Blu-ray: Laurel and Hardy - The Silent Years

Though among the most successful film comedians of the early sound era, Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy’s cinematic partnership had actually started in the early 1920s. It’s easy to overlook their silent short films, 15 of which are collected here.

The oldest, 1921’s Lucky Dog, is an entertaining curio, a starring vehicle for Laurel’s Keatonesque naif with Ollie in a subordinate role as a hapless thug. Stan’s athleticism is impressive, whether he’s being struck by a streetcar or sneaking into a dog show on all fours, and there’s a winning turn from the titular canine. Both actors signed contracts separately with producer Hal Roach in 1926, appearing together in 13 shorts of variable quality before making their "official" partnership debut in 1927’s Putting Pants on Philip. The earlier films are entertaining curios: Duck Soup (not the Marx Brothers classic) has them working as a team while their parts in Slipping Wives could have been taken by any jobbing comic actors. With Love and Hisses has its longueurs but does feature an appearance by the great James Finlayson, whose sound-era catchphrase “D’oh!” was borrowed, decades later, by actor Dan Castellaneta when voicing Homer Simpson.

Laurel and Hardy’s screen personas became fully formed in 1927. Flying Elephants is a Stone Age curio, visually entertaining but not as funny as the prehistoric sequence in Buster Keaton’s Three Ages. The Second Hundred Years is terrific, though, our heroes attempting to dig an escape tunnel from their prison cell which leads them into the warden’s office and eventually to impersonate a pair of French dignitaries. The facial tics are now present, and there are some wonderful sight gags, notably Stan sneezing after inhaling tobacco, and his pursuit of an errant cherry during a dinner scene. Putting Pants on Philip is better still, Ollie charged with shepherding his kilt-wearing Scottish nephew through the city streets. Watch out for Stan repeatedly walking over a ventilation grille, the results anticipating Marilyn Monroe’s skirt mishap in The Seven Year Itch. Most of the humour is visual, though the title cards are consistently funny. Notably when Stan’s boxer shorts take a hit and a policeman tells shocked onlookers that “This dame ain’t got no lingerie!”

As a closer we get Battle of the Century in a near-complete version, its missing fragments and stills seamlessly slotted in. The second reel is priceless, culminating with the custard pie fight to end all cinematic skirmishes. In Stan’s words, "Let’s give them so many pies that there never will be room for any more pie pictures in the whole history of the movies." Each film comes with a commentary, and a short interview with Neil Brand beautifully encapsulates Stan and Ollie’s onscreen relationship. Eureka’s booklet includes notes by silent film aficionado Paul Merton, and the restored prints look good. Enormous fun, in other words.

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