, maybe intended that way. All in all, it's just not a rewarding watch at all. Spanky's changing face expressions when the dog drinks the milk felt rather bizarre and not funny and same can be said about most other segments here. I give it a thumbs-down. Not recommended.

David Allen Milk And Mush (1933) is a "Little Rascals" short subject comedy movie made by Hal Roach and featuring Spanky MacFarland and his pals. It is charming.The kids are stuck in a bad home for orphans, but rescued when the old man caretaker named "Cap" gets his "back pension" and bails the kids out of the home, and celebrates by taking them to an amusement park and big dinner at a fancy restaurant when his $4,000 "back pension" finally "comes through.Was $4,000 much money back in 1933? Yes, $4,000 was indeed a lot of money back in 1933 (almost 80 years ago...I write this in 2009), and a thrifty pensioner could do OK on that for the rest of his life.Working class people in the early 1930's typically earned $15 per week and that could pay rent for an OK house or apt., pay for food, basic clothing, etc......some people (many people, maybe) supported families (in a thrifty way) on money that small.The idea with pensions back then (and now, too) was you were supposed to have paid off your house, and had basically no major capital expenses facing you....you just needed money for food....kept wearing clothes you already had.Doctors still made home visits back then, and charged maybe $2 for a standard house call. Medications doctors prescribed didn't cost much...also just a few bucks at local indy drug stores (NO drug store chains or mega-drug companies back then charging $10 per pill for treatment expected to go on for years).A big day at the local amusement park in 1933 for 10 children going on maybe 5 rides each (ferris wheel, roller coaster, etc.) plus a sit down lunch or dinner could easily have been pulled off for $20 total....not a big chunk at all of Cap's $4,000.Life was better in 1933 for many reasons....things were cheaper and people were decenter and kinder, and that included landlords, health care people, and vendor sources people depended on...drug stores, hospitals, entertainment venues. Less crime, cleaner cities, cheap public transportation, great public park and recreation systems (concerts in park bandstands in every city which had public parks, etc.).What happened? In 1932, the world population crossed over from one billion (at which it had arrived in 1850) to two billion people...total.Population for the entire USA back in 1933 was maybe 100 million. (It's now ....2009..... around 300 million).Two billion worldwide total was a workable number. It got to 3 billion by the early 1950's and just recently skyrocketed/ crossed over into SEVEN BILLION recently (2009).That's too many people, all scrambling for life's necessities...which explains why things previously cheap NOW cost too much...not enough to go around, despite claims about how "we've never had it so good." The world is NOW filled with people all of whom need things which were easier to get, and cheaper, in 1932.I hope Cap enjoyed his $4,000 back pension he finally got in MILK AND MUSH (1933).----------------------------- Written by Tex Allen, SAG Actor. Visit WWW.IMDb.Com and choose "Tex Allen" "resume" for contact information, movie credits, and biographical information about Tex Allen.Tex Allen has reviewed more than 35 movies posted on the website WWW.IMDb.Com (the world's largest movie information database, owned by Amazon.Com) as of January 2011.These include: 1. Alfie (1966) 29 July 2009 2. Alien (1979) 24 July 2009 3. All the President's Men (1976) 16 November 2010 4. American Graffiti (1973) 22 November 2010 5. Animal House (1978) 16 August 2009 6. Bullitt (1968) 23 July 2009 7. Captain Kidd (1945) 28 July 2009 8. Child Bride (1938) 24 September 2009 9. Creature from the Black Lagoon (1954) 22 September 2010 10. Detour (1945) 19 November 2010 11. Die Hard 2 (1990) 23 December 2010 12. The Wonderful, Horrible Life of Leni Riefenstahl (1993) 19 November 2010 13. Jack and the Beanstalk (1952) 26 July 2009 14. King Solomon's Mines (1950) 1 December 2010 15. Knute Rockne All American (1940) 2 November 2010 16. Claire's Knee (1970) 15 August 2009 17. Melody Ranch (1940) 10 November 2010 18. Morning Glory (1933) 19 November 2010 19. New Moon (1940) 3 November 2010 20. Pinocchio (1940) 6 November 2010 21. R2PC: Road to Park City (2000) 19 November 2010 22. Salt (2010) 24 August 2010 23. Sunset Blvd. (1950) 1 December 2010 24. The Great Dictator (1940) 1 November 2010 25. The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner (1962) 9 January 2011 26. The Man in the White Suit (1951) 5 August 2009 Written by Tex Allen, SAG-AFTRA movie actor. Visit WWW.IMDb.Me/TexAllen for more information about Tex Allen. Tex Allen's email address is TexAllen@Rocketmail.Com.See Tes Allen Movie Credits, Biography, and 2012 photos at WWW.IMDb.Me/TexAllen. See other Tex Allen written movie reviews....almost 100 titles.... at: "http://imdb.com/user/ur15279309/comments" (paste this address into your URL Browser)

Jim-500 Okay, we all know how good most of the Our Gang comedies are, and this this is certainly one of the best. That said, I think it's fascinating how these shorts also serve as historical documents. For example, the actress who plays Cap's wife, Louise Emmons, was born in 1852. The president at the time was Millard Fillmore! This is nine full years before Abe Lincoln was elected! He was probably still splitting logs in 1852. Just imagine sitting with Louise during lunch at the studio commissary and picking her brains.