Un ancien flirt

Yes, the movie has both Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy in it but it's not a 'Laurel & Hardy' movie. They're not a comical duo in this movie and they actually share very little sequences together, since Hardy's role is only a bit part. The real main character of this movie is perhaps James Finlayson. Not that I'm complaining about it thought, I love James Finlayson! He has an excellent comical timing and facial expressions, which fits the genre extremely well.

The movie was later in 1931 remade again by Laurel & Hardy with sound this time, under the name "Chickens Come Home". That movie is basically a scene-by-scene remake only with the actors in different roles. (Oliver Hardy in the James Finlayson role and James Finlayson as the butler, among other changes.) Yet the remake is better, not only because it has sound but also because it has more sequences with Laurel & Hardy together with also as a result that the slapstick comes over as even more hilarious and the comical moments are just as well, if not better, timed and executed.

The movie is fun from start till finish. It has some excellent comical characters in it and a very good build up. The movie gets more and more funny as the movie progresses and builds up to the unavoidable confrontation in the Finlayson residence. It makes the movie probably one of the better build up comedies from Laurel & Hardy and the silent era in general.

It's a very enjoyable and fun movie but not as good as the inferior remake, that is one of the better Laurel & Hardy shorts.

7/10

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This is yet another early film of Stan Laurel & Oliver Hardy but here, as in other of their early work, they're not really together as Stan has the lion's share of scenes and Ollie is only in small doses as a visiting judge. In this one, Stan works as an associate of James Finlayson and they both are married. Suddenly, Mae Busch comes in Fin's office and demands money or she'll reveal her affair to his wife! I'll stop there and just say I thought this was as hilarious as when it was remade as Chickens Come Home when Hardy took Fin's role, Fin took Charlie Hall's role here as a butler, and both Ms. Busch and Stan reprised theirs. There was also a Spanish-Language version called Politiquerias which only featured Laurel, Hardy, and Finlayson. By the way, I reviewed both under my previous username tavm. All the supporting players I just mentioned made their L & H debut here. So on that note, I say give Love "Em and Weep a look if you're curious about the early work of Stan and Babe (Ollie's offscreen nickname). P. S. Also appearing is Vivien Oakland as Stan's wife. She subsequently played Hardy's in That's My Wife, a judge's wife in Scram! And the sheriff's in Way Out West.

This is one of Laurel & Hardy's "pre-team" comedies, one of several shorts both men appeared in more or less coincidentally before they developed their familiar childlike characters, i.e. the duo with the derby hats we all know and love. In this go-round Jimmy Finlayson is basically the lead player (although Mae Busch originally received top billing), and yet Stan steals the show in a prominent supporting role. Oliver Hardy is relegated to a minor part, and he dutifully reacts to the antics of the other players without any real comic business of his own to perform. Four years later, however, after Laurel & Hardy had become the top comics on the Hal Roach lot, Love 'Em and Weep would be remade as a talkie and retitled Chickens Come Home, with Hardy in the lead, Stan and Mae Busch repeating their earlier roles, and Finlayson reduced to playing Hardy's butler. Something of a comedown for Fin, though it must be said he played his part to a fare-thee-well on that occasion.

At any rate, Love 'Em and Weep is quite enjoyable in its own right, that is, if you enjoy a good old fashioned marital farce. All the ingredients are in place: Finlayson is a respectable bourgeois businessman (profession not specified) who is thrown for a loop when an old girlfriend pops up and attempts to blackmail him. His wife, of course, enters at an inopportune moment and the girlfriend is forced to hide in the bathroom. Finlayson must then explain the presence of her cigarette, fur stole, etc., to his gimlet-eyed wife. The angry girlfriend later shows up uninvited at Finlayson's home while he's entertaining guests and creates even more havoc.

This sort of thing can be tiresome if not well handled -- lesser comedians cranked out dozens of interchangeable short comedies along these lines -- but in this case, the first-rate performers manage to squeeze a lot of laughs out of the situation. Mae Busch is every inch the foxy, smirking troublemaker in the opening scene, and Finlayson's pop-eyed double-takes are as strenuous as ever. Okay, so maybe he was a one-note performer, but he certainly perfected that one note! Stan is quite funny as Finlayson's assistant, a man who (we are told) has great control over women, although we are offered no evidence of this. Quite the contrary! Stan's hair was still slicked down at this point, but he'd already perfected that familiar look of blank vacancy, and when the plot reaches a crisis we get a quick sample of the Laurel Cry.

Love 'Em and Weep is by no means the best comedy short ever made, but it's also far from the worst, and it amounts to a very pleasant diversion for the undemanding viewer. For me, this movie also served to demonstrate the difference an audience can make when viewing a silent comedy of this vintage. I first saw the film at home on TV with a friend and found it moderately amusing, but later, when I was fortunate enough to see it again at a public screening, with live music and an appreciative audience, it was as if a fossilized dinosaur skeleton had suddenly come back to life with a roar. Gags and pratfalls that seemed mildly funny at home rocked the house when seen with a crowd. I can only urge interested viewers to try to see these movies with an audience whenever possible, and if there's no place in your community where this is taking place, then start your own Film Society!

Love 'Em and Weep (1927)

** 1/2 (out of 4)

A married man (James Finlayson) gets a call from his old girlfriend threatening to blackmail him so another guy (Stan Laurel) takes her out to make a deal. Oliver Hardy has a small role and it's hard to tell it's him due to his wig and mustache. The film has some good laughs but many of them aren't too big. The film was later remade with L&H working together in Chickens Come Home.

Should Married Men Go Home? (1928)

*** (out of 4)

Laurel breaks up a quiet evening at Mr. And Mrs. Hardy's house but he and Oliver go golfing anyways, which just leads to trouble. This was the first official Laurel and Hardy movie and it works quite nicely. The best moments occurs towards the end of the film with a big mud fight. Another highlight is a gag by the malt stand, which was later borrowed by Abbott and Costello in Buck Privates.

Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy were comedic geniuses, individually and together, and their partnership was deservedly iconic and one of the best there was. They left behind a large body of work, a vast majority of it being entertaining to classic comedy, at their best they were hilarious and their best efforts were great examples of how to do comedy without being juvenile or distasteful.

After 'Duck Soup' indicated a step in the right direction for early on in their careers after their previous two short films underwhelmed somewhat (especially '45 Minutes from Hollywood), Laurel and Hardy's fifth outing featuring them both is not a step backwards but not a return in the right direction either. It is nice and entertaining, more than watchable in an inoffensive way, but later offerings make far better use of Laurel and Hardy and their partnership and are much funnier, including its remake as mentioned by a few here. 'Love Em and Weep' felt like they were not yet fully formed and yet to properly find their feet.

'Love Em and Weep' looks quite good and hardly the work of an amateur. James Finlayson is an amusing lead and even better is Laurel who is great fun, 'Love Em and Weep' is worth watching for him alone.

There are amusing and charming moments and the pace is generally very energetic.

Hardy however has a nowhere near as interesting cameo role and his material is inferior to that of Laurel's. A waste, and even more so that 'Love Em and Weep' misses the chance to utilise their chemistry properly. 'Love Em and Weep' doesn't really feel like Laurel and Hardy, due to Hardy having little to do and their chemistry barely existent, and more Laurel and Finlayson.

Not everything is funny, too much of it being predictable and not being sharp enough in timing. The story is very slight and erratically paced, sometimes too busy while not getting going soon enough.

In summary, worth a look but hardly a Laurel and Hardy essential. 6/10 Bethany Cox