. . . we'd all still be watching silent flicks today. TOYLAND CASINO is a kid's variety show. What sound there is of screechy, grating kid voices attempting to croon out adult songs about love and hanging trees is cringe-inducing today. If the sound quality was comparable when this hit the Big Screen in 1938, it's hard to believe that it did not empty every theater in which it played before the main feature began. Mercifully, about half the 19-minute running time of TOYLAND CASINO is devoted to kids tumbling and tap-dancing WITHOUT any singing. This is not particularly interesting, but it's a lot easier on the ears. It's not that difficult to picture Hitler and Tojo's henchmen watching TOYLAND CASINO, and projecting from it that America would fold six weeks after the sneak attack on Pearl Harbor. Perhaps it's not fair to blame millions of gratuitous deaths on TOYLAND CASINO, but the infamous American Board of Censors gave it MPAA Approval Certificate #02097. With all the war rumbles in 1938, WHAT could these folks have been thinking? As for now, if you cannot get enough outtakes from Jon Benet Ramsey and Honey Boo-Boo, TOYLAND CASINO might be right up your alley. For everyone else, it's probably a Dead-end.

In the 1920s and 30s, various studios tried creating their own versions of the Our Gang comedies--and most of them were pretty bad. This 1938 film appears to be a knock-off of the later Our Gang comedies--the ones that weren't nearly as funny and relied too much on kid talent shows. In fact, with "Toyland Casino" they don't even have a plot--just act after act singing and dancing. While this sounds pretty bad because of the lack of plot, it's worse because the kids are all a bunch of no-talents. It's no surprise that none of these kids went on to have big careers in Hollywood, as their singing was generally painful to hear. In fact, that is THE problem--the film isn't entertaining and is just painful from start to finish--sort of like if you are forced to attend some elementary school pageant where your kids aren't even performing! Just awful.

Toyland Casino (1938) ** (out of 4) If you're looking for something cute then you really don't have to look any further than this Warner two-reeler. However, if you're looking for something good then you're not going to find it here. What we basically have here is a talent show with kids doing all of the performances. We get dance routines, singing, jump rope and several other "tricks" being done by kids who all appear to be under the age of 12. I'm not going to lie, around the eight minute mark of this thing I was already getting bored out of my mind and that wasn't good because there were still several other acts to follow. I'm not going to go all out and bash the kids because that just wouldn't be right. Yes, some of them have very bad singing voices and some of the acts really weren't all that impressive but they're kids. The acts were at least cute and I guess that's all we could really ask for. While watching this short it reminded me of the talent shows that I used to be a part of in elementary school and looking back on them, we were cute but there wasn't too many good acts. That's the same here, although I noticed a few of the cast members would go onto have careers including Abbe Lane and Bobby Hastings who had credits up to a couple years ago.

I love seeing films from the 20s and 30s,As we cant see further back in time, its so cool that these films have been preserved....I rare treat to see a myriad of children performers, singing and dancing.... too cute, and too much fun...In some ways a more polished Lil Rascals show.The little girl on toe shoes tap dancing and jump roping is pretty impressive. Lots of tap here.I also love when the band makes it sound as if her tapping herself on the head with her foot is a woodblock hit.And for small children pretty dang melodic, I sing for a living, and its rare to hear kids that small with a range, pitch and personality...An adorable slice of the 1930's.