Laurel & Hardy: The Silent Years (1929) – Review

By Sarah Morgan

You can’t beat a bit of Stan and Ollie. Almost a century since the films depicted in this box set were released, they’re still winning over new fans while keeping their old ones in stitches.

We’ve already been treated to two previous releases dedicated to their early silent work and the formation of their world-famous comedic partnership; this third one will be the last of its kind because it brings together the final shorts they made during the era, and even includes an early foray into sound.

“Wrong trousers”

By 1929, Laurel and Hardy were a well-established and successful duo working for the Hal Roach studio. While entries on previous discs saw them gradually moving towards the personas we know and love so much, this one sees their characters fully formed.

Highlights include Liberty, in which the duo play escaped convicts on the run who have been sprung from jail by their fellow gang members. Unfortunately, while changing into their civvies in the back of a getaway car, they put on the wrong trousers, and the action follows them as they attempt to switch back, a scenario that puts them in a few risqué situations.

Angora Love was their last silent movie, and it’s a great way to go out – it sees our heroes trying to hide a rather over friendly goat from their landlord, but obviously nothing goes to plan. The plot was dusted down some years later and revived as one of their well-known classics, Laughing Gravy, this time featuring a dog.

Edgar Kennedy plays the landlord in Angora Love, and he pops up in my favourite entry in this release – Unaccustomed As We Are. This is actually not a silent, but an early sound short featuring some wonderful lines for the duo. Of course, the sight gags come thick and fast too as Ollie, with ‘help’ from Stan, tries to keep the fact that he has a female neighbour (Thelma Todd) hidden in a trunk in his apartment from both his wife (Mae Busch) and the woman’s cop husband (Kennedy).

“Curiosity piece”

The special features include audio commentaries on each short and a real curiosity piece – as well as the original silent version of Double Whoopee, there’s a chance to see a ‘sound’ take on it, which was created as part of a short-lived experiment to add dialogue to L&H’s silent films.

Impersonator Chuck McGinn provides their voices, albeit rather unconvincingly. It’s an intriguing addition, but the film – including a segment in which a very young Jean Harlow literally loses her clothes – is better without it.

Despite that, Eureka Entertainment, which is behind the release, is delivering another fine mess of films from stars we will never tire seeing.

Sarah Morgan( Writer )

Sarah Morgan studied film journalism at post-graduate level with the BFI and has been writing about TV and film for PA Media’s newspaper, magazine and new media customers since 1996. She’s also written for a wide range of other publications, both online and in print, including the book Offbeat and Intermission magazine, and is a regular contributor to the Talking Pictures TV podcast. When she isn’t watching movies, she’s collecting and reading vintage crime and horror paperback books or, for her sins, watching her beloved Sheffield Wednesday.

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