Pardon Us (1931) Online

Laurel and Hardy are shopping for ingredients for their next get rich scheme – making and selling liquor during prohibition. Of course when Laurel sells a bottle of beer to a policeman, there is only ever going to be one outcome and the two finds themselves on the way to the big house. Locked up with a mean spirited collection of fellas, Stan and Oliver take their chance to escape and find themselves wanted men on the run.

Having just watched the very structured "Our Relations" it was noticeable when I stepped back into the much looser Pardon Us. The basic plot is no more than a nail on which to hang a series of comic scenarios and, as such, it works because it is pretty funny for the majority. The story is pretty weak but it does allow for a solid spoof of jail clichés as well as a pretty un-PC but funny scene where the boys try to pass themselves off as cotton pickers. Despite not having this flow to it, the film does have a couple of good stand out scenes that will please everyone with their typical silliness and mix of looks and double-takes.

Laurel and Hardy are both on form and are served to their strengths well. Finlayson is wonderful in a great classroom scene and he got the biggest laughs from me with a master class in slow burns and double takes. Long is enjoyably tough as The Tiger while Lucas is a good warden. The support cast are roundly good even if they are mainly there to carry the scenes rather than the comedy. The musical numbers are obvious but still good – with Hardy getting a good chance to show off his baritone talents.

Overall a thinly plotted affair but one that delivers quite a few memorable and hilarious scenes, connected with generally amusing moments.

In & out of prison, Stan & Ollie just can't seem to stay out of trouble.

"PARDON US" was the Boys' first starring feature film. Rather disjointed and poorly edited, it plays more like a few of their short subjects strung together. However, the Boys never falter and they deliver a film whose parts are greater than its whole.

The film was meant to be a spoof of MGM's popular THE BIG HOUSE (1930) and it helps to have seen that earlier movie to fully appreciate this one. Many of the standard conventions of the typical prison film are mocked here: the ‘understanding' warden, the dangerous convict cell mate, the confinement in Solitary, the escape chased by bloodhounds, the prison riot.

A few comedy pieces in particular stand out: Stan's loose tooth; Ollie in the dentist's chair; the Boys trying to settle into the constricted confines of an upper bunk. James Finlayson, Stan & Ollie's old nemesis, makes the most of his one scene as the prison schoolteacher driven to despair by the Boys' good-natured idiocy.

Walter Long is lots of fun as the Tiger, the meanest convict in the prison (Boris Karloff played the part for the French language version). Movie mavens will spot an uncredited Charlie Hall as the dental assistant.

An added delight is Babe Hardy's rendition of ‘Lazy Moon,' one of the decade's finest film songs. Ollie had a warm, evocative voice, full of feeling and emotion. Here, backed by the magnificent Hall Johnson Choir, his song reaches out of the screen and down the decades to touch the hearts of the audience.

Being the lads first full length feature it's not surprising that much of it feels like filler, certainly the jokes are not quick fire and the culminating outcome doesn't quite leave the viewer fully satisfied. However it should be noted that Laurel & Hardy's average output is still better than most other duos who would follow in their slipstream, and Pardon Us does have those moments that ooze comedy class. Witness both Stan & Ollie trying to control a machine gun with typical riotous results, enjoy Stanley's tooth problem that becomes a running gag, and of course enjoy Oliver's incredulous looks at the camera. It's solid if unspectacular, but certainly worth a watch now and then, 6/10.

Footnote: Other user comments allude to certain aspects being un PC for the modern age, who cares is what I say, this is after all Laurel & Hardy in the 30s, it worked then and really it still works now, harmless and enjoyable fun.

Laurel And Hardy made their first starring feature film for Hal Roach with Pardon Us. It's a prison picture, but this correctional facility will never be the same now that Stan and Ollie have served time there.

They were not very good as bootleggers selling some of their illegal stock to an undercover policeman and got sent to the big house. Where Stan makes an inexplicable friend in the toughest con in the joint Walter Long. Ollie is not so similarly fortunate, but Long tolerates him as long as he's with Stan.

Stan has an additional problem. A loose tooth has him make the noises of a Bronx Cheer at the most inopportune moment.

This film has a large black cast of extras because part of the plot involves the boys escaping and eluding their captors while in blackface pretending to be field hands. Unlike a lot of films the black people here are portrayed with dignity. The sequences show the singing talents of Ollie and Stan does a nice patter with a dance. Since the blackface is integral to the plot I've not heard any objections raised to it here.

It was a good beginning for Stan and Ollie in sound feature films.

In Laurel's and Hardy's first full length talking picture the boys go behind bars.And Stan's loose tooth gets the boys in trouble many times, when it starts making a funny noise every time he speaks.Pardon Us offers you many funny moments with Laurel and Hardy.

This was the first full-length movie from Laurel & Hardy, that last over 1 hour long. Their first effort is definitely one of their better ones.

Difference with most other Laurel & Hardy movies is that this one actually has a story and continuity in it. It's more than just one slapstick and comical moment after another and it's obvious that they definitely put lots of effort in the story. The movie is constantly funny although the movie could had done without those musical numbers in my opinion. It's extremely old fashioned and takes the pace right out of the movie.

Besides the two boys the movie also has some other memorable characters in it such as Wilfred Lucas as the jail warden, James Finlayson as the jail schoolteacher and Walter Long as fellow prisoner The Tiger. Especially Walter Long stands out in his role and he plays an extremely fun character who of course gives the two an hard time.

The movie is very fine constructed and build up to the memorable ending in which one big jail break is attempted. It's pretty violent stuff for Laurel & Hardy standards and I had never thought that I would ever see the two of them holding a gun. The ending is almost action movie like but it of course is also extremely hilarious at the same time.

There are quite some returning running gags in the movie that all help to make this movie a very memorable one. Also enough slapstick humor is present so fans of that will also be delighted with this movie.

9/10

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So says Ollie at the start of a sustained eleven-minute sequence where he and Stan paint their hands and faces to hide amongst a black community. On two occasions the paint gets washed off and has to be replaced; Stan with dirt from a puddle, Ollie with oil. Like the stereotypical black people that occupy the piece, it's one of those "would never be allowed nowadays" moments that marks Pardon Us out as an unusual curio. The boundaries between innocence and unintentional risk-taking occur throughout. Set largely in a prison, there's a later scene where Stan is threatened by a knife, and an inmate is shown to be a potential rapist when coming face to face with the warden's daughter. Although Stan's sharing a bed with Hardy and the same inmate promising that he and Stan will be "great pals" is played without any form of sexual connotation.

This sort of politically incorrect humour is not only common to Pardon Us, however. In the following year's Pack Up Your Troubles the duo would pretend to have only one arm in order to escape being drafted into the army. Stan would pour boiling hot water over three men, while the two would steal $2000 from a bank. The 1932 film would also tackle the theme of wife battery and feature another race joke, which takes us back to Pardon us. In a curious scene, Stan mistakes two prisoners – one black, one Asian – as the radio "blackface" double-act, Amos and Andy. It's impossible to condemn the film on such matters, and I wouldn't even try, as that sort of thing was commonplace for the time it was made. But it's notable, and slightly alarming, even so. Whoever would have thought such naive humour still had the ability to shock seventy years on?

Laurel and Hardy perhaps never had wide ambitions, though did some pretty groundbreaking stuff in terms of stunts and special effects. More intelligent than The Three Stooges, they nevertheless didn't aspire to the same terms of art and film as, say, Chaplin. But while they may not be as admired as Charlie, Keaton or even Lloyd, they are doubtless more loved. Even though most of the jokes are clearly set-up, their assured execution, by Laurel, particularly, means they never fall flat. It must be said that the interplay between the two stars isn't as good as it would be, and that as their first full-length talkie, the pace is notably slower than what was to follow. The age of the silent movie is still felt throughout, with a lone damsel in distress in a burning building, and some overstated body language from the bit players. The film opens with a caption, and incidental music is almost omnipresent – both now redundant, and slightly distracting. Though while the rapport between the two would be stronger - only their 24th talkie, they would appear in another 52 together after this - Pardon Us is still a fine example of their work. Stan's gormless, inane smile, dopey eyes and sticky ears are a delight, while his mastery of physical comedy is exceptional. Those who wish to build an argument that Stan was the talented one will be served here by a Hardy who gets to be second fiddle all the way, and is encouraged to double-take to camera a few too many times.

Lastly, two points come to mind. One is a dentist calling Stan "Rosebud" – was Orson Welles inspired? And Ollie here says "another nice mess", not the oft-quoted "fine".

PARDON US, filmed in 1930 then edited down and released in 1931, is Laurel and Hardy's first feature-length comedy. In it, they are set to jail after Stan sells some illegal brew to a policeman ("Well, I couldn't help it-I thought he was a streetcar conductor!"). The whole film is pretty funny. There isn't much story, but a series of funny things that happen to the boys in jail. The finale has Stan and Ollie foiling a jailbreak. Highlights of the film include a great "welcoming" scene with extremely tolerant warden Wilfred Lucas, Laurel and Hardy posing as African American sharecroppers (with Stan shoving entire plants of cotton into his bag while Hardy daintily picks each piece of cotton with care), and a hilarious schoolroom scene with teacher James Finlayson! Not up to the standard of SONS OF THE DESERT or WAY OUT WEST, but still very funny. Try and get the complete 65-minute version that was on video in the early 1980s.

PARDON US (Hal Roach/MGM, 1931), directed by James Parrott, introduces the team of Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy to feature length comedy. Having been paired in comedy shorts since their initial teaming in 1927, and continuing through 1935, Laurel and Hardy's participation in features began with guest spots in musicals "The Hollywood Revue" (1929) and "The Rogue Song" (1930). Working in shorts with a feature per year before promoted directly to features by 1936, for PARDON US, a parody on prison films that were the stir of the time, was in fact a spoof on MGM's own success of THE BIG HOUSE (1930) starring Chester Morris and Wallace Beery. Although a drama, Fox Studios accomplishment in prison films followed with UP THE RIVER (1930) featuring Spencer Tracy, Warren Hymer and a very young Humphrey Bogart. Being a comedy, it lacked the humor PARDON US provided, mainly because the teaming of Tracy and Hymer an attempt of copying the friendly rivals chemistry of Victor McLaglen and Edmund Lowe of WHAT PRICE GLORY? (1926) fame, can't compare to them nor Laurel and Hardy, nor did they ever try to be. Such as it is, Laurel and Hardy's PARDON US is another fine mess they've gotten themselves into, with fine results.

Opening title: "Mr. Hardy is a man of wonderful ideas ... so is Mr. Laurel, as long as he doesn't try to think." Set during the Prohibition era, Oliver has a get-rich-quick scheme about brewing beer. He tells his partner, Stanley, "whatever we can't drink, we can sell." Next scene finds the Laurel and Hardy handcuffed and escorted to prison after Stanley sells their home made beer to a policeman he mistakes for a streetcar conductor. After meeting with their warden (Wilfred Lucas) who gives them a lecture on prison life, they are then placed in a cell with four other convicts, with The Tiger (Walter Long) the leader and toughest of the bunch. Because Stanley's loose molar causes him to make a buzzing sound mistaken for what's commonly known as a "raspberry," which gets him into trouble, The Tiger takes it as a sign of courage, making Stanley his immediate pal. With Ollie wanting to get in good with the Tiger by doing the same thing, he isn't so fortunate. Going through the daily routine of prison life, attending school and placed into solitary confinement for unwittingly disrupting the class, Stan and Ollie later take part in a prison break, and hide themselves from the law by taking refuge in a Negro community disguised as black cotton pickers.

PARDON US may not be the best in the filmography of Laurel and Hardy, but delivers with its full quota of laughs. The classroom sequence with James Finlayson as the schoolmaster is a true highlight. School was never like this, especially with prisoners beginning their school day singing, "Good morning, dear teacher," along with the teacher asking students questions and getting the answers not found in text books. For the ten minute cotton field sequence where fugitives Stan and Ollie appear in black-face, they, along with the other Negro workers, do some singing while working in the fields to such tunes as "Hand Me Down," "Way Down in the Old Camp Ground," "Swing Along," "From Birmingham" and "Down at the Farm." Oliver Hardy, a gifted singer in his own right, solos during the evening's recreation period with "Lazy Moon." While there's no secondary love interest to bog down the plot, June Marlowe, as the warden's daughter, is the only female in the cast, with very little to do, probably a victim of heavy film editing. Other Laurel and Hardy stock players, aside from Walter Long's parody of Wallace Beery from THE BIG HOUSE, and the hilarious Jimmy Finlayson, include Charles Hall as The Dentist; and Stanley "Tiny" Sanford as one of the prison guards. It should be noted that in the French language version of PARDON US, Boris Karloff appears in place of Walter Long. Not that's something to see!

A neglected comedy gem that would have been virtually forgotten had it not been for television where Laurel and Hardy comedies were rediscovered by a new generation with each passing decade since the 1950s. By the 1980s, home video such as Nostalgia Merchant, and cable TV guaranteed further popularity for Stan and Ollie, where this and their short subjects and features were presented, including American Movie Classics (1994-1996), and Turner Classic Movies where PARDON US premiered April 1, 2005 as part of its April Fools festival.

While prints of PARDON US were shown in years past in slightly choppy 55 minute format, the TCM print offers better picture quality at 64 minutes. Regardless of its pros and cons, PARDON US demonstrated further that Laurel and hardy are capable of carrying on successfully in feature length comedies, especially with such masterpieces as SONS OF THE DESERT (1933), BABES IN TOYLAND (1934) and WAY OUT WEST (1937) into their not so distant future. (**1/2)

This was Laurel and Hardy's first full-length movie, though it is admittedly a short full-length film. And, apart from a few somewhat slow moments (particularly in the very politically incorrect and portion where the team pose as Black sharecroppers) as well as a running gag that isn't funny (the tooth), it is great fun overall. Part of the reason it is so much fun is that their foil is Walter Long--one of the absolutely scariest looking bad guys in movie history! I loved him in this movie and he is just terrifying. Well, the boys being very stupid, find a way to get on Long's bad side and they know their days are numbered unless some miracle happens--and that's exactly what happens at the film's conclusion. I won't give away the details because I don't want to spoil the fun, but this is a wonderful little film--minus all the songs that seemed to be added as padding.

Laurel and Hardy's first feature film is a rather uneven affair with a disjointed story that sees Laurel and Hardy are sent to prison for selling home brew to a policeman during prohibition.

In hail they end up on the wrong side of their cellmate, The Tiger who is mean bad one. Stan's loose tooth which makes a raspberry noise constantly lands the duo in trouble.

They end up in solitary, then escape to a cotton plantation and once recaptured they inadvertently break up a prison riot.

The film is rather overlong and padded, like a couple of shorts cobbled together with some songs.

The story goes that Hal Roach had to build his own prison set after negotiations with M.G.M. fell through to rent one of theirs, and finding the cost prohibitive for a short he ordered the movie expanded to feature length.

I don't know if this story has been confirmed, but if true it would explain the lack of continuity in certain scenes, and the musical numbers used to pad out the running time.

But for all that there's some wonderful stuff in here. Great gag of Stan and Ollie planning to sell bootleg hooch; the next cut has them being marched straight into prison. Wonderful check-in gags and the mugshot scene is hysterical "If they come out good can I have a copy?" says Stan.

But the best scene for me is the classroom set piece with Jimmy Finn. This had me convulsed with laughter. Asked to name a comet, which has previously been described as a star with a tail on it, Stan answers Rin Tin Tin! In the second half the standard slips slightly, and Stan and Ollie in black-face is not exactly PC these days. However it was not meant to be racist, and Ollie gets to sing "Lazy Moon", which is fine.

Pardon Us is perhaps lacking the cohesive plots of some of the boys' later films - compare this to Sons of The Desert, for example. But for the most part it's an enjoyable film, and worth seeing.

This was Laurel & Hardy's first feature-length film, and it's clear they're not too comfortable with the format: too much padding, not enough laughs. They play a couple of would-be beer barons who find themselves in the slammer after trying to sell beer to a cop, and they look like veritable lambs to the slaughter as they fall foul of Walter Long, the evil-eyed Tiger. The best thing about this film – apart from the boys themselves, who rise effortlessly above their rather mediocre material – is the great array of weather-beaten punch-drunk faces of the character actors chosen to flesh out the parts of the other inmates. They all look like they spend most of their time loitering in dark alleyways waiting for some poor soul to come wandering past.

There's a lot of content that would be considered politically incorrect in these wonderfully enlightened times, and for once the film would probably be no worse off if it wasn't there. There are a few laugh-out-loud moments, but for the most part this one falls far short of the boy's usual high standard. The editing, in particular, is shockingly bad – even for 1931.

Not their best, but still very, very funny in places.

Worth seeing just for the gag about the bloodhounds. If you're scratching your head, watch it again.

This film used to be on all the time when I was a kid. Happy days.

1931 was a very different time in this country. "pardon us" reflects the modes and mores of the time; remember, that was seventy-three years ago. the attitude toward blacks at that time was of one to a second-class people. so, we have laurel pointing at two black inmates and saying "look, amos 'n andy". happy, singing sharecroppers (i'd like to know if the singing sharecroppers were the crinoline choir seen in bing's "mississippi" and the marx bros "day at the races")...stan and ollie coloring themselves with grease and mud. as another reviewer remarked, they couldn't get away with that today, and rightly so. withal,pardon us is not a "great" film, but it is a great l&h film. the accompanying music is straight out of the silents. listen to it...savor it...worth the admission. hardy exhibits his fine tenor voice in "lazy moon"..the various l&h skits throughout. my favorite is when l&h declare a hunger strike but the guard tempts them with visions of a roast turkey dinner replete with all the trimmings including hot biscuits and a big, black cigar. how could hardy turn that down! laurel pipes up after all that and asks, "any nuts?" "all you can eat of them!" comes the stentorian answer from the guard. wilfred lucas (the warden), walter long (the "tiger") and jimmy finlayson (the school tutor) lend yeoman support to l&h. all three supported them in other vehicles. wilfred lucas was the dean in "chumps at oxford"; walter long appeared in "saps at sea" and, of course, finlayson appeared in all l&h films. listen to the warden's welcoming talk at the start and his congratulatory talk at the end. poor l&h...they are mesmerized by the pomposity. fine l&h film, creaky in spots, but recommended for the film buff and the l&h fan.

...for not being very funny. Scenes drag on with slapstick and pratfalls which must have been tired and dated even in 1931. It is quite anxiety-inducing to watch as you just want it to stop. I quite liked the idea of Stan blowing raspberries at the prison's 'Top Dog' Walter Long (The Tiger). However, it's funny once, maybe twice but please stop it there. In this offering, I'm afraid the repetition of this joke falls flat and becomes an irritation. Sort of what Abbott & Costello were to do in the 1940s - you know, milk a joke to death so that it is no longer funny.

I'd watched "The Big House" (1930) the day before I saw this and the inspiration from that film is obvious in both storyline and set. That film is better than this Laurel & Hardy offering and I just felt slightly let-down because I never really got a good laugh from this film.

There are no words to describe the genius of Laurel and Hardy. I've watched all kinds of comedy all my life, from all over the world, and to me Laurel and Hardy is still the best. I watched this morning and literally laughed all the way through. When Stan's "pfft" noise comes from his loose tooth when he talks makes you cry with laughter just on it's own. Amazing. Just amazing. Perfection!

Laurel And Hardy

Infamous for their witty sense of humor that whips you around for both, their verbal sparrings and physical sequences, this comedy duo has managed to entertain and inspire millions of viewers and comedians for their own personality and nothing else. The type of characters that they have shined their lights on, may not resonate on terms of their characteristics with you, but can easily be communicated by their deeds. And performing such simplistic persona, Laurel and Hardy has spoken a lot of the society that they resided at that era and the betterment that they seek at the end of it. Laurel using his body language often has the torch in his hand, he is a type-of-bully natured towards Hardy but in a brotherly way, he also plays the smarter cookie between them, the one who is more is touch with practicality. Hardy, on the other hand, has its own rhythm to beat, he lives on his own imagination, he is more emotionally fueled and often the butt of the joke. Teaming up for ensuing chaos for themselves, the writing has always explored the nature of a being, to its best and is its primary armor to draw in the dramatic impact on their audience. Their knack of animating themselves on the gags; something that comes up when they are deep into it and have been exaggerating for a while, doesn't come off as they anticipate every time.

Pardon Us

A classic perspective change over the personality as a new world surround them, Laurel is suddenly more street than Hardy, these layered jokes are what you have to seek. As far as physical comedy is concerned, Laurel trying to sleep is the only one and boy is it stretched by him and the more he stretches that sequence the more funnier it gets. The storytelling is decent in fact it has much more to offer than any other one hour films of theirs, since t explores their one and only track throughout the course.

I don't care what the detractors say, this is one of my favorite L&H feature-length films, , as well as their first such film. Not bad for a picture that originally was conceived as just another comedy short. Part of the reason I like it so much is the occasional presence of 2 charismatic supporting actors. One is Walter Long, cast as 'The Tiger': leader of attempts to break out of prison and stage a prison riot. He certainly had a distinctive 'tough guy' face and demeanor. However, he wasn't always as tough in his behavior. Of course, Walter played tough guys in several other L&H shorts and features. .......The second charismatic supporting actor is Jimmy Finlayson, also frequently seen in other L&H comedy shorts and features. Here he plays the prison schoolmaster, and is hysterically funny, with his signature squinty-eye double takes. Stan gives imaginative answers to some of his questions. For example, Jim asks what a blizzard is. Stan answers "The insides of a buzzard". Jim asks what a comet is. Stan says "a star with a tail on it". Jim : "Can you give an example?" Stan says "Rin Tin Tin"! ........Periodically, Stan gets in big trouble for making a raspberry-like sound, supposedly with a loose tooth. At one point, a prison guard takes him to the dentist(Otto Fries) to cure the problem. But, initially, the dentist gets confused, when Ollie sits in the dentist's chair to demonstrate how simple it will be, to the fearful Stan. Yes, the dentist asks no questions, and pulls Ollie's tooth. Stan then gets his turn, but the raspberries continue, as most dramatically illustrated when responding to the pardon the boys received for(accidentally) aiding in foiling the prison riot. The warden went ballistic, as he did when that happened at their first meeting..........Incidentally, the boys were sent to prison for illegally selling home brew.(This was still the Prohibition Era). Stan tried to sell some to a policemen, whom he thought was a streetcar conductor! After the warden's pardon speech, stupid Stan invited him to try some of their brew!..........Things get very hectic when Stan doesn't understand why a Thompson submachine gun was passed to him under the dining table. He pulls it out, and, pointing at Ollie, asks "What is this for?" Ollie's shocked response resulted in it being fired in the air, causing the inmates to run for their lives. This also alerted the authorities that a prison riot was imminent. Later, when The Tiger-led rioters wanted to get through a prison gate, first Stan, and then Ollie, fired the gun into the floor or walls, causing the rioters to retreat from the gate. Eventually, when they ran out of bullets, the state militia was at the gate, to save them and quell the riot...........Although some reviews don't like the inclusion of musical numbers, as interruptions of the action, as a fan of musical comedies, I saw this as a welcomed break in the harshness of the prison scene...........While picking cotton, the Etude Ethiopian Chorus sang several spirituals that are not included in the 'Soundtracks' section at this site. This was followed by a rendition of "Lazy Moon", by a blackfaced Ollie, backed up by the Hall Johnson choir. Stan did a bit of dancing to it. ........Later, after the boys were back in prison, the Avalon Boys, while in the exercise yard, sang Irving Berlin's "Wish I Was in Michigan Again", a keeper song for me. Judy Garland sang it in the musical "Easter Parade". Again, this song is not listed under 'Soundtracks' at this site, apparently, because neither Stan nor Ollie was involved. Incidentally, the boys were wearing rather light blackface, so that they fit in with the other cotton pickers, and hopefully avoided notice by the overseer(I noticed that Stan was putting whole branches in his bag, whereas Ollie only put in the bolls.) Unfortunately, they were called upon to try to fix the warden's car, which stopped near them. While Ollie was under the car, looking for a problem, a dog came along and licked some of the blackface off. He redistributed some from other areas, and Stan got some more from inside the hood. However, their cover was blown when Stan's tooth made a raspberry. Incidentally, the warden's daughter(Played by June Marlowe) discovered the problem with the car. It was out of gas!........See it in B&W or the colorized version,(I saw the latter) at YouTube.

I think it was the natural and successful career move for Laurel and Hardy to make feature length movies. They proved during the 1930s that they could adapt to making films of approximately an hour in length by working with a fuller storyline. Several of their feature length films remain classics and rightly so. It would take a couple of films before Stan and Ollie felt at home in this particular format but their debut feature, "Pardon Us" shows a lot of promise. It is a patchy film in that the story is a bit drawn out but the comedy is very good. Our hapless heroes attempt to cash in on the bootlegging racket but don't realise they have sold some of their product to an undercover police officer - until it's too late. Sent to prison, they find it hard to cope with incarceration. Stan suffering from toothache doesn't exactly help! He manages to incur the wrath of everyone as a result. I don't usually care for music numbers being included in comedy films. In fairness though, it doesn't harm this film. I enjoyed the cast of African/American performers as they sang and harmonise together. Great singing all round, not least from Ollie who was truly blessed with a superb voice. The best Laurel and Hardy feature films were to follow but "Pardon Us" has some effective scenes.

I wonder if some of the younger viewers will get the initial premise. A Constitutional amendment, whose number I don't want to bother looking up, made almost all forms of alcoholic beverages illegal during the 1920s until the amendment was repealed in 1933. It was a curious law. The targets seemed to be not so much booze as immigrants who drank for recreation (Irish) or as part of a meal (Italians). It was particularly bad for most of the breweries. They were run by Germans, who had just been demonized in World War I. (Think Schlitz, Blatz, Anheuser-Busch, Budweiser, Gablinger, etc.) When Laurel and Hardy are first seen, they're planning to buy enough ingredients to make 25 gallons of illegal beer. Presumably they get caught. That's why they're taken to jail.

It's their first talkie but some of the verbal gags are unexpectedly cute. So the dynamic duo are being booked. "What's your name?", the gruff desk sergeant demands of Laurel. "Stanley Laurel," is the obedient answer. "Say SIR when you speak to me!" "Sir Stanley Laurel." More are routine puns but still amusing. What's a comet? A star with a tail on it. Correct -- name one. "Rin-tin-tin." For you young uns, Rin-tin-tin was a famous dog in the early movies. Hardy seems to break the fourth wall more often than usual but not enough to turn the viewer off.

There are scenes that some might find irritating or offensive because they are echt-non-PC. Laurel and Hardy escape from prison, don blackface, and join a small community of black who pick cotton and live in tumbledown houses. But so what? A lot of blacks in the South DID pick cotton. They're presented as positively as any other group -- singing and enjoying themselves after a hard day's work -- and Laurel and Hardy are perfectly comfortable in their company. Hardy sings "Lazy Moon," totally forgettable, while the banjo and guitar back him up, and Laurel does a little dance. Later, when they're back behind the walls, a quintet of inmates sings the more successful "I Want To Go Back to Michigan," written by Irving Berlin in 1914. From a materialist point of view, disregarding ethics, this was 1931 and all of the actors in this movie -- stars and extras alike, black or white -- were collecting pay checks that might be otherwise hard to come by.

One of the more notable scenes: Laurel and Hardy in the waiting room, about to have the dentist pull one of Laurel's teeth. There's no slapstick at all. One by one, the waiting prisoners are ushered into the dentist's office and shortly afterwards we hear screams of pain and fear, the crashing of pots and pans, while Laurel quivers in fright. Maybe I responded the way I did because one of the phrases I most dread hearing is a dentist saying, "Now just open wide and turn this way a little." The direction is pretty crude -- lots of close ups of faces registering one or another intense emotion. But the story has continuity and leads to a properly kinetic climax with some imaginatively choreographed slapstick.

Only 64 minutes in the TCM version, as some of the minor extended scenes are missing. The boys sell beer to 2 cops during Prohibition and are sent to prison. Slightly racist with an "Amos and Andy" remark and the boys in blackface while picking crops in the field. The makeup wears off, the warden recognizes them, and then back to prison. The "Negro Spiritual" is first-rate and sung by a gospel group. Reminiscent of later L & H short features, such as "Saps at Sea" and "Flying Deuces". (Basically all 4 reelers.) Typical routines include: A goofy classroom lesson by the prison's teacher. The prison dentist pulls the wrong teeth. Hi-jinks with machine guns and slapstick but nobody actually gets hurt. Two prison breaks. Neither one proves successful. The running gag is Stan's loose tooth, which involuntarily causes him to give everyone "the raspberries" sound. Most enjoyable for what it was. A primitive first feature by Hal Roach Studios. Some will say that the 3 musical numbers slow it down and "pad" it, but this was typical of movies of that era.

Stan and Ollie are sent to jail for making home brew which they decide to sell during the Depression (and, of course, Prohibition). Stan insults the Warden because he has a vibrating tooth which makes it sound like he is giving the guy the raspberries. They are put in prison with the worst of the worst, who respects them because Stan does his vibrating tooth thing (he is seen as courageous). When the boys get caught up in a jailbreak, they manage to escape and go on to hide in cotton fields in the South with a bunch of black people. Unfortunately, the Warden and his daughter come along, and now they are back in prison. What happens after this involves another effort to escape. This is a cute movie. Stan even sings in this one.

Stan & Ollie's "Pardon Us" is not one of their most memorable films, and not one of their funniest. Stan and Ollie are send to jail for selling beer, they later escape but are recaptured. The plot seems pretty thick compared to comedy films of that day, and there seems to be less attention paid among the scriptwriters on jokes and funny moments. The running gag through the movie is Stan's loose tooth, which makes him sound like he insults everyone. It's not very funny, and gets extremely repetitive and thus predictable. And if you look past that joke, then there isn't much left to laugh about about.

And that is pretty much the problem. Not once during the movie did I laugh. Just a halfway grin on occasion. So it remains just a little film, that you watch, and then forget. There are of course a few half funny moments, Stan trying to get comfortable to sleep in his and Ollie's bed at the prison. The scene at the dentist, the scene at the prison school (with Finlayson, who makes his usual - but still great - mimics) and the ending of the film are all OK moments, but not that much more. There's an extremely huge amount of singing in the movie. Singing at the prison, and while Stan and Ollie escapes, they hide as black workers on a cotton farm, leading to classic "negro-spirituals" and similar. It's not bad at all, but it drags on a bit too much.

So all in all, too much regular movie'ish plot, and too little solid comedy. It's not a bad film at all, but far from being a Stan 6 Ollie classic.

A few years later, the boys would make "Sons Of The Desert", a master example on a classic Stan & Ollie movie. And it success "Pardon Us" in every way possible.