"Ants in the Pantry" is a brilliant Three Stooges comedy directed by Preston Black. Moe, Larry, and Curly are exterminators for the Lightning Pest Control Company. They are told by their boss Mr. Mouser (Harrison Greene) that they will lose their jobs if they don't drum up some business. So the Stooges decide to crash a swank party and bring their own pests with them, the idea being that they can secretly infest the house with these pests and then get hired to exterminate them!
Highlights from "Ants in the Pantry" include the following (but don't read any further if you have not yet seen this film). After a mouse crawls down the back of one of the party guests (Bobby Burns), he gyrates so wildly that the Stooges feel they must join in the dance. As Moe and Curly escape from the upstairs bedroom, they painfully discover that the ladder Curly "borrowed" has been taken away. As the Stooges are playing cards in the opening scene, Moe tells Curly to cut the cards, which he does with a cleaver (Harpo Marx applied this same gag in the 1932 Marx Bros. comedy "Horse Feathers"). The boys are simply hilarious as they try to remove a bag full of cats from the interior of an upright piano. Moe asks Larry why he is holding a bear trap, to which Larry answers, "You never can tell. We might meet up with a bear," to which Moe says, "Yeah. Meet my bare hand" and slaps him.
Again, "Ants in the Pantry" is a very clever entry in the Three Stooges film library. There is a tiny subplot at the end of this short regarding a fox hunt, but this is negligible. The true essence of "Ants in the Pantry" is the extermination plot; as we eventually find out, the Stooges just can't seem to get the hand of this mouse-catching business!
Highlights from "Ants in the Pantry" include the following (but don't read any further if you have not yet seen this film). After a mouse crawls down the back of one of the party guests (Bobby Burns), he gyrates so wildly that the Stooges feel they must join in the dance. As Moe and Curly escape from the upstairs bedroom, they painfully discover that the ladder Curly "borrowed" has been taken away. As the Stooges are playing cards in the opening scene, Moe tells Curly to cut the cards, which he does with a cleaver (Harpo Marx applied this same gag in the 1932 Marx Bros. comedy "Horse Feathers"). The boys are simply hilarious as they try to remove a bag full of cats from the interior of an upright piano. Moe asks Larry why he is holding a bear trap, to which Larry answers, "You never can tell. We might meet up with a bear," to which Moe says, "Yeah. Meet my bare hand" and slaps him.
Again, "Ants in the Pantry" is a very clever entry in the Three Stooges film library. There is a tiny subplot at the end of this short regarding a fox hunt, but this is negligible. The true essence of "Ants in the Pantry" is the extermination plot; as we eventually find out, the Stooges just can't seem to get the hand of this mouse-catching business!