Excuse My Dust

There's nothing more volatile than an idea in small-town 1895 America, especially for eager inventor Joe Belden. He's making a horseless carriage that runs on an explosive cleaning fluid called gasoline -- a "gas-o-mobile." Why, it's enough to make John Q. Citizen flip his straw boater! Red Skelton portrays Joe, taking the wheel in a Technicolor musical comedy that has him wooing the daughter (Sally Forrest) of the man most threatened by Joe's invention: the local livery master (William Demarest). But there's happiness all around at the end of the road, and getting there is great fun because the horseless carriage-race finale "is a frantically funny affair [with] a lot of old Keystone contrivances" (Bosley Crowther, The New York Times).

• comedy
• musical