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Laurel and Hardy's 1927 short film Duck Soup was originally thought to be lost by film scholars, critics, and the industry. The only pieces of the short that were rumored or assumed to exist were stills or very short clips, but miraculously, the film was found in a Belgium archive in 1974. However, not before the short was remade into Another Free Ride in 1930 and ideas salvaged for Pack Up Your Troubles in 1931, both Laurel and Hardy shorts.

Watching Duck Soup is nothing shy of a privilege, as it was almost never meant to be. Yet, like with all lost films, I quietly hope most of the famous lost films will not be lost forever and that we will eventually get to see the famous works as they were originally intended.

Duck Soup concerns Laurel and Hardy as two impoverished men, who are about to be recruited by forest rangers as volunteer firefighters. In a sublime chase, in true silent movie fashion, the two manage to escape them on a bike and take refuge in a mansion, while the owner and his servants have go away on business. Hardy impersonates the owner and offers to rent the home to an older English couple, with Laurel posing as the mansion's maid. This can only go on for so long, as they are the targets of two very temperamental groups of people.

Aside from the hilarious chase scene, Duck Soup wins one over mainly because of its simplicity and the fact that it begins and conducts itself by following the building blocks of comedy, which usually starts from the lead character(s) doing something they don't want to do. In this case, Laurel and Hardy don't want to fight wildfires, so they stumble into a decidedly more lavish option of taking refuge in a mansion to only disastrous results. To add to that, the film is consistently active, bearing the fantastic physical comedy and rabble-rousing entertainment necessary for a short like this to work, only proving why Laurel and Hardy became two enormous comedic names.

Starring: Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy. Directed by: Fred L. Guiol.

While it's not one of the funniest Laurel & Hardy comedies, "Duck Soup" is still worth seeing. It is at least fairly amusing, and at times quite funny, besides its greater historical significance. The story and some of the gags both allow you to see the beginnings of the "Stan and Ollie" personas that the comic duo would later refine and perfect.

In this short, the humor mostly comes from the ways that they work together, and from the silly predicaments in which the boys find themselves, rather than from any of the specific gags. Most of the gags do work all right, but they are not as imaginative or as creative as the kinds of routines that Laurel and Hardy did in later features. The basic situation is funny, and it creates some good possibilities, some of which are used well. After they had a little more experience with each other, they learned how to take this kind of setup and make it even funnier.

Overall, this movie is probably going to be of interest mostly to those who are already Laurel & Hardy fans, who will certainly find this an interesting look at their early days together. In itself it has some good moments of comedy as well.

This is not the funniest Laurel & Hardy comedy short but still it's a great movie due to the way the movie is constructed.

This was not the first movie with starring both Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy in it (they both appeared before in the movies " 45 Minutes from Hollywood" and " A Lucky dog".) but it was the first movie of the two appearing as a comical duo. Therefor this movie already is a bit of a must-see. It's an historical significant movie, that marked one of the very first step of silent-movie history.

No, it certainly ain't an hilarious movie but it rather is a very well constructed movie, with an excellent story and extremely good timing and pace. The editing was truly superb and kept the pace high, as well as the movie itself consistent. It all helps to make "Duck Soup" a very pleasant and amusing movie to watch.

Stan Laurel is already great in his role but Oliver Hardy still obviously had to grown into his role. The beginning is there but he's not quite perfect yet. The subtle little things that made his character so great are still missing in this movie. Luckily the boys already have some great chemistry together in this movie.

Not an hilarious movie but a very well constructed and amusing one, with Laurel & Hardy for the very first time together as a comical duo.

10/10

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Aside from two previous films(LUCKY DOG and 45 MINUTES FROM HOLLYWOOD),this film is the very first that Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy appeared together properly.For nearly 50 years a lost film,it was thought that the comedians hardly shared any scenes in DUCK SOUP,if at all.When a copy did turn up in the 1970's,all shallow theories and guesses were proved totally wrong.Laurel & Hardy are very much a team throughout the entire picture,although their appearances are decidedly unorthodox;"Stan and Ollie" are "Hives and Maltravers",and are dressed in tramp costuming;Stan however does wear a bowler hat.Ollie wears a hat too,but of the top variety,and sports an unshaven chin instead of a toothbrush moustache.The film itself isn't particularly funny,having much frantic chases and running about,instead of the more controlled,carefully-paced nuances that L & H perfected barely a year later in further films.But at least they are a team,which was not to be the case in their following couple of pictures,where they sometimes played bitter enemies.DUCK SOUP is a film of massive and important interest,though.6 out of 10.

This is the first short in which Laurel and Hardy worked together as a team. They were not called 'Mr. Laurel and Mr. Hardy' but have fictitious names. And Hardy has a two day growth of stubble. Nevertheless, this one is loaded with some very funny sight gags (this being the silent era) and ranks among their funniest films.

Forest Rangers are recruiting volunteers and have been given permission to press into service vagrants found in the LA area. Our heroes fall into that category in this short and do all they can to avoid the Rangers. They come upon an unoccupied mansion and hide inside - until a couple who rented it show up at the front door. Things begin to unravel for the boys in predictable fashion, making it one of their best. It played at Capitolfest, Rome NY, 8/14/21.

******** 8/10 - Website no longer prints my star rating.