Sailors, Beware!

I am not a huge fan of Laurel and Hardy, I will admit. BUT, I am a huge fan of Harry Earles, who plays the baby/midget in this short. In general, I would say that this movie is very very good. It is pretty quickly paced, Hardy plays the slightly effeminate (IMHO) steward on a ship in which Laurel has mistakenly been put aboard. Since Laurel doesn't want to be there, and with the only other choice being too detrimental to his well-being, he decides to go along with it. During his pseudo-duties, he finds a midget (Harry Earles) acting as a baby in order to help his thieving wife aboard the ship. Generally a good bit o' fun! The only problem I had was with the many many sound effects that accompanied my version. Hopefully you won't have the same problem!

One of the better shorts made with Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy before their celebrated teaming;well produced,some amusing sequences,though frustratingly the boys don't share that many scenes in the film.Still,we get the the first known camera-look from Hardy(although he had performed this trait in previous films,notably STICK AROUND,made in 1925),and Anita Garvin and Harry Earles are fine as an improbable man and wife jewel thieving team.Hal Yates is credited with the direction,though in fact Hal Roach is thought to have been the director,with Yates filming one day's worth of retakes.Later in the year,he directed HATS OFF,when the teaming was becoming an item;sadly no copy of HATS OFF is known to exist.

Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy appeared in a substantial number of films together before they were officially teamed by producer Hal Roach. In fact, Roach (a very shrewd businessman) always kept Stan and Ollie under separate contracts to his studio, intentionally dating the contracts so that Hardy's would expire (and be renewed) six months after Laurel's. This clever gambit prevented Stan and Ollie from leaving Hal Roach Studios simultaneously and negotiating a better deal for themselves as a team elsewhere. This also explains why Roach produced 'Zenobia' as a solo vehicle for Hardy: because Laurel's contract had expired and he had not yet renewed.

During the period before their official team-up, the Roach shorts that co-starred Laurel and Hardy tended to give them separate footage (as in 'Flying Elephants'), or to feature them as rivals rather than allies. Still, the strong chemistry between Stan and Ollie shines through, often quite hilariously, even when they're foiling each other rather than working together.

'Sailors Beware' is one of the "pre-team" Laurel & Hardy team-ups. Not only is this a very funny movie; it's also a very interesting example of how Stan and Ollie play *against* each other as antagonists. As they're not yet a team, they're still using 'funny' character names instead of their own monickers.

Stan is Chester Chaste (ouch!), a cab driver who picks up a fare: a stylish brunette (Anita Garvin) with her baby in tow. Mother and infant are in a hurry to get to the quayside, to board the Miramar, a luxury liner. Stan's passengers board safely, but then Stan's cab gets caught in a cargo hoist -- with Stan inside, of course -- and gets yanked aboard the ship. By the time Stan gets out of his cab, the ship is underway ... with Stan shanghaied.

Oliver Hardy, in a role definitely subordinate to Laurel's, plays the ship's pompous purser. As far as he's concerned, Stan is a stowaway. He puts Stan to work, to pay his passage.

Meanwhile, it turns out that the brunette is Madame Ritz, the notorious jewel thief. And the 'baby' is in fact her husband and accomplice Roger ... a midget! Roger is played by midget actor Harry Earles. In several silent films, including this one, Earles played a midget who impersonates a baby ... and his disguise is astonishingly convincing. Just occasionally, the adult Earles actually did play a genuine baby on screen, sometimes as a stunt double. Regrettably, the arrival of talkies ruined Earles's acting career: he had a thick German accent, was getting a bit too old for nappies, and the talkies revealed that he had no real acting ability. He ended his screen career as one of the Munchkins: the one with the dark blue shirt in the Lollipop Guild trio.

Madame Ritz and her faux infant have boarded the ship with the specific intention of robbing the wealthy passengers. If a baby gets caught in the act of snatching a pretty bauble and stuffing it into his pram ... well, surely it's an innocent mistake, yes? There are several hilarious set-pieces in 'Sailors, Beware' ... and the implausible comedy is made funnier by the fact that Earles's baby impersonation is indeed so realistic. In one scene, the 'baby' suckers Stan into a crap game and proceeds to swindle him. I laughed at this, but I found it too contrived: Stan's character in this movie doesn't seem *quite* dumb enough to fail to suspect that a baby who can shoot craps isn't really a baby.

But this is the sort of humour that can't stand up to analysis. 'Sailors Beware' is very funny, and an interesting example of Laurel and Hardy -- as opposed to Laurel & Hardy -- playing against each other. It doesn't hurt that Anita Garvin is quite sexy here, as usual. I'll rate this comedy 7 out of 10.

Sailors Beware is one of Laurel & Hardy's earlier shorts, and they're not friends in this one. Ollie's a ship's purser with an eye for the ladies while Stan is a taxi driver who gets duped out of his fare and winds up on Ollie's boat. The film is quite funny, although the most memorable aspect is the midget who plays the husband of a villainous vamp. Disguised as a baby throughout, the midget puffs on a cigar and cheats at dice. Weirdest of all, he actually looks like a baby, which definitely lends a surreal quality to the film at times.

Stan's persona is almost fully developed by now. The blank gazes at the screen aren't there yet, but the confused tears of distress are, and it's clear his character isn't the brightest of sparks. He's probably not quite as dim as he would later be, but he's getting there. Ollie, meanwhile, displays surprisingly few of the trademark delicacies of movement that would later make him instantly recognisable. The film's still worth a look, anyway. If you like the boys and/or silent comedy, you're sure to be entertained.

This is another of the early Laurel & Hardy silent shorts that I watched on YouTube with added music score from subsequent Hal Roach talkies, suitable sound effects, and the voices of Stan, Ollie, and Anita Garvin from their subsequent films. I enjoyed those additions and I also enjoyed the plot of this one: Stan is a taxi driver waiting for his pay from Garvin as she and her "infant" board a ship. Stan ends up on that vessel as well when his car is accidentally picked up upon it making him a stowaway in which he now has to work for his admission. Ollie is the purser who has to guide Stan to his duties. I'll stop there and just say that I found much of it quite funny even though some of the characterizations seem inconsistent. With each subsequent short I review of the boys, I'm getting closer to when they officially become the "Stan & Ollie" we know and love, that's for sure! So that's a high recommendation of Sailors, Beware!