While not all their works are equal, Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy absolutely deserve their status as comedic legends. Their humor may have been a tad lighter and gentler, and sometimes outright silly, but they were broadly as dependable as iconic contemporaries like Harold Lloyd, Buster Keaton, and The Three Stooges, especially in their physical comedy, gags, and repartee. I think it behooves one to approach with skepticism the very notion of a modern picture in which different actors portray the duo in a new story, ostensibly revisiting their style of comedy, but who am I to refuse the experience? Well - as ever I'll watch anything and everything, and I think there is certainly much to appreciate in 'The all new adventures of Laurel & Hardy.' Unfortunately, despite all the best efforts to expose the pair to a new, younger audience, it takes little time at all for the issues to accumulate and the fun to flounder. I don't think this is very good.
By all means, there really is a lot to like here. The least that can be said is that the film-making team of John R. Cherry III and Larry Harmon - writers, directors, and co-producers - worked hard to recapture as best they could the look and feel of Laurel and Hardy themselves. Of anyone who could be cast in the roles, Bronson Pinchot and Gailard Sartain probably bear the nearest physical resemblance to their respective figures; it's not a one-to-one comportment, but that wouldn't be possible anyway. Similarly, much love to Pinchot and Sartain themselves, for they clearly studied the movies of Laurel and Hardy very closely in an effort to match, as closely as possible, their manners of speech, posture, and energy. No one could ever hope to completely replace the legends, yet I watch this and I plainly see the men in the actors' performances; these are probably the best possible homages, or tributes, that one could ask for in terms of portrayals. I would also say that I do recognize, in both writing and direction, elements of the same fun-loving mirth that defined Stan and Oliver: slapstick, situational comedy, gags and exaggerated reactions, and above all the dynamics between the two stars themselves. We see this in how "Laurel" and "Hardy" are written generally, and in the best of the dialogue and scene writing.
Yet 'For love or mummy' quickly starts to break down beyond the baseline endeavor to recapture the root elements. One may reasonably raise a skeptical eyebrow at Laurel and Hardy having been brought into the present day, yet I don't think the notion would have been an issue if all the other sensibilities of the 20s, 30s, and 40s had been left intact. That's not what happened here, however. Even when the icons themselves were placed in a period setting in their features (e.g., 'Fra diavolo' in 1933, or 'The Bohemian girl' in 1936) the sense of humor was not modified, and the setting only added slight, appropriate flavor to the shenanigans. Regrettably, this is one core trait of the duo that Cherry and Harmon failed to discern in their studies; it's not just that Laurel and Hardy have been loaded into the 90s, but the 90s have been overloaded into Laurel and Hardy. There's a mean streak to no small amount of the intended humor here, and cartoonish absurdism that is right at home with Ernest P. Worrell, 'The Stupids,' Ace Ventura, or 1993's 'Super Mario Bros.,' but not with the sensibilities of the 20s, 30s, or 40s. This 1999 flick weaves in wildly fantastical aspects to the plot, and tries to flesh out the storytelling with background, lore, and asides for supporting characters, but again, these modern conceptions of cinematic storytelling, and Laurel and Hardy, do not belong together. Frankly, the same ethos applies to the cinematography, direction, music, stunts and effects (practical and post-production), and pretty much everything else in these eighty-odd minutes.
Don't get me wrong: in and of themselves, every part here looks and sounds good. I have no notes for the cast or crew; their work is admirable, from every actor's performance, to those stunts and effects, to every note in the score, and from art direction to costume design, hair, and makeup. The direction is strong. 'The all new adventures' is well made according to the standards and aesthetics of the 90s. And I believe there's much to like in what Cherry and Harmon conjured for the title - in writing and direction alike - in terms of the dialogue, characters, scenes, and narrative. And I would absolutely be lying if I said that this didn't inspire some hearty laughs. Yet therein lies the issue: all the laughs came from those moments that most closely aligned with the comedy of the real Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy, and their dimwitted, bumbling fictional selves; for all the excellent work that Pinchot and Sartain put into their depictions, they still had to operate within the bounds of the screenplay and its realization, and those moments are relatively few and far between. It clearly was possible to bring the icons a few decades forward in time. However, more than not the picture is simply a 90s comedy. If you want a 90s comedy, you'll get it; if you want a Laurel and Hardy comedy, you need to revisit the pieces they made more than fifty years prior. (Yes, I'm counting out 1951's 'Atoll K' / 'Utopia.' Everyone should.) Cherry and Harmon tried to blend Laurel and Hardy and the 90s, but in the process they failed to see what made Laurel and Hardy such shining stars, or at least forgot to meaningfully take those qualities into consideration in the mixture.
I don't think this is completely rotten. I see the skill, hard work, and intelligence that went into it, and there really is a lot that deserves respect. Pinchot and Sartain are surely the top highlights in their efforts to mimic Laurel and Hardy, and insofar as Cherry and Harmon took their comedic cues from those films of many years past, 'For love or mummy' really is funny. Sadly, in this case, two halves just do not make a whole, and there are wide swaths of the length where "Stan" and "Ollie" could have been replaced with any two random blokes and the presentation would have been no different. If you want to make a Laurel and Hardy flick, you need Laurel and Hardy. I do appreciate the effort and all that its participants put into it, but the end result just doesn't live up to expectations. There are far worse ways to spend one's time, but even if you're a "Son of the Desert" and a devotee of the pair themselves, there's just not much reason to check this out.
By all means, there really is a lot to like here. The least that can be said is that the film-making team of John R. Cherry III and Larry Harmon - writers, directors, and co-producers - worked hard to recapture as best they could the look and feel of Laurel and Hardy themselves. Of anyone who could be cast in the roles, Bronson Pinchot and Gailard Sartain probably bear the nearest physical resemblance to their respective figures; it's not a one-to-one comportment, but that wouldn't be possible anyway. Similarly, much love to Pinchot and Sartain themselves, for they clearly studied the movies of Laurel and Hardy very closely in an effort to match, as closely as possible, their manners of speech, posture, and energy. No one could ever hope to completely replace the legends, yet I watch this and I plainly see the men in the actors' performances; these are probably the best possible homages, or tributes, that one could ask for in terms of portrayals. I would also say that I do recognize, in both writing and direction, elements of the same fun-loving mirth that defined Stan and Oliver: slapstick, situational comedy, gags and exaggerated reactions, and above all the dynamics between the two stars themselves. We see this in how "Laurel" and "Hardy" are written generally, and in the best of the dialogue and scene writing.
Yet 'For love or mummy' quickly starts to break down beyond the baseline endeavor to recapture the root elements. One may reasonably raise a skeptical eyebrow at Laurel and Hardy having been brought into the present day, yet I don't think the notion would have been an issue if all the other sensibilities of the 20s, 30s, and 40s had been left intact. That's not what happened here, however. Even when the icons themselves were placed in a period setting in their features (e.g., 'Fra diavolo' in 1933, or 'The Bohemian girl' in 1936) the sense of humor was not modified, and the setting only added slight, appropriate flavor to the shenanigans. Regrettably, this is one core trait of the duo that Cherry and Harmon failed to discern in their studies; it's not just that Laurel and Hardy have been loaded into the 90s, but the 90s have been overloaded into Laurel and Hardy. There's a mean streak to no small amount of the intended humor here, and cartoonish absurdism that is right at home with Ernest P. Worrell, 'The Stupids,' Ace Ventura, or 1993's 'Super Mario Bros.,' but not with the sensibilities of the 20s, 30s, or 40s. This 1999 flick weaves in wildly fantastical aspects to the plot, and tries to flesh out the storytelling with background, lore, and asides for supporting characters, but again, these modern conceptions of cinematic storytelling, and Laurel and Hardy, do not belong together. Frankly, the same ethos applies to the cinematography, direction, music, stunts and effects (practical and post-production), and pretty much everything else in these eighty-odd minutes.
Don't get me wrong: in and of themselves, every part here looks and sounds good. I have no notes for the cast or crew; their work is admirable, from every actor's performance, to those stunts and effects, to every note in the score, and from art direction to costume design, hair, and makeup. The direction is strong. 'The all new adventures' is well made according to the standards and aesthetics of the 90s. And I believe there's much to like in what Cherry and Harmon conjured for the title - in writing and direction alike - in terms of the dialogue, characters, scenes, and narrative. And I would absolutely be lying if I said that this didn't inspire some hearty laughs. Yet therein lies the issue: all the laughs came from those moments that most closely aligned with the comedy of the real Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy, and their dimwitted, bumbling fictional selves; for all the excellent work that Pinchot and Sartain put into their depictions, they still had to operate within the bounds of the screenplay and its realization, and those moments are relatively few and far between. It clearly was possible to bring the icons a few decades forward in time. However, more than not the picture is simply a 90s comedy. If you want a 90s comedy, you'll get it; if you want a Laurel and Hardy comedy, you need to revisit the pieces they made more than fifty years prior. (Yes, I'm counting out 1951's 'Atoll K' / 'Utopia.' Everyone should.) Cherry and Harmon tried to blend Laurel and Hardy and the 90s, but in the process they failed to see what made Laurel and Hardy such shining stars, or at least forgot to meaningfully take those qualities into consideration in the mixture.
I don't think this is completely rotten. I see the skill, hard work, and intelligence that went into it, and there really is a lot that deserves respect. Pinchot and Sartain are surely the top highlights in their efforts to mimic Laurel and Hardy, and insofar as Cherry and Harmon took their comedic cues from those films of many years past, 'For love or mummy' really is funny. Sadly, in this case, two halves just do not make a whole, and there are wide swaths of the length where "Stan" and "Ollie" could have been replaced with any two random blokes and the presentation would have been no different. If you want to make a Laurel and Hardy flick, you need Laurel and Hardy. I do appreciate the effort and all that its participants put into it, but the end result just doesn't live up to expectations. There are far worse ways to spend one's time, but even if you're a "Son of the Desert" and a devotee of the pair themselves, there's just not much reason to check this out.