User Reviews

While quite stunning to look at with exquisite sets, lavish costumes and some beautiful snowy photography, at times this seems just too long even though it's got a full length plot line and a few musical numbers to pad it out. Oliver is married to the cheating Mae Busch who kidnaps a princess then runs out on Oliver anyway, leaving the young girl (Darla Hood as a child, Jacqueline Welles as a young lady) to be raised by Oliver and his sidekick, Stan Laurel.

Moving from shorts into features full time, Stan and Ollie were lucky to have material that could be extended into a full plot line. They had done a similar situation before in the 1933 full length operetta "Fra Diablo", so this needed a fresh take on an old story, having been based upon an opera itself. I would have loved a dance number with the gypsies, as the songs aren't all that memorable.

Heading into the Little Rascals series, Darla Hood manages to be cute without being cloying, something that left me cold to her in the shorts. The future Julie Bishop really has nothing substantial to do as the older young lady. Of the supporting players, Busch is a convincing shrew, while James Finlayson is funny with his double takes as a palace guard. The lovable Zeffie Tilbury is, as always, a delight as the gypsy queen, while Mitchell Lewis deliciously sinister as her son. Silent star Antonio Moreno is sensuous as the roving gypsy whom Busch carries on with in front of her own husband. It's pretty enjoyable, but I found myself more entranced by the setting and technical aspects of the film than the actual movie as a whole.

Be forewarned, a scene of Stan sawing bars is like nails down a chalkboard.

Producer: Hal Roach. Copyright 12 February 1936 by Metro Goldwyn Mayer Corp. New York opening at the Rialto: 16 February 1936. U.S. release: 14 February 1936. 8 reels. 70 minutes.

SYNOPSIS: Based on the operetta by Balfe, this is a tale of gypsies who, offended by the master of a noble house, kidnap his only child, and raise her as one of their own. Years later, the gypsy band returns to the same locality, where the old nobleman still mourns the loss of his daughter. The girl, now a young lady, in love and unaware of her past, is betrayed by a jealous gypsy woman.

NOTES: Final film appearance of Thelma Todd, who died on 16 December 1935. In order to eliminate controversy, most of her scenes were dropped. This film M-G-M's biggest box-office success in France for 1936.

COMMENT: One could be nasty and say that it was difficult to tell which was funnier: the scenes that were meant to be funny or those that were meant to be taken seriously. The directors lost a grand opportunity to really send up this ridiculous old operetta by having most of the players including Moreno, Wells, Busch and Carleton play with heavy theatrical over-emphasis admittedly but perfectly straight nonetheless — and even Hardy himself is guilty in his few dramatic scenes. One could say this except that the funny scenes in the hands of such two accomplished masters of timing are so funny, particularly the last couple of reels with Stan doing some delightful business with some empty bottles and a climactic run-in with our old friend James Finlayson and Stan delightfully putting the soldiery to flight with a whip; and we love Oliver's masterful fade-out on the scene in which he is suddenly presented with a six- year-old child — "Come, Stanley, let's spread the glad tidings!" enunciated with delightfully comic emphasis.

Where some critics get the idea there are only two songs I don't know. The 52 minute TV version is full of songs, not only solos for some romantic gypsy, Miss Wells and Mr Carleton, but numerous choruses of gypsies and soldiers and an insistent music score that heavily underlies every scene whether "dramatic" or comic. The songs themselves are not bad and some are quite catchy but in keeping with the film's generally drab production values, the sound recording is tinny and the staging is straight out of a stage presentation of the operetta by the Lower Podunk Amateur Dramatic Society. At least the corny and unintentionally ludicrous presentation matches the wheezes of the dialogue (which seems to have been lifted straight from the stage) and the ridiculously melodramatic turns of the plot.

Oddly enough the 52 minute TV version in which some unsung genius has made a game try to improve the film by extremely sharp editing and elaborate cross-cutting in the first 30 minutes or so is a reasonable success. Aside from L&H, Finlayson and Zeffie Tilbury alone of the players enact their ludicrous lines with the tongue-in- cheek heartiness they deserve.

OTHER VIEWS: The full 70 minutes version is entertaining and also moves fast, though there is still a bit of inventive cross-cutting and the censor has chopped Moreno's flogging scene (which is accompanied bizarrely by a light-hearted tune from the background orchestra). Laurel and Hardy's fortune-telling episode which was deleted from the 52 minutes version has been restored — and a very funny sequence it is too. Oddly it also boasts one of the most effectively inventive camera angles of any L&H movie (not generally noted for their photographic finesse).

L&H are remarkably at home in the weird plot, but the support players fare less adroitly. Fin is great but doesn't enter till the climax. On the other hand, Tilbury and Todd (who has virtually nothing outside of her introductory song, which is dubbed anyway) disappear without explanation after their initial scenes.

When she finally enters, Julie Bishop makes a fetching heroine, though saddled with obvious dubbing for her famous solo, "I Dreamt I Dwelt In Marble Halls". Despite the poor sound quality and primitive staging, the songs come across excitingly enough to maintain interest in the overly melodramatic plot. A bizarre fade-out with the boys saved NOT just in the nick of time is typical Laurel and Hardy.

I notice that the majority of reviewers have major criticisms of this period Laurel and Hardy feature-length comedy, based on an 1843 opera. Despite cutting out nearly all of Thelma Todd's scenes, due to her untimely and suspicious death, and frequent complaints about the quality and quantity of the musical numbers, I loved it. Incidentally, you may notice that the colorized version is a few minutes shorter than the original B&W. That's because Thelma Todd's rendition of "Heart of a Gypsy" was eliminated. Since this was the only significant remaining scene featuring Thelma, I assume the idea was to expunge her contributions to the film. Or perhaps because this was the only major song added to the original music, perhaps it was eliminated?. Some reviewers don't like music inserted into a comedy, but I like musical comedies, including this one. I don't think I've laughed so many times in L&H feature.........Mae Busch, as Ollie's wife, was right on target as the ultimate scold, as well as a gold digger, thief and blatant adulteress. She was also a kidnapper, , capturing Arline(Darla Hood, of "Our Gang"), the small daughter of Count Arnheim(William Carleton) in retribution for the flogging of her lover, Devilshoof(Antonio Morono), simply for being a gypsy.........There are several reality problems with this abduction. Mae saw her playing by the road, and simply put a shawl over Darla and carried her to her trailer, with no evident resistance by the child, who readily accepted her captor and L&H. The second problem is that, instead of telling Ollie the truth about her, she claimed she was his daughter, with no explanation as to her whereabouts before this. Ollie accepted this obvious lie, not wanting to contradict his wife. Soon thereafter, Mae would steal all of Ollie's gleanings from his pickpocketing, before setting out with her current lover. leaving Ollie and , presumably, Stan to care for Arline.........Ollie and Stan seemed to make their living by telling fortunes and pickpocketing outsiders. The implication was the other gypsies also engaging in the same activities. Stan had a particular strategy where he mesmerized the victim by slowly bringing 2 fingers toward their eyes, as part of his fortune telling technique, then using his other hand to pick their pocket. Ollie was not as skilled at this technique, and more greedy, so that the dandy he was robbing easily detected his activity, and drew a derringer on him, making him return all things stolen, plus his gleanings from a previous robbery. However, a palace guard saw the last part of this exchange, and demanded that the dandy give back everything he had taken from Ollie, who lifted some things he had not previously taken, including the derringer. Very funny!........I won't give away the final scene, which is quite humorous.........One 'problem' with the screenplay is that all the main characters other than Arline are pictured as being flawed in some way. L&H are thieves, Mae is also a thief, as well as a scold and adulteress, and the Count is unjustly cruel toward gypsies. The screenplay gives the false impression that most gypsies survived on fortune telling and thievery. Women did often make their money from telling fortunes, but men, such as L&H, didn't.......... Returning to the music, the keeper song from the opera is "I Dreamed I Dwelled in Marble Halls", lip synched by Julie Bishop, as the adult version of Arline, and dubbed by the beautiful and talented Rosie Lawrence, who played Mary Roberts, in "Way Out West". The other songs derived from the opera are : "Then, You Will Remember Me" and "The Heart Bowed Down". I've mentioned Thelma's "Heart of a Gypsy."

During the 1930s and 40s, conventional Hollywood wisdom said that if you had a comedy team in a full-length movie, you MUST provide some musical interludes to make the audiences happy. Well, conventional wisdom was WRONG!!! In most cases, comedy teams like Stan and Ollie, The Marx Brothers and Abbott and Costello lost all their momentum due to pointless singing. And to make things worse, in the case of Laurel and Hardy, they were often placed in movies with opera-style warbling!! Who in their right mind would think that low-brow comedy (this isn't meant as an insult) and high-brow music (this isn't meant as a compliment) belong together?! As musicals, these movies stank and as comedies they left a lot to be desired.

In this film, just like THE ROGUE SONG, we find Stan and Ollie in an operatic nightmare! Fortunately, the awful songs hit hard early on--after that it's a true Laurel and Hardy film until about 47 minutes into the film--when the yecchy music strikes again! True fans of the duo will no doubt feel annoyed that there is no momentum and the songs are so gosh-darn awful. Generally, Irving Thalberg was thought of as a great genius at MGM, but one of the mistakes he made was pushing for music in both Laurel and Hardy as well as Marx Brothers films. Sure, I loved A NIGHT AT THE OPERA, but none of this film's better moments consisted of the awful singing of the musical leads!

THE BOHEMIAN GIRL features Stan and Ollie as gypsies who steal and get into little mix-ups--none of which are among their better work. Ollie is married to a cheating harpy who eventually leaves him for another man. In the process, she leaves a stolen child with Ollie who somehow thinks this 3 or 4 year-old kid is his--even though they just met! Was wife Mae Busch keeping her in a closet or drawer up until then? How else could Ollie justify that this is his daughter?! No one is THAT stupid!! Then, at about 57 minutes into the film, some more pointless music. Following this, Ollies daughter (12 years later) is caught be her REAL biological father and he plans on beating her within an inch of her life because she has the nerve to be a gypsy! So, it's up to Stan and Ollie to rescue her. Well, things kind of work out--except for Stan and Ollie--who we see in a funny final scene that probably will provide a good chuckle.

Unfortunately, while the non-singing parts are pretty good, it is still far from the team's best work. The biggest problem is that apart from the funny moments involving Mae Busch, the rest of the stuff just isn't all that funny. My advice, then, is do not watch this film unless you have seen most everything by the team. Instead, in the same amount of time it takes to see this, you can see three of their shorts. You'll have a lot more laughs and will have a much better idea of the genius of Laurel and Hardy.

FYI--the little girl who plays Ollie's daughter is the same one who later played Darla in the Little Rascals films.