Although the setting for this Three Stooges short is unusual and the costumes and sets much better than usual, it's otherwise a very typical sort of film for these folks. It begins with Moe, Curly and Larry being told by their sickly father that they are actually of noble birth and they are to go to the Queen and offer their services to her as guards--much like the Musketeers. However, when these three idiots are wrestling about as entertainment for the Queen, they don't notice that she's been kidnapped. They are arrested and only avoid execution when they are sent to find her. What follows are lots of folks being bonked on the head and people being stabbed in the butts with swords. If this is your kind of thing, you'll love this short. Otherwise, it has a lot of energy but lacks good belly laughs.

Restless Knights (1935) ** (out of 4) After hearing about a plot to assassinate the Queen, the Three Stooges becomes knights but trouble follows. I think this is one of the weakest shorts that feature the original group of Stooges. I think the writing is pretty lazy, which leads to extended scenes that just aren't very funny. The wrestling matches are deadly dull and pretty much kills everything that follows. Even the slapstick humor is pretty dull.Now available in Columbia's 2-disc set, which features over 20 classic shorts.

"Restless Knights" is an early Three Stooges short directed by a man who made the boys follow the script: Charles Lamont. In the kingdom of Anesthesia, Prime Minister Boris (George Baxter) is plotting to kidnap Queen Anne (Geneva Mitchell) and take over the entire kingdom. Who else to the queen's rescue but Larry, Curly, and Moe? Highlights: Some wonderfully majestic music is heard not only during the film's credits but also briefly during the queen's initial entrance and during the wrestling match between Moe & Curly. The Stooges' father (Walter Brennan) blesses them by giving them a triple slap. In the wine cellar, after successfully clubbing two villains, Moe & Larry accidentally club themselves, Curly, and the queen.The Stooges' comic personalities were still developing while they made "Restless Knights," and with their next short - "Pop Goes the Easel" (1935) - Moe, Larry, and Curly would team up with a director who really helped shape them into, respectively, their boss/middleman/patsy Stooge personae. His name was Del Lord.

This is one of those stooges films that starts off with a bang(the scenes with Walter Brennan playing the boys father, the wrestling match in the castle)then starts to run out of steam after about 8 minutes and doesn't pack as many ROFL moments to close out the short that it started with.5/10