Abbott & Costello films have always been popular with children, so it is not surprising that the boys made a couple of films geared directly for the small fry. "Jack and the Beanstalk" features Lou as Jack and Bud as Dinklepuss. The boys are sent by the Cosman Employment Agency to baby-sit an obnoxious kid (David Stollery) and his baby sister. Jack falls asleep reading "Jack and the Beanstalk" and dreams himself and his friends into the fairy tale, ala "The Wizard of Oz." Sergeant Riley (Buddy Bear) becomes The Giant, while Eloise (Shaye Cogan) and Arthur (James Alexander), Donald's older sister and her date, are transformed into the Princess and Prince. Dinklepuss, of course, becomes the butcher who trades the five magic beans for Jack's cow. "Jack and the Beanstalk" is also the film where Bud Abbott first grew what became his trademark mustache. This 1952 film, directed by Jean Yarbough, faithfully follows the fairy tale, which meant Abbott & Costello could not do their standard routines. Lou, who plays to the camera big time, has a great bit with his song "I Fear Nothing," while Bud gets to take a stab at being a comic villain. The weakest part of the film is that the love interests are not all that interesting. Not Disney, but not half bad, especially for the kiddies.
Rating: 5 out of 5 stars - ONE THE TEAM'S BEST FEATURES. Abbott & Costello star in this adaptation of the fairytale classic. This is the team's FIRST COLOR film. The second being "ABBOTT & COSTELLO MEET CAPTAIN KIDD". The feature pays tribute to the classic film "THE WIZARD OF OZ" by starting in black & white, and then switching to color for the entire story, and then back to black and white again for the ending. The ENTIRE family would LOVE this feature starring one of the GREATEST comedy teams of all time.