OPERATING as a team for close to a full decade, Laurel & Hardy had made a goodly number of the most successful of 2 Reelers; peppered with an occasional Feature. The system had worked out quite well; but alas, it was now 1935 and there were many changes taking place in the World; including tastes in Hollywood's Movie Manufactories.
MUSIC, situations and the subjects used as fodder for building comedy routines were morphing rapidly from what they had been only a few short years earlier. Small wonder that it should be so; for the Nation and the World had now endured the cross of over 5 years of the Great Depression. Tastes of the public and tolerance for certain Comic Story lines was now more somber than that which had been present during the Roaring 20's Jazz Age.
OVER at Hal Roach Studios, the attempt to meet the new popularities and demands of the mass audience, the Studio initiated a sort of hybrid film form. It was dubbed "the Streamliner"; being a short feature that came in at about 50 to 55 minutes in length and was designed to play as a second feature on the Double Bill, Matinée and the emerging movie house sub-species, the Drive-In Theatre.
THE immediate consequence of this move was to eliminate the Short Subject. Ironically it was the Comedy Short that made Roach & Company a serious movie production outfit by bringing us an overall outstanding product using the talents of such luminaries such as: Laurel & Hardy, Harold Lloyd, Charley Chase, Max Davidson, Our Gang, Snub Pollard, the Taxi Boys (Billy Gilbert & Ben Blue), Thelma Todd, Patsy Kelly, Zasu Pitts and others. The past successes not withstanding, they were out, kaput and left to the likes of Columbia Pictures' and RKO Radio Pictures' Short Subjects Departments! EVEN in bringing the Laurel & Hardy Shorts Series to a halt (the last of the Hal Roach Shorts Series), the gang at the Roach Lot weren't afraid to try some things a little different; or, off-beat, even.
STARTING out in typical enough fashion, THICKER THAN WATER (Hal Roach Productions/MGM, 1935) includes a typical non-tranquil domestic situation for Mr. Hardy. Ollie is wed to diminutive, though totally bitchy, spouse. Complications are rendered by having Oliver's friend, Mr. Laurel, as a boarder. Additional support comes from such familiar Hal Roach Players as: James Finlayson, Charlie Hall, Bess Flowers, Harry Bowen and Baldwin Cooke; although only Finn gets to perform to any measure that was equal to what had been before, dating to the Silents.
GOING beyond the usual realm of the L & H comedy, with their slow burns, takes & double takes, Ollie's pomposity and Stan's chronic propensity for malapropisms; the folks in the production team attempted to be more than just a little off the beaten path. They offered us both a super sight gag concept and a sort of science fiction/fantasy sort of a gag to wrap it all up.
THE super sight gag was the "ability" of Stanley to "grab" onto the edge of the screen image and to seemingly pull it off; revealing the next scene. This is mildly amusing at best and is really sort of a derivative of the World of Mr. Disney and the Brothers Fleischer, the Animated Cartoon. Predictably, once it slips from Laurel's hand; forcing him to hurriedly scamper back and grip it again.
SECONDLY, the final gag has a Laurel to Hardy transfusion go bad; mixing and co-mingling not only their plasma, but also their personalities. A clean shaven Hardy with Laurel's voice and mannerisms and a mustachioed Laurel with the inimitable voice of Oliver walk off the last scene; with Stan grabbing the edge of the frame, of course.
THICKER THAN WATER is far from being a top Laurel &Hardy entry; but it doesn't deserve to get some of the criticism that we've read. Let us explain.
HARKING back to 1935, not 1960, '70, '80, '90 or the 21st Century even, we would not have the luxury of contrasting the picture to the entire output of the comedy team; as the L & H Series was then still an ongoing work. There was no thought of "Comic Genius" or "Cinematic Immortality". Getting "Today's" laughs in their current movies was the sole objective. Then they would move on to the next project.
AND, of course, no one would ever want to have been accused of being "behind the times." DOES this make any sense to anyone out there in our Cyber Space Audience? POODLE SCHNITZ!!
MUSIC, situations and the subjects used as fodder for building comedy routines were morphing rapidly from what they had been only a few short years earlier. Small wonder that it should be so; for the Nation and the World had now endured the cross of over 5 years of the Great Depression. Tastes of the public and tolerance for certain Comic Story lines was now more somber than that which had been present during the Roaring 20's Jazz Age.
OVER at Hal Roach Studios, the attempt to meet the new popularities and demands of the mass audience, the Studio initiated a sort of hybrid film form. It was dubbed "the Streamliner"; being a short feature that came in at about 50 to 55 minutes in length and was designed to play as a second feature on the Double Bill, Matinée and the emerging movie house sub-species, the Drive-In Theatre.
THE immediate consequence of this move was to eliminate the Short Subject. Ironically it was the Comedy Short that made Roach & Company a serious movie production outfit by bringing us an overall outstanding product using the talents of such luminaries such as: Laurel & Hardy, Harold Lloyd, Charley Chase, Max Davidson, Our Gang, Snub Pollard, the Taxi Boys (Billy Gilbert & Ben Blue), Thelma Todd, Patsy Kelly, Zasu Pitts and others. The past successes not withstanding, they were out, kaput and left to the likes of Columbia Pictures' and RKO Radio Pictures' Short Subjects Departments! EVEN in bringing the Laurel & Hardy Shorts Series to a halt (the last of the Hal Roach Shorts Series), the gang at the Roach Lot weren't afraid to try some things a little different; or, off-beat, even.
STARTING out in typical enough fashion, THICKER THAN WATER (Hal Roach Productions/MGM, 1935) includes a typical non-tranquil domestic situation for Mr. Hardy. Ollie is wed to diminutive, though totally bitchy, spouse. Complications are rendered by having Oliver's friend, Mr. Laurel, as a boarder. Additional support comes from such familiar Hal Roach Players as: James Finlayson, Charlie Hall, Bess Flowers, Harry Bowen and Baldwin Cooke; although only Finn gets to perform to any measure that was equal to what had been before, dating to the Silents.
GOING beyond the usual realm of the L & H comedy, with their slow burns, takes & double takes, Ollie's pomposity and Stan's chronic propensity for malapropisms; the folks in the production team attempted to be more than just a little off the beaten path. They offered us both a super sight gag concept and a sort of science fiction/fantasy sort of a gag to wrap it all up.
THE super sight gag was the "ability" of Stanley to "grab" onto the edge of the screen image and to seemingly pull it off; revealing the next scene. This is mildly amusing at best and is really sort of a derivative of the World of Mr. Disney and the Brothers Fleischer, the Animated Cartoon. Predictably, once it slips from Laurel's hand; forcing him to hurriedly scamper back and grip it again.
SECONDLY, the final gag has a Laurel to Hardy transfusion go bad; mixing and co-mingling not only their plasma, but also their personalities. A clean shaven Hardy with Laurel's voice and mannerisms and a mustachioed Laurel with the inimitable voice of Oliver walk off the last scene; with Stan grabbing the edge of the frame, of course.
THICKER THAN WATER is far from being a top Laurel &Hardy entry; but it doesn't deserve to get some of the criticism that we've read. Let us explain.
HARKING back to 1935, not 1960, '70, '80, '90 or the 21st Century even, we would not have the luxury of contrasting the picture to the entire output of the comedy team; as the L & H Series was then still an ongoing work. There was no thought of "Comic Genius" or "Cinematic Immortality". Getting "Today's" laughs in their current movies was the sole objective. Then they would move on to the next project.
AND, of course, no one would ever want to have been accused of being "behind the times." DOES this make any sense to anyone out there in our Cyber Space Audience? POODLE SCHNITZ!!