Way Out West (1937)

I wanted to but couldn't!

It’s sentimental, ridiculously long and only occasionally funny

The thing I enjoyed most about the film is the fact that it doesn't shy away from being a super-sized-cliche;

It’s sentimental, ridiculously long and only occasionally funny

The perfect scores here are astounding. The reviewers must be oblivious to what made Laurel and Hardy great, or else they are so besotted with L&H that they give them a 10 just for showing up, like opera fans do for divas past their prime.This may be the best "feature length" L&H, but that's not saying much. As other reviewers have pointed out -- and been voted down for their perception -- feature-length -- even short feature-length like this -- is too long for L&H. L&H did short subjects, extended jokes, not the overproduced shaggy-dog stories of the feature- length era. MGM had done the distribution from the 20s, but I think they had a hand in replacing the shorts with the feature-length in the mid-30s.We get a hint of trouble already at the start of the opening credits. Instead of L&H's trademark Cuckoo Song, with screechy clarinets -- primitive notes in keeping with the antics of the shorts -- we get boilerplate orchestration, which continues relentlessly and intrusively throughout the movie, smothering the charm of the interplay between Laurel and Hardy.We don't see L&H for the first 6 minutes, instead we get a stock dance-hall scene with hoochy-koochy girls and carousing cowboys, serving only as padding. This kind of waste goes on and on. As for the songs, etc. L&H are not a song & dance act, as MGM made them in many of the feature-lengths. Which is to say, more padding.I was looking forward to seeing a feature-length L&H. After all, if 20 minutes is great, then imagine over an hour! Alas, I discovered that comedy wasn't added, just the runtime. Film historians, critics and Hal Roach himself agree that L&H's decline began when the MGM-labeled feature-lengths replaced the shorts. They're right.

A personal note before reviewing this movie proper: I first watched this as a kid in 1979 at the East Baton Rouge Parish Library (a building which was torn down last year to be replaced by another one with the same name) when the place showed old movies every Saturday. I only saw part of it then but what I saw was pretty funny. Then I saw it again, weeks later, at the same place-this time the entirety of it-and it was really funny! This was my first viewing of a Laurel & Hardy film. The thin English one and the heavyset one from Harlem, Georgia were hilarious to watch for me at the time so as a result, they became my favorite comedians to this day. Their arrival in a western town is to deliver a deed-from her late father-to a woman named Mary Roberts (Rosina Lawrence). But since they've never seen her before, Mickey Finn (L & H regular James Finlayson) passes his wife, saloon singer Lola Marcel (Sharon Lynne) as her. I'll stop there and just say after rewatching this on YouTube, this is still quite a hilarious outing for the boys whether, among other things between them, getting chased by the Finns or doing their dance to a tune by The Avalon Boys or even when they're singing and Stan suddenly changes voices mid-song! This was funny mostly from beginning to end. So on that note, I highly recommend Way Out West.

A superior feature with Stan and Ollie traveling out West to deliver the deed to a gold mine to a deserving young woman, Mary Roberts, who works in a saloon. Naturally they are hoodwinked by James Finlayson and wife into turning it over to them. After some scuffling they retrieve the deed and escape with the virginal Mary Roberts.The plot is nothing more than a peg on which the gags are hung. Many of the jokes are pretty old or else so silly that they don't really amuse. Four people shouting and chasing each other in a frenzy around a table isn't really very funny in itself. I used to watch this with my kid when he was ten or twelve and enjoyed it more in his responsive company.But it's still pretty good. Some of the jokes work just fine. Ollie is undone when Stan tries to hoist him by block and tackle to a balcony, with a mule on the other end of the rope. Ollie is so heavy that the mule winds up on the balcony and Ollie crashes through the cellar door. We all know what cellar doors are, I hope. I don't think they have them anymore. They're the things that Jimmy Cagney used to slide down as a child in "Public Enemy." There's a running gag about the two men walking across a shallow creek and Ollie suddenly disappearing with a monstrous splash into a deep hole. It's old but it's done splendidly.And there are a couple of unexpected but delightful treats. Stan and Ollie do a charming little dance in front of the saloon and later they sing a duet to "The Trail of the Lonesome Pine." The verbal gags are often successful too. Stan and Ollie inform the (fake) Mary Roberts that her father is dead. She replies mournfully, "What did he die of?" Stan: "He died of a Tuesday, I think." If it's not uniformly successful, it's still often amusing and it's never dull.

"Way Out West" is quite simply, Laurel and Hardy's best film. Some people (and most film critics) say "Sons of The Desert" is Laurel and Hardy's best movie, but the reason I like "Way Out West over "Sons of the Desert" is because it never slows down. It is jam-packed with verbal jokes and slapstick (and two great song and dance routines). There is also some great support from James Finlayson and Harry Bernard. I think the cast of a Laurel and Hardy film tends to be over looked. Who can imagine "The Boys" movies without Charlie Hall, Mae Busch and Tiny Sandford? An interesting thing to note is that the readers of "Total Film" voted it the 26th greatest comedy film of all time. One of the very finest screen comedies.