Showing as part of the extended celebration of the 125th anniversary of Stan Laurel’s birth, this Laurel and Hardy double bill arrives in cinemas in high-definition, following an extensive restoration. While the duo’s petty, pratfall-based humour might not be as inventive as that of their contemporaries – Chaplin, Keaton and Lloyd – there’s a glorious streak of surreal mischief displayed here.
In Way Out West, which sees the duo charged with delivering the deeds of a gold mine to the daughter of a dead prospector, Stan repeatedly baffles Ollie by using his own thumb as a cigar lighter. In Towed in a Hole, in which the pair star as a couple of itinerant fish salesmen, Ollie boots a bucket at Stan’s head, only to have it rebound and knock him backwards into a boat full of water. The cumulative effect of this dedication to sight gags and silliness is irresistible.
