The All New Adventures of Laurel & Hardy in 'For Love or Mummy'

I can see why Laurel and Hardy purists might be offended by this rather gentle 're-enactment', but this film would be an excellent way to introduce children to the pleasures of classic L & H. Bronson Pinchot and Gailard Sartain acquit themselves reasonably as the comedy duo and there's a reasonably good supporting cast. I enjoyed it.

The Laurel & Hardy impersonations were pretty good, but that aside it was a fairly weak movie. The "damsel in distress" was not very engaging, the villain seemed out of place, and the less important characters contributed very little to the movie. If you want to see an entertaining movie with Laurel-and-Hardy-like characters, you'd probably enjoy "The Impostors" more than this one. If you want to watch Laurel & Hardy, get the real thing.

It was not Laurel and Hardy, but the two actors did a more-than-acceptable job at adopting their mannerisms and voices. What's so wrong with conjuring up the sweetness and memory of the greatest comedy team ever, and doing it up again in a modern setting and on the big screen? Granted, the clothes were out of place and the context of the originals was totally not there. But the whole thing could have been much worse. At least it wasn't overly crude, as many modern comedies are. Maybe it will get a few people (especially kids) to seek out the original L&H.

I was glad when I heard about this new film, and Gailard Sartain was outstanding as Ollie. Although this new film wasn't as laugh-out-loud as the original L&H films were, it's still worth a watch. Hopefully we'll see more to follow in the film series. And with the advent of the internet, perhaps Larry Harmon will take a few suggestions from the huge fan-base (that he now has access to) on what direction to follow for a possible second L&H motion picture. If there isn't a second, then find the original Laurel and Hardy feature "Sons of the Desert." That is, quite possibly, one of their best features by far. "Flying Deuces" is another goodie, and easier to find.

However, perhaps I'm nitpicking, but in my opinion the "modern day" setting doesn't really seem to work in some respects. For a start, Stan and Ollie still wear their 30s/40s style attire - how many people do you catch wearing bowler hats in this day and age? At times, they seemed almost to be living in a bizarre time warp, which didn't really make sense.

Overall though, this is good, old-fashioned slapstick comedy, well in the spirit of the real Stan and Ollie. It's nice to see such innocent laughs for a change, with the kinds of films we're seeing most of the time today, this is a rare treat for the family!