Try as they might, the Bowery Boys just aren't up to speed without their leader Slip Mahoney (Leo Gorcey) on board. You could give Huntz Hall an 'A' for effort for soldiering on, but the gags are thin and the only other recognizable gang member is Gorcey's brother David holding on to the end of the series run with Hall.Considering how the film makers recycled themes regularly in their stories, I thought sure the hypnotist gimmick would have already shown up in a Bowery Boys flick, but having seen almost all of them now I can't seem to locate another entry. Needless to say though, Sach (Hall) will be on the receiving end of hypnotist Simon Noble's (Robert Foulk) attempt to regress Duke Coveleskie (Stanley Clements) to a past life.You know, I had to stop and think about how much Noble was actually going to charge the Bowery Boys' landlady (Queenie Smith) for the regression technique - two hundred dollars! For 1957, that seemed to me to be quite a hefty piece of change when even today you could probably find one of these shysters to do it for less than half the amount. No wonder Noble could feel 'that soft pink light bathing me', he would put all the cool green right in his pocket.Well, with Sach discovering that he was once a royal tax collector back in the Seventeenth Century, it doesn't take long for both the Boys and the bad guys to go on the hunt for a missing treasure that Blackbeard the Pirate stowed away in 1682. You know, I was curious about that mention of Hobson's Cove, having been a New York, Hudson Valley resident all my life and never having heard of it. Turns out if you do a google search, 'Hobson's Cove' actually turns up in an Act of Parliament of the United Kingdom under King Edward VII in 1908. It's right there on page 187 under a heading for the Department of Marines and Fisheries, but you have to be fluent in Roman numerals to find it.So with all the shenanigans by Sach and the rest of the Boys, and the clumsy attempt of the bad guys to abscond with the jewels, I was left to ponder what might have been the real treasure chest of the story. For that I would refer the viewer to Dr. Noble's able assistant Cleo, portrayed by actress Jane Nigh, who did all her best work here in profile.

Although the Bowery Boys just doesn't gel in many ways without Leo Gorcey still it's nice to see Huntz Hall alone in the spotlight in these last remaining Bowery Boy films that Allied Artists did. In this one Sach is hypnotized by faker hypnotist Robert Foulk and he regresses back in his mind to when he was His Majesty's tax collector and none other than Blackbeard the Pirate gives Hall a treasure map in lieu of hard cash for his back taxes. Al Capone could certainly sympathize.It wasn't Foulk though it was a pair of earrings that Foulk's gal pal come on Jane Nigh was wearing. The bit with the earrings was later used in the Road To Hong Kong to put Bob Hope under. So for Duke, Sach, and the rest it means get the earrings to get the treasure.One thing this does prove is that Horace DeBussy Jones is the same in any incarnation.

The last decade of Bowery Boy films are among the most beloved of all the films the gang had made. But be aware, after Leo Gorcey was fired, (his last film was Dig that Uranium) the seven remaining movies were not only a departure from the usual formula, they were weak, disjointed, and badly executed. By this time, Leo and Huntz were a well-oiled comedy team. Without Gorcey, and his late father who played Louie (he died in a horrible car crash), the very heart and soul of the series was no more. But the contracts called for 7 more films. The boys became men (wearing suits and now interested in women rather than girls, and focused on making money more than ever). This film is the worst of the bunch! A lost attempt to play on the Bridey Murphy phenomenon. Sach is taken back to his past life. This involves a treasure. The story doesn't resemble a Bowery Boys romp in the least bit. If you are a fan and have seen their best films you will be saddened to witness this installment.

Hold That Hypnotist (1957) ** 1/2 (out of 4) Sach (Huntz Hall) and Duke (Stanley Clements) try to protect Ms. Kelly from a crooked hypnotist so they set out to prove that he's a fake. When the hypnotist puts Sach under it turns out that the nutty fool at one time knew Blackbeard the Pirate and also knows where a hidden treasure is. The forty-fourth film in the Bowery Boys series is the third without Gorcey and I must admit that compared to the previous two horrid entries this one here comes off as a mini-masterpiece. A new writer and director were introduced to the series and they clearly made a much better movie than we've seen in quite a few films and this goes back to when Leo was with the series. I was a little skeptical when the movie first started because we got all sorts of silly slapstick that really didn't prove any major laughs but once the story is set in place I thought the pacing was very good and things really started to pick up. I think this film works for a number of reasons but one is that the screenplay doesn't get burdened down in familiar plots. Yes, it turns out that the hypnotist is a crook who tries to steal the treasure from the boys but thankfully this doesn't take over the entire plot. Instead of the plot being centered around this, the bad guy aspect doesn't turn up until the final ten-minutes and by doing this the screenplay can center on the boys and I think it does a very good job at keeping everything moving. There's a very funny sequence when Sach first goes under and then another one later when the boys are flirting with the doctor's sexy blonde. There's a flashback sequence where we see Sach's previous life with Blackbeard and while I didn't understand the "game" they were playing, the entire thing was funny and rather clever. Another plus this time out is that Hall and Clements have got a nice chemistry flow, which is yet something else that was missing in the previous two movies. I thought the two worked well off one another and they also mixed well with the other cast members. At just 61-minutes the movie really doesn't contain any dry moments and in the end it turned out to be one of the most entertaining entries in the series.