Australian
Screen

an NFSA website

Gone to the Dogs (1939)

play
Email a link to this page
To:
CC:
Subject:
Body:
clip Two dopes and a dog

This clip chosen to be G

Clip description

George (George Wallace), Henry (John Dobbie) and their dog Aloysius are trapped in the haunted house, the lair of master criminal Dr Sunderman. They encounter a variety of scary effects designed to frighten them away.

Curator’s notes

by Paul Byrnes

Gone to the Dogs employs a series of well-worn movie comedy routines, some of which are borrowed directly from silent film. The haunted house as criminal lair premise comes straight from a 1921 Buster Keaton comedy, The Haunted House, but Hall also makes good use of design and special effects shots in this sequence. In terms of comedy, the film will try just about anything to get a laugh, as evidenced by the rising dog’s ears in this clip, followed by a reversal shot in which the dog takes shelter. These gags were already hoary in 1939, but they contribute to the film’s cheerful silliness. Although it’s not up to the standard of Let George Do It (1938), Wallace’s first film with Ken Hall, there are moments of inspired lunacy in Gone to the Dogs. Clearly George Wallace and Ken Hall were determined to have fun with this picture, Cinesound’s last before the coming of war.

Thanks to the generosity of the rights holders, we are able to offer Two dopes and a dog from the feature film Gone to the Dogs as a high quality video download.

To play the downloadable video, you need QuickTime 7.0, VLC, or similar.

You must read and agree to the following terms and conditions before downloading the clip:

australianscreen is produced by the National Film and Sound Archive. By using the website you agree to comply with the terms and conditions described elsewhere on this site. The NFSA may amend the 'Conditions of Use’ from time to time without notice.

All materials on the site, including but not limited to text, video clips, audio clips, designs, logos, illustrations and still images, are protected by the Copyright Laws of Australia and international conventions.

When you access australianscreen you agree that:

  • You may retrieve materials for information only.
  • You may download materials for your personal use or for non-commercial educational purposes, but you must not publish them elsewhere or redistribute clips in any way.
  • You may embed the clip for non-commercial educational purposes including for use on a school intranet site or a school resource catalogue.
  • The National Film and Sound Archive’s permission must be sought to amend any information in the materials, unless otherwise stated in notices throughout the Site.

All other rights reserved.

ANY UNAUTHORISED USE OF MATERIAL ON THIS SITE MAY RESULT IN CIVIL AND CRIMINAL LIABILITY.

This clip is available in the following configurations:

File nameSizeQualitySuitability
gonedogs3_pr.mp4 Large: 22.1MB High Optimised for full-screen display on a fast computer.
gonedogs3_bb.mp4 Medium: 10.4MB Medium Can be displayed full screen. Also suitable for video iPods.

Right-click on the links above to download video files to your computer.

Thanks to the generosity of the rights holders, we are able to offer this clip in an embeddable format for personal or non-commercial educational use in full form on your own website or your own blog.

You must read and agree to the following terms and conditions before embedding the clip:

australianscreen is produced by the National Film and Sound Archive. By using the website you agree to comply with the terms and conditions described elsewhere on this site. The NFSA may amend the 'Conditions of Use’ from time to time without notice.

All materials on the site, including but not limited to text, video clips, audio clips, designs, logos, illustrations and still images, are protected by the Copyright Laws of Australia and international conventions.

When you access australianscreen you agree that:

  • You may retrieve materials for information only.
  • You may download materials for your personal use or for non-commercial educational purposes, but you must not publish them elsewhere or redistribute clips in any way.
  • You may embed the clip for non-commercial educational purposes including for use on a school intranet site or a school resource catalogue.
  • The National Film and Sound Archive’s permission must be sought to amend any information in the materials, unless otherwise stated in notices throughout the Site.

All other rights reserved.

ANY UNAUTHORISED USE OF MATERIAL ON THIS SITE MAY RESULT IN CIVIL AND CRIMINAL LIABILITY.

Copy and paste the following code into your own web page to embed this clip: