Flying Elephants (released February, 1928; directed by Frank Butler)

Early summer, 1927, the Hal Roach Comedy All Stars headed to the Nevada desert to produce a film conceived and apparently directed by Roach himself, although Frank Butler received screen credit. Roach was probably right to leave his name off this mess, one of the weakest of all the Laurel & Hardy films, the half-assed Stone Age comedy Flying Elephants.

Seems that the tribe has decreed that all men between the ages of 13 and 96 must be married, and James Finlayson’s daughter, the last (and most nubile) single woman in the valley, is the object of the last two single men, the blustering Oliver “Mighty Giant” Hardy and the effeminate Stan “Twinkle Star” Laurel. A lot of hitting each other on the head with clubs ensues, until a goat knocks the Mighty Giant off a cliff. Meanwhile, elephants are flying south for the winter in a typical ponderous gag in this film.

The costumes are impressive; very furry. There, I’ve said something nice. Although Roach is credited with the story, it’s as if they all rode out to the desert and decided they’d think of something funny when they got there, but forgot to bring scotch or any other potent potable to help inspire them. Completed by the summer of ’27, the film sat in the Pathe vault until 1928.

“I can get five women in five minutes… and you should see me when I’m working fast” Ollie says at one point, in what is undoubtedly the least in-character line he’d speak until he went off to work for Fox a decade and a half later.

Flying Elephants is not available in a superior print, but it wouldn't be any better if it were. The version to be found on The Lost Films of Laurel & Hardy, Vol. 6 DVD is cobbled together from various sources and is only satisfactory, but is better than the one on the German DVDs.

Do Detectives Think? (released November, 1927; directed by Fred Guiol)

In the spring of 1927, Hal Roach signed a new distribution agreement with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. As Randy Skretvedt wrote in “Laurel & Hardy: The Magic Behind the Movies”, it was a good deal for both sides: “MGM got some badly needed short subjects for all of its theaters, and Roach some badly needed theaters for all of his short subjects.” Roach owed Pathé additional films, though, before he could consummate the deal with Metro, and one of the last to be produced under the old arrangement was the next “Hal Roach All-Stars” film, a little something called Do Detectives Think?, which just happened to be a turning point in the Laurel & Hardy canon.

James Finlayson is Judge Foozle, who – acting under instructions from the jury (“We find the prisoner guilty! Bump him!") – has just sentenced the Tipton Slasher to death by hanging, adding for good measure, “...and I hope you choke!” The Slasher vows to escape and cut the Judge’s tonsils out, and before we’re even comfortably in our theatre seats he’s out of prison and masquerading as the new butler in the lavish home shared by the Judge and his gorgeous young wife (Viola Richard). Hearing the news of the Slasher’s escape, the Judge sends for a pair of crack detectives to act as bodyguards; he ends up with Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy.

In every way a true Laurel & Hardy film, unlike most of the teamings we’ve seen so far, and not a bad movie, either, with portents of things to come. The film is marred by a long, unfunny sequence in a cemetery; Stan & Ollie have to retrieve their hats and are literally afraid of their shadows (and a sinister shadow of a goat). On the plus side, when they DO reclaim their hats, they keep getting them mixed up, always good for a solid laugh in an L&H film.

Other highlights: a naked Finlayson spotting the Slasher through the bathroom door keyhole, Stan & Ollie reading the paper and finally realizing who that sinister new butler is; and Stan collaring the villain (Noah Young, who could not BE any more menacing) in the final reel – and imprisoning him in the closet in which Ollie’s hiding.

The Lost Films of Laurel & Hardy, Vol. 1 (Image) includes a gorgeous print of the Do Detectives Think? from a 1927 nitrate negative.

Previous Slapstick Sundays

This week, we’re marking the long-awaited (we hope) return of Slapstick Sundays with no less than a trio of Laurel & Hardy films, taking up where we left off in the L&H canon: early 1927, before Stan Laurel & Oliver Hardy were an official comedy team, but while they were slowly morphing into valuable players on the Hal Roach lot.

We promised earlier in this series to relate the story of how is it that here in the Balcony, many of the early Laurel & Hardy films have never been screened before despite the fact that we count ourselves as among the biggest and most loyal L&H fans on the planet. Well, the answer is simple: we acquired these films (scarce as they’ve been prior to the Lost Films of Laurel & Hardy DVD series from Image Entertainment) to show as part of our regular Friday night film series (see our sister website HERE). As our Friday night crowd grew, however, and as the L&H comedies became harder to see (with fewer TV showings), we decided to showcase the BEST of Laurel & Hardy rather than the earliest examples of their work, which – according to Randy Skretvedt in his must-have book, Laurel & Hardy: The Magic Behind the Movies – typically weren’t that good anyway. We’ve therefore been delighted, in screening the films here, to discover that some of them are quite worthwhile indeed.

Why Girls Love Sailors (released July 1927; directed by Fred Guiol)

This film was once considered, along with the still lost Hat’s Off, to be the rarest of all the short subjects in the L&H canon. Several years ago, a copy was located with French intertitles in the Cinematheque Francaise, and the DVD collection The Lost Films of Laurel & Hardy Vol. 9 includes a beautiful print of it (with both French and restored English titles).

Stan is a rather silly sailor engaged to the lovely Viola Richard, but she tickles the brutal Captain’s fancy and he kidnaps her. Stan – with the unwitting help of the dense First Mate, Oliver Hardy – schemes to rescue the girl by dressing in drag and seducing the rest of the crew(!) until the Captain is alone and can be taken out. In the end, the taking out is done by Mrs. Captain, Anita Garvin, making the first of many appearances in a Laurel & Hardy film.

A so-so film with the funniest moments coming when Laurel & Hardy actually act like Laurel & Hardy, which wasn’t happening too often at that time period. There’s an amusing scene in which Oliver responds to Stan-in-Drag’s advances: (“I haven’t kissed a woman since we left Africa!”) and Stan’s cheery greeting when he welcomes the daggers-out-of-the-eyes furious Captain’s wife to the ship: “Hello there! Welcome aboard!” Miss Garvin doesn’t show up until the end of the film, but she’s gorgeous and makes VERY funny faces as she attempts to kill her philandering husband. She’s a gem.

With Love and Hisses (released August 1927; directed by Fred Guiol)

The first L&H military comedy; Stan is a prissy private, Ollie is a bullying sergeant, and James Finlayson is an outrageous Captain. The comedy comes from Fin yelling at Ollie, who then yells at Stan, who then screws everything up.

Although they are not the typical Laurel & Hardy characters we would come to love, this is a pretty good film with some genuine laughs and a great oddball sight gag, typical of the Hal Roach studio: following a long march, we see the feet on the soldiers actually throbbing. Of course, it’s a silent film, so we miss the BWEEE-BWAAAA sound effect. Stan is surprisingly girly here, considering he keeps a girlie in his tent. When he’s getting chewed out for screwing up a drill, he puts his hand on his hip and hisses to the Captain, “I’m MAD at you!” In the most surreal moment, the outfit’s skinny-dipping party is interrupted by a surprise inspection, and since all their clothes have been burned up (this IS a Laurel & Hardy film, folks) they have to cut out the faces in the Cecil B. DeMille movie billboard for The Volga Boatmen and hide behind that. Silly but effective.

Sailors, Beware! (released September, 1927; directed by Hal Yates)

Wow, the plot of THIS one is complicated. A steamship full of millionaires is on its way to a gambling jaunt in Monte Carlo, filled with millionaires. Hardy is the ship’s girl-hungry purser; Laurel is a cabdriver who gets stuck aboard the ship accidentally after delivering passengers dockside; Anita Garvin is a beautiful jewel thief; and Harry Earles is her husband, a midget who dresses up as and pretends to be her baby. Ewwww.

I liked this film the best of the three; again, still not yet a typical L&H film, but with some good moments and Anita at her absolute sexiest. Stan shoots craps with the “baby” and not only are the dice loaded, but the Unholy One cheats at cards, too. Stan is also given a job to do by the psychopathic Captain of the ship (“The stowaways I don’t MURDER I put to WORK!”) and manages to screw everything up nicely. Ollie’s job is to keep an eye on Stan, so they actually share some nice sequences together. Oh, and if you look fast, you’ll see lovely Lupe Valez, who gets tossed into a swimming pool.

Both With Love and Hisses and Sailors, Beware! can be found in gorgeous prints on The Lost Films of Laurel & Hardy Vol. 7 from Image Entertainment.

Sold at Auction (1923) Directed by Charles Parrott (a/k/a Charley Chase)

Harry ‘Snub’ Pollard was another in the Hal Roach stable of supporting gagsters, and one of the most memorable. Although he never hit the heights of Harold Lloyd or Laurel & Hardy (or even Charley Chase or James Finlayson), ‘Snub’ (born Harry Fraser in Melbourne, Australia in 1889) had a lengthier film career than any of them.

Pollard was only 21 when he moved to America permanently to appear in vaudeville, and soon found a spot with the Keystone Cops. But the mid ’teens, he was supporting Lloyd in Hal Roach short subjects; by the end of the decade, he was starring in his own wildly inventive short subjects, often under the guidance of writer/director Charley Chase.

The Pollard/Chase duo gives us this week’s film, Sold at Auction, released in May, 1923. The film begins with a throwaway gag, but a good one; Pollard as a baby (a very large baby) is left on the doorstep of an imposing-looking mansion by a weeping mother. Twenty-five years later, he's still on the doorstep, still living in the basket. Which has nothing to do with anything else in the film, except, as we said, it's a good gag.

Later, Pollard successfully helps a kid cross a busy street; on his way back across, though, he’s run over by a series of automobiles, much to the joy of a nearby auctioneer selling household goods, who tells the resultant crowd, “You never can tell when you'll need a first aid cabinet!” The resulting run on first aid cabinets gives the salesman a lucrative idea about ‘Snub’: "Hire that bird - I like his sincerity!" The guy then uses Pollard’s face and body to stage a series of incidents which demonstrate a variety of recommended household staples, including brass knuckles and a variety of similar products (“Every lady an' gent of refinement should carry a blackjack”).

Eventually, the auctioneer gets a nice bargain: a down-on-his-luck gentleman sells him the entire furnishings of his house, and ‘Snub’ – moving up in the world – is assigned the task of cataloging and delivering the materials. Alas, it’s the next door neighbor’s goods that are accidentally sold, and Pollard has to retrieve all of the items, including Grandpa’s false teeth, which were sold to a daredevil stunt pilot.

Sold at Auction is one of the funniest and freshest of the silent screen comedies, with several inventive gags from Pollard and Chase. At one point, ‘Snub’ retrieves a set of books by playing the trumpet so badly that the buyer tosses them at him (with a brick thrown in at no extra charge); smashed on their respective heads, Pollard and Finlayson do a crazy slow-motion dance that takes ‘Snub’ right down the boulevard.

The film is included in Allday Entertainment’s American Slapstick (Vol. 1) compilation, and is an excellent print with a very nice piano score. Highly recommended. As for 'Snub', as movies found their voice he found work as comic sidekick to Tex Ritter, and then continued on to character parts, supporting roles, and bits in many, many films (that's him that Gene Kelly hands the umbrella to in the Singin' in the Rain number). Pollard died in 1962.