Beau Hunks (1931)

LOVE COMES: MR. HARDY IS AT LAST CONSCIOUS OF THE GRAND PASSION -- MR. LAUREL ISN'T EVEN CONSCIOUS OF THE GRAND CANYON.

We return to early days, the year 1931 to be specific, for another look at a film from comedy legends Laurel & Hardy. As you may (or may not remember), the only time we’ve looked at a film from this pairing before, Be Big!, turned out to be something of a damp squib… in my opinion. Timing was off, ideas were short, and laughs were, as a result, thin on the ground. Well, today’s venture sees us looking over a film the pair produced in the same period/year, still working under contract with Hal Roach. Fortunately, there seems to be a bit more potential in the set-up for this one. This is Beau Hunks (also known as Beau Chumps).

Ollie (Oliver Hardy) is in love, smitten, all aflutter with feelings of amore. He informs his friend Stanley (Stan Laurel) of his plans to be married to his sweetheart, Jeanie Weenie. However, within minutes of this announcement, he receives a letter informing him that the relationship is over. Heartbroken and disillusioned, Ollie decides to join the French Foreign Legion to forget his heartbreak, and he’s bringing Stanley with him. Once there, though, in the harsh arid heat of the desert, the pair very quickly find themselves in over their heads.

There should be an immediate moment of recognition with this film for anyone who is familiar with Laurel & Hardy, even if they’ve never seen any of their films. There are effectively three (arguably four) images of the comedic duo that have become somewhat iconic for them. One is them in their classic garb of suits and bowler hats; one is them dressed in police uniforms; and the third is Ollie & Stan dressed as a pair of soldiers in the Foreign Legion (in case you’re wondering, the fourth would be them as hobos). You’d certainly think that the film that presented the world with this image would be worth the watch, and not just some kind of excuse to put them in a funny costume. Well, it was, but that can work out quite well sometimes.

And fortunately enough, it worked. Beau Hunks is a solid outing from the pair, with a good pace, good gags and a pretty good story that runs through the whole to keep things moving. Sure, perhaps some may consider it a bit of a leap that a guy would go off to an inhospitable foreign land to serve out the rest of his days as a soldier for an army he can’t leave all because he was so heartbroken… but then it’s not really too much of a leap given the context. Hollywood movies relied on the idea of the French Foreign Legion being populated by men of desperation, the troubled ones, the wronged ones, and they made a great use of it. This is kind of a spill-over from literature, predominantly the novel Beau Geste, where this film gets its title. Besides, even if you do find it somewhat difficult, it’s a Laurel & Hardy comedy from the early 1930s, which puts it not too far above a Bugs Bunny cartoon. We can give them some leeway for shenanigans.

And the set-up is handled very well, and gives them some pretty good gags. Even moments separate from the plotting are a fine trove of visual gags, callbacks and physical gaffs, which come off much better here than they did in Be Big! because they don’t feel like they’ve been stretched out past breaking point. The opening few minutes of this film has a much better hit ratio. Aside from showing off Ollie’s actually rather sweet singing voice as he serenades (from afar) his loved one, Jeanie, Stan accidentally cuts a square of fabric out of the seat of armchair, and tries to cover it up. After Ollie finishes his song and confesses his intentions to marry, Stan says he doesn’t believe him, asking who would marry Ollie. His answer, “A woman, of course. Have you ever heard of someone marrying a man?” Stan says he has. A little surprised, Ollie asks who. Without missing a beat, Stan replies, “My sister.” Classic.

Once the pair arrive at the fort of the Foreign Legion, things start to get under way. Stan flubs the roll call, they both get on the wrong side of the commanding officer (who they constantly refer to as a different rank every time they address him), and Ollie discovers a truth about his beloved Jeanie Weenie. From the beginning, Ollie has clutched a picture of his true love close to his heart, and it’s only in this picture that we ever see her… it’s an autographed picture of Jean Harlow. When they arrive at the barracks, whilst Ollie looks forlornly at her image, Stan looks around the other new recruits, and every one of them is also tearfully clutching an autographed picture of Jean Harlow. So, it turns out that Ollie has perhaps had nothing more than an unrequited crush on a beautiful movie star, literally just like everyone else. That he received a letter from her breaking off their relationship seems to be neither here nor there, since, it would seem, so did every other guy. This theme then becomes one of the better running gags of the film.

The direction of Beau Hunks actually feels stronger, more visually coherent thanks to director James W. Horne (on viewing this, we would have to surmise that Parrott was the one responsible for the directorial flatness on Be Big!). The first time we find ourselves introduced to the communal sleeping quarters of the new recruits, we see it through an extended rifle rack, presenting an apparent image of these men being behind bars… made of guns. That’s a pretty strong and striking image of the world our pair now find themselves in, where these men are now effectively trapped in a life of military servitude from which there is no escape. When you think about it, that’s kind of a harsh image to put in a Laurel & Hardy comedy. Later, as the troop are marching in the desert, on their way to their first real assignment, we get what is basically handheld camerawork, with the camera bobbing and shaking in front of out intrepid duo, marching along with them and heightening the difficulty of their effort. And this was in 1931, before the camera advances that came from World War II news reporting made such manoeuvres less cumbersome. Visually, Beau Hunks is a kind of a treat.

There may be some issue with Beau Hunks as concerns the depiction of Arabs in the film, being that they are the villains of the piece, all barefoot and Allah-praising. That said, I’m not entirely sure how much of a problem it really is. They aren’t actually as hideously stereotyped as they could have been, certainly when considering the time period of the film. Nor are they overly evil, or regarded as any kind of godless heathens or savages. They are painted pretty broadly as simple bad guys for our heroes to fight. Bad guys that would, given the temporal and geographical setting, would make sense to use. It’s probably not good that they would have been just straight up used as the bad guys, nor is it necessarily the best defence to say that they aren’t as badly portrayed as they could have been, but they aren’t really demonised, either. It’s perhaps just a point of note.

Again, speaking from a personal perspective, there are some moments where I think a couple of jokes go on a bit long, the one that springs instantly to mind is when Stan gets his rifle caught in Ollie’s belt and can’t get it loose. However, that’s kind of just getting picky at this point. Plus, that’s just my own personal taste.

Beau Hunks is a good and worthy use of the comedic talents of Laurel & Hardy, showcasing some of their best skills in a variety of comedy disciplines, not to mention being a fine show for the acting and singing talents of Oliver Hardy. On top of that, it offers some surprisingly deft use of camerawork and visual metaphor that you wouldn’t necessarily equate with this kind of picture, particularly for its time, thanks to Horne. Beau Hunks may in fact be the longest Laurel & Hardy film, but it’s certainly up there with their best.

Excellent. Good to find the guys back in a good place for me.

Be Big! (1931)

MR. HARDY IS A MAN OF GREAT CARE, CAUTION AND DISCRETION. MR. LAUREL WAS MARRIED, TOO.

Today, we going to be going back into the long, long ago… well, the early 1930s. We’re going to look at a comedy short from the early days of the “talkies” from one of the most legendary comedic duos ever… Laurel & Hardy, classic combination of the skinny Limey and the fat Yank. Though both began as established actors in their own right, they ultimately began officially working together under the roof of Hal Roach’s studio in 1926, where they stayed for 14 years, becoming one of the most beloved comedy treasures that Hollywood has ever given the world. During their time under Roach, they released the film that we look at today - Be Big!

Just about to leave for the train station for a vacation in Atlantic City with their wives, Stanley (Stan Laurel) and Oliver (Oliver Hardy) get a phone call from a fellow lodge member who tells them a surprise stag party is being held in their honour that evening. Initially hesitant because of their plans, they accept and Oliver feigns illness to get out of leaving that day, suggesting Stanley stay to look after him and sending the wives on ahead by themselves. What follows is a series of physical pratfalls as the pair attempt to get ready for their big night.

What’s that rule about comedy? You know, the famous one. The one about how important something is to the telling of a joke. It’s only one word. It’s the key to comedy. Why can’t I remember it? Well, I suppose I shouldn’t feel too bad about not remembering that one rule, since it seems that Laurel & Hardy and most other people involved in Be Big! had forgotten it, too. There’s something ver-TIMING! That’s it! The most important thing in comedy is timing! Thank God, that would have annoyed me for a long while. Anyway, what was I saying? Oh right…

There’s something very laborious about this venture from the guys in the bowler hats, like they're just going through the motions because it's time to make another film. The premise itself is actually a pretty decent set-up for physical gaffs and energetic clumsiness. Two guys want to go to a party with their friends, but have already made plans with their wives. As such, they invent some scheme whereby they can get out of the plans they already have and do what they want, all without their respective spouses being any the wiser. Let’s be honest, it smacks of crazy shenanigans, which is exactly what Laurel & Hardy were all about.

And probably the best thing going for the film was the general conceit that gives the film its title. As Olly himself says, "No man is bigger than the excuses he makes to his wife. So... Be Big." It all ties to that idea that in order to have a successful marriage (read as: fool their wives and get away with their scheme), they need to lie… a lot. This idea is actually a pretty common one: if you make up a lie, the smaller and more convincing it sounds, the less likely it is that people will believe it. As such, the best way to go is to have an excuse be so big and ridiculous and implausible that it would have to be true, so they would have to believe it. One guesses that this idea has been of greater use to comedy writers over the years than people who actually are trying to lie effectively. I actually remember this idea being the basis behind an episode of Cheers ("Let Sleeping Drakes Lie") involving Norm, Tom Skerritt and a swarm of bees. And to be honest, Cheers did it better.

What really gets in the way of Be Big! being good is the incredibly clumsy way in which the central conceit has been handled, and it’s all down to a combination of bad direction, poor timing and simply not knowing what to do with that idea. The film itself is just under a half hour long, around 27 minutes or so. I’m not kidding when I say that around 12 of those minutes are given over to one single joke: the pair accidentally put the other’s boots on, Oliver becomes stuck in Stan's boots and they try to get them off… almost half of the film’s duration sees the two clumsily, awkwardly, utterly failing to free old Olly from these boots. He tries pulling them off himself, Stan tries to pull them off, they try using a bootjack, they try using brute force, all without success. In doing so, they break a chair, a mirror, some curtains, Olly sits on a nail, and they each get their foot caught in the other’s sweater. This may sound all zany and the like, but it feels like it goes on forever. I understand they’re going for the hilarious notion of so much bother caused by such a simple task, as is the mainstay of physical comedy, but it’s just tiresome. And it’s all just basically one joke, repeated over and over and over and over again. It constantly aims for silly and hits stupid almost every time instead. As an example, there is a moment when Olly tries to explain to Stan just how simple this process should be. He has Stan put on one of his (that is, Olly’s) boots just so he can take it off and show the ease with which they should be able to the same for Olly. However, this is just kind of ridiculous considering we know the boot will come off Stan’s foot easier because it’s too big for him. In fact, we previously saw him literally jump out of one earlier, so this whole bit is just nonsense. And yes, I know that part of their dynamic was that Olly would try to explain to Stan how simple some things should be with disastrous consequences, but that doesn’t mean it always works.

Another problem comes from a trademark of both men: Olly’s looking into the camera with consternation; and Stan’s looking awkwardly confused. They, of course, do this several times throughout the film, but all it does here is get in the way, stretching out the gaps in action and killing what little momentum they managed to build. If the film were better paced, or the physical gaffs were better, these moments would add to the moment, as they do with the pair's other movies. Directors Horne and Parrott really drop the ball in this instance since there was a way of bridging the gaps between these gags without constantly stopping things. When the wives arrive at the train station, they find out they’ve just missed their train and there won’t be another one until tomorrow. As such, they get back in their taxi and head home, saying how they can’t wait to see the look on their husbands’ faces. That’s the last time we see them until the end. We could have cut back to them, just once or twice, showing their progress, maybe giving them an obstacle to draw out the journey a little, just to build a bit of tension and allowing quicker set-ups between Olly and Stan’s boot-pulling attempts.

Of course, it’s all well and good me saying this 80 years after the fact. Besides, there would have been some constraints to deal with, the biggest of which likely being a reluctance to cut away from Laurel & Hardy, who were the stars of the picture and the thing people wanted to see. It’s doesn’t really excuse the problems, but does at least explain some of them. The fact that they have only one comedy idea for the whole film which just gets repeated again and again is the thing that remains without explanation or excuse.

Be Big! isn’t really one of the pair’s better efforts and not a good place to start for those new to Laurel and Hardy, mostly just feeling inane thanks to flat direction, rather choppy editing and what feels like a complete lack of ideas given the golden ticket of the titular idea. Given that almost half of the film’s running time is taken up with a single extended gag, which runs out of steam very quickly, it would seem that this film was made as a piece of filler rather than anything that was meant to last. Had the film been half as long, it would likely have been greatly improved. As it is, it’s a rather untoward bump in the golden comedy road for the duo.