World Film and Television Progress (1938)

A CROP of COMEDIES M, Professor D< lanon I raser reviews I rotessor Deware, I hank tvans and Swiss AAiss. Three comedy features are running in the West End : Professor Beware, Thank Evans and Swiss Miss. Harold Lloyd, Max Millerand Laurel and Hardy are the comedians concerned. The humour in all three films depends on the reaction of the individuals to awkward or unpleasant situations, but the American pictures have the added attraction of large doses of slapstick. The British picture is therefore much more dependent on its characterization. It is to Max Miller's credit that he does a sufficiently good job to bring his picture into fair competition with the other two. To take the oldest-timer first, Harold Lloyd repeats the set-up that he has used consistently in his past films. It is as follows: A rather simple young man gets into trouble, falls in love and performs various miracles of courage and physical endurance in order to win the girl. This theme is tagged on quite legitimately to a convenient setting. In this case Harold Lloyd is an Egyptologist who is led to believe that he is living over again the life of a figure in Egyptian mythology. The situations which this lay-out allows for are imaginative but not as funny as one could hope, and Harold Lloyd has made this type of picture much better before. However the final slapstick sequence when the hero is proving his valour makes up to a large extent, for Lloyd is as athletic as ever and though his exploits are not hair-raising they are sufficiently impossible to be exciting. The Max Miller picture is more close to reality. Evans is a racing tipster whose eloquence is the same, off the track or on. The characters that surround him are as exaggerated as his own portrayal of the tipster and if one accepts the music-hall tradition there is nothing to stop one from having a good deal of enjoyment from the film. Thank Evans should appeal to British audiences. Its humour is sufficiently broad and its technique sufficiently good to make a fairminded audience overlook its British origin. It moves fast and the dialogue is competent. We have seen a good deal less of Max Miller on the screen than any of the other comedians mentioned here. His particular contribution is unlike theirs in almost every respect, but he does bring a freshness to film comedy that need not be overlooked when assessing the value of the current British product. We can certainly stand more of him. Laurel and Hardy have departed from their usualstylein theirnewfull-lengthfilm Swiss Miss. The antics of the two are woven into a musical comedy background. There is a slight plot which allows for the entrances and exits of the comedians and serves the useful purpose of providing sets, characters and chorus. Otherwise the plot is of practically no importance or interest. I say 'practically' because I wish to make an exception in the case of Eric Blore, although his genius has not been used to the fullest advantage. Laurel and Hardy and their producers seem to have had a hard time deciding whether the feature-length film was a fit vehicle. Swiss Miss appears to be a fresh attempt at solving this problem, but it is not nearly such a successful effort as Way Out West. Several of the individual episodes are as good as any that have appeared in the Laurel and Hardy films. There is a mousetrap demonstration when Laurel bores holes in the floor of a cheese factory and accidentally opens up a gas main. The holes, of course, are for the non-existent mice. Unfortunately Laurel sets the gas alight and flames use the exits provided by the mouseholes — to the detriment of Hardy's pants. The flames are driven back and each hole carefully corked up. But there is the inevitable disaster when all the corks blow out at once. Laurel is given the stage to himself in a magnificent sequence when he tries to rob a St. Bernard dog of the case of brandy he carries round his neck. After many efforts to persuade the reluctant dog to part with the brandy he fakes a snow storm with chicken feathers. The dog comes dutifully to the rescue, and Laurel becomes gloriously drunk. In this condition he joins Hardy in transporting a piano across a swinging bridge to a mountain-top chalet. The terrors of the crossing are intensified by the sudden appearance of an enormous monkey. Disaster is again inevitable. The piano and the monkey are hurled into the ravine as the bridge collapses, while Laurel and Hardy save themselves in the clumsiest manner possible. These are but samples of episodes which are carefully distributed throughout the film. The intervals between are neither long nor particularly tedious, but I would like to make a strong protest as I prefer my Laureland-Hardy neat. The intervals appear to me useless padding, for one thing; old-fashioned technique, for another. 171