In terms of special features, the set does have some interviews and home movies on offer. That’s actually one of the most interesting things about this collection, working through some of those solo films you’re less likely to have seen if you’re, even if you have seen a bunch of their movies! And in terms of their work together, the collection includes both their first and last films (“Lucky Dog” and Utopia) and a handful of films in between, so you really walk away from the DVDs feeling like you get a proper sampling of their work throughout the years. It brings together a selection of 24 short and feature-length films, some of which feature Laurel and Hardy as a team, but many of which are in fact films they starred in without the other. I was able to get a look at the new Mill Creek entertainment DVD release of The Laurel and Hardy Comedy Collection and it’s a pretty sizable package of films for a reasonable price. If you’re not familiar with the work of Laurel and Hardy, that is something you really should fix ASAP. And when all was said and done, they appeared in almost 100 films together, when you add up all the silent shorts, sound shorts, and features! Not too shabby at all. They first appeared onscreen in 1921 in a short film called “Lucky Dog,” and they made their last feature film in 1951 with Utopia. So in that way, Laurel and Hardy were truly something special.Īnother thing that’s impressive about the Laurel and Hardy’s work together is how long they lasted and how prolific they were as a team. There was, you know, that whole scandal with Fatty Arbuckle and the death of Virginia Rappe that’s hardly something we should get into here. Looking back on other comic duos of the silent era, I’d have to say I prefer the work of Fatty Arbuckle and Buster Keaton… in that era, but they surely didn’t make it as a team in the post- Jazz Singer world of sound cinema. Englishmen Laurel became recognizable as the less graceful and more endearingly dim-witted of the two, while his American partner Hardy traditionally played the role of the pompous blowhard, taking out his frustrations on his meeker, soft-spoken companion. That duo is of course Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy. But only one prominent duo got their start in film’s silent era and succeeded in transitioning into sound as a comedy team. If you look back on the history of comedy in cinema, plenty of comic duos left their audiences in stitched from Martin and Lewis to more recent pairings like Will Ferrell and John C Reilly.
0 kommentar(er)
