Babes in Toyland

When video was much less accessible, I waited every holiday season to see this movie. I always remembered the fun stuff, especially Laurel and Hardy, but forgot some of the bad music and rather draggy dialogue. Nevertheless, the set designers did a nice job creating this nursery rhyme world, with three little pigs (one of whom gets turned to sausages), and a raft of other characters. The scenes in the toy shop with the Boys are the best. I do remember as a small child being pretty terrified of that land of the bogy men. It was well done, as are all places where "you must never go" or "where you will be banished to." Stan and Ollie do their shtick with finger wiggles and some silly game called "peewees." They attempt to save the day for the old woman who lives in a shoe. They manage to bumble everything up royally. Still, as things play out, this doesn't have the tightly knit fabric of their best comedies--they need to be on camera more. But as a holiday event, this is worth a look for a new generation.

Given its nature Babes In Toyland unlike most operettas from bygone days will have productions running forever. The Victor Herbert-Glen McDonough music will last forever and productions for Theater companies that specialize in youth will always be putting on this show.

Hal Roach put on this one and it starred his two favorite comedy players Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy playing sorcerer's apprentices to the evil Barnaby played by Henry Brandon. Brandon wants to take over Toyland and he's got special designs on Little Bo-Peep played by winsome Charlotte Henry whose other big role was Alice in Alice And Wonderland. Those designs are of the Snidely Whiplash variety.

Stan and Ollie play characters and for the most part eschew the normal shtick associated with them. Their characters don't stand out as they are well integrated in the story.

The two musical numbers associated with this production are done quite nicely, Toyland and March Of The Wooden Soldiers. The latter is used to great affect in the climax.

Walt Disney did a decent production of Babes In Toyland in the Sixties with Annette Funicello and Tommy Sands. But I'll take Stan and Ollie any day for a mystical journey to childhood.

I know many people will not watch this for many reasons. The excuses range from "I Hate Black and White Movies", "I Do Not Like Old Movies" ,"I herd this was stupid", "I never Herd of this", and so many others.

Well this film is "Dated" but its also part of its charm. This film stars "Laurel and Hardy" and it is a delightful surprise. Think of this film as the inspiration for the "Shrek" films.

In this film A woman is about to lose her home. Stannie Dumb (Stan Laurel) and Ollie Dee (Oliver Hardy), live in a shoe (as in the nursery rhyme There Was An Old Woman Who Lived In A Shoe), along with Mother Peep (the Old Woman), Bo Peep (Charlotte Henry), a mouse resembling Mickey Mouse (and actually played by a live monkey in a costume), and many other children. The mortgage on the shoe is owned by the villainous Silas Barnaby (Henry Brandon), who is looking to marry Bo Peep. Knowing the Widow Peep is having a difficult time paying the mortgage, Barnaby offers the old woman an ultimatum – unless Bo Peep agrees to marry him he will foreclose on the shoe. Widow Peep refuses, but is worried about where she'll get the money to pay the mortgage. Ollie offers her all the money he has stored away in his savings can, only to learn that Stannie has taken it to buy peewees (a favored toy consisting of a wooden peg with tapered ends that rises in the air when struck with a stick near one end and is then caused to fly through the air by being struck again with the stick). He and Stannie set out to get the money for the mortgage from their boss, the Toymaker (William Burress). But Stannie has mixed up an order from Santa Claus (building 100 wooden soldiers at six feet tall, instead of 600 soldiers at one foot tall) and one of the soldiers, when activated, wrecks the toy shop. Stannie and Ollie are fired without getting the money.

I don't want to tell too much more but truest me the film is fast paced and its never boring.

Give it a try!

...from MGM and directors Gus Meins and Charles Rogers. In the fantastical world of Toyland, many fairy tale and nursery rhyme characters live together in a weird community. Widow Peep (Florence Roberts), aka The Old Woman Who Lives in a Shoe, takes care of her many children, including eldest daughter Little Bo-Peep (Charlotte Henry). She also rents a room to toymakers Stannie Dum (Stan Laurel) and Ollie Dee (Oliver Hardy). Bo-Peep is in love with Tom-Tom (Felix Knight), but the dastardly landlord Barnaby (Henry Brandon) wants Bo-Peep for himself, and threatens to evict Widow Peep if Bo-Peep won't marry him. Stannie and Ollie vow to help the Peeps, but they cause even more trouble.

Storybook sets and stylized costumes add to the head-trip visuals of this whacked-out yet entertaining kids flick. I was particularly fond of the weird dwarf-in-a-costume mouse who moves around in an unsettling way, usually running from the equally off-kilter Cat with a Fiddle.

The large scale finale, featuring scores of extras as evil "bogeymen" versus man-sized wooden soldiers, is impressively chaotic and occasionally disturbingly violent.

I am a huge Laurel and Hardy fan, and while this may not be considered one of their great feature length films, I love to get this out for the December holidays. After the rest of the family watches "Wonderful Life", "Scrooge" and the Nutcracker, I pull this out and laugh until I cry. The only link to the holiday is the use of the "March of the Soldiers" music - but that's enough for me. Stan Laurel's ingenious battle tactics just send me into a fit.