How to Keep a Job (1949)

★★★★ · How to Keep a Job · Christine Hennig · 2002-11-06

Ed gets fired and has to look for another job. He goes to a thoroughly unbelivable job interview with a guy who is determined to educate him out of his shortcomings, even though he's just met him. He tells him a contrived story about Bob (Gallant) and his twin brother Walter (Goofus), and how one is a slacker and the other is a booster. Ed sees his own slacking ways described and becomes a booster all the way, so he gets a great job in the mail room. This film is Coronet through and through, which makes it great fodder for msting. Ratings: Camp/Humor Value: ****. Weirdness: ***. Historical…

★★★★ · Not bad... · jenniferger · 2011-10-30

...but unrealistic. For example, the bit about loyalty to the company is quite dated now, since we all know there are two sides to every story and some employees do indeed have a right to be unhappy with their management, hence unions. I've also never met a manager who actually spent any time trying to personally develop the employees or nurture their careers with any words of wisdom. These days, the best you can hope for is a torturous team building day that leaves you feeling demoralized. If people ever really behaved like this manager does in the film, I would be surprised.

★★★★ · Not since <i>The Usual Suspects</i> · dynayellow · 2003-09-05

A recently terminated young man applies for a new job and is drawn into a psychological game of cat and mouse with his prospective employer. First Mr. Wiley asks Ed why he was fired, and when add replies "Why was I fired?" Wiley replies, "How should I know?" Ed agrees with the intelligence of this reply, but it was all just a gambit in Mr. Wiley's little game: he does know why Ed was fired! Wiley continues playing his little cat-and-mouse game with Ed throughout the film, seeming to care deeply about the boy, but in the end, he has been played again. Brothers vanish and are…

★★★ · The scope of Coronet actors · Spuzz · 2003-08-13

In this seemingly endless race of who made the most Coronet social guidance films of the "Datign Do's and Don'ts' boys, the kid who played "Alan Woodruff" stars here, playing twins! A young man goes to apply for a job, he didn't like his old job and he was fired. The employer-to-be relates the story of the twin brothers. This is sort of a goofus and Gallant type of story, where one guy does everything right, while the other slacks off. A pretty good film, with a pretty stupid twist ending..

★★★ · Coronet Stock Company at Work · Dodsworth the Cat · 2022-11-21

Evidently, Edward W. Blakeslee learned nothing from this film. We find him in front of the Coronet cameras a year later as unemployed Ken Michaels in "Better Use of Leisure Time." He appeared as one of Dick York's track buddies in "Rest and Health." Interestingly enough, there was a real-life Edward W. Blakeslee born in Chicago in 1927, but this is not him on the screen (he was living in Los Angeles at the time). Radio actor David Whitehouse plays this Ed Blakeslee in a film set in Midvale, Mo. (according to his employment application at the 0:49 mark). The "twin" story seems like a unique…