Aerial Antics

source: Aerial Antics

This L&H talkie comedy short is available in its colorized, as well as B&W forms at YouTube. It's especially appropriate for those who like to see someone looking for their hat, which is on their head, and someone repeatedly falling off a roof, and an unconventional ride through traffic, to end up squashed between 2 trolleys. A don't mean to be sarcastic. These are funny or scary gags......Some reviewers wish the initial section, where Ollie is looking for his hat, which is on his head, had been deleted, as being too simple, too extended and not being related to the rest of the screenplay. However, I think Ollie does a fine job making it interesting, then with an unexpected twist at the end. I don't understand why the 2 women present: Fay Holderness as Mrs. Hardy, and Dorothy Granger, as the maid)didn't soon tell him it was on his head. I guess they just wanted to watch him struggle with the problem. ......Stan's car ultimately proved useful, acting as an extension of their ladder , to get to the roof. However, initially, its horn scares Ollie to fall from the ladder. Also, after parking it where Ollie wanted it, it let out a flaming backfire than singed Ollie's bottom, causing his pants to smoke. Stan got a bucket of water from the fish pond, but his aim was poor, mostly soaking the rest of Ollie. Ollie would get a much better taste of that water, several times, when he fell off the roof, trying to put up a large radio aerial. Of course, Stan 'helped' him in this project. The last time he fell from the roof, it was down the chimney after he had demolished the outer portion by tying a rope around it as a safety harness for himself. It didn't work. as the chimney was poorly made. After he got to the bottom, some of the 'bricks' fell on him.........Certainly, the scariest portion of the film is the last section, where Ollie is on top of the ladder, which is resting on Stan's runaway car. The car travels down various roads, seemingly driving itself, as Stan supposedly holds the ladder steady(Didn't know they had self- driving cars in those days?). If you think about it, this couldn't happen, as Stan would have to start the motor, and the accelerator would have to remain depressed after he took his foot off. Also, there is no way Stan could have steadied that ladder alone, with Ollie on the top. Totally illogical, but spectacular to watch........The final leg of the film has Mrs. Hardy catch up with the car, after Ollie fell off in front of a bus. She wanted to tell Ollie that the repossession man just took their radio: a deflating irony. Then, with the car parked on a trolley track, Stan can't get the motor started. Eventually, the car gets squashed between 2 trolleys (How does this happen?). We end up with a car squashed so that the passenger section is raised high above the rest, with the front and back axils much closer together than usual. Quite a sight, and apparently no one was injured, and the car now runs! ........ In 1932, the film "County Hospital," also ends with their car smashed between 2 trolleys. But, their car is not as spectacularly misshapen as in this film.

HOG WILD is one of the early talkies made by Laurel and Hardy. It starts off on a bad note, with a laboured comedy routine involving Ollie losing his hat (it's on his head the whole time) and getting involved in a massive argument with his wife. This bit is shrill, histrionic and irritating. Then Stan shows up and the two attempt to fit a new aerial on the roof, and it suddenly gets very good. The best Laurel & Hardy shorts were the ones with them attempting to complete a job and this film is no exception. Much of it takes place on a single rooftop and there's plenty of opportunity for the high-power slapstick that fans know and love from the duo. This time around, the pratfalls invariably involve characters falling from a great height, and such moments never fail to elicit a laugh. HOG WILD sustains its running time very well, but in the last five minutes things suddenly take a turn for the even more extreme and it becomes a classic indeed with one of the best sequences ever of the troublesome twosome's career. Basically, it involves a car, a ladder, and...well, just go watch it, as you won't be disappointed!

Hog Wild concerns Hardy, who wants nothing more than to go out on the town with Laurel until his wife insists that he install a radio antenna atop their roof. Hardy still winds up inviting Laurel over to help him with such a project, which will of course go awry in a multitude of different ways. For starters, the roof begins to fall apart due to the carelessness of the men, and eventually results in an epic (for the time), collision, sending the boys into a complete tailspin of idiocy. Hog Wild is standard slapstick Laurel and Hardy fare, but it provides for a certain kind of "one thing leads to another" setup that keeps it going longer than if it was just an assortment of gags (which it still is at times). The verbal banter between the two men is downplayed, and the only real kind of situational gag imposed is at the very beginning of the film, where Hardy is searching for his hat that he is scolding his wife (Fay Holderness) for misplacing when it is already on his head. Certain gags like this feel like cop-outs and deliberate distractions from the fact that the film has nothing going on under its head (sort of like Laurel and Hardy themselves). The short turns a bit more captivating towards the end, when all hell really starts breaking loose. Laurel and Hardy shorts have a traditional potboiler effect to their drama, where events escalate faster than the audience can keep up in the best way possible. Hog Wild has that effect in a low-key sense, making it at least marginally interesting even if the action and the wit isn't as substantial as it could be. This is a fine, effective short all around, despite lacking in the area that Laurel and Hardy are best in, which is verbal banter and quirky exchanges. Starring: Stan Laurel, Oliver Hardy, and Fay Holderness.

One of the team of Laurel and Hardy's most famous shorts hasn't lost its impact. It's 14 going on 90, funny to the kids who saw it in many of its incarnations (whether in the theater back in 1930, or in the 1970's when I saw it on TV), and as timely as ever. For those of us who can't understand modern technology, we can truly understand their obsession with trying to find a way to figure out these things on our own. In the case of L&H, it's about trying to hook up a radio antenna at Ollie's wife's demand. Even when she begins to realize that the destruction of her house is imminent, the wife wisely tells them not to bother. But, where there's a will, there's a way, and Oliver will get it up regardless of the bumps and bruises that he might get. This goes from bad to worse for them, ending up with laurel driving an out of control car with Oliver stuck on the back of the ladder. How they filmed these stunts remains a mystery, and its obvious to see why they have remained as potent in comedy as they are.

Stan and Ollie managed to milk a lot of gags into the simple act of putting up a radio antenna. This is necessary because that hatchet faced harridan of a wife that Ollie is married to simply has to hear the broadcasts from radio Tokyo. This particular short subject Hog Wild really is one that Ollie takes center stage with. At first it's just him and wife Fay Holderness looking for his hat and of course that familiar derby is right where hats usually are. After that it's a contest to see how many ways can Ollie fall from the roof of a house. That's actually dangerous business I had a cousin who died from injuries sustained from falling from a roof. Still when Ollie does it, it's entertaining. The roof business is more like something I would have expected from the Three Stooges. It ends with Stanley driving away with Ollie on top of a ladder that was attached to the car. It looks like a runaway hook and ladder with poor Ollie hanging on for dear life and Stanley with that look of pure innocence not figuring just to pull the car to gradual stop to solve the problem he created. But this timeless stuff is why Stan and Ollie remain popular.

Mr. Hardy is failing to raise a radio antenna on his house's roof, and Mr. Laurel is helping him do that. Fail, that is. Fay Holderness plays Oliver's wife in this short, and she's a very good actress..... but not the least funny in the role, only mildly exasperated. Meanwhile Stan and Ollie are risking life and limb, falling off roofs and so forth. It's another series of perfectly timed variations on a theme of destruction, where the boys are 90% of the movie, and Miss Holderness is there for a couple of reaction shots....and Dorothy Granger for her legs.

"Hog Wild" is not only one of Laurel & Hardy's best films, it's simply one of the greatest shorts ever made. Give the boys a simple situation, let 'em milk twenty minutes worth of inspired gags out of it and you have a damn near perfect comedy. In this 1930s short, Laurel & Hardy are planning to put up an aerial, ("Mrs Hardy wants to get Japan!"). That is all there is to say about the story; what we get is Laurel & Hardy playing with tools, Ollie being pestered by his wife and a hilarious slapstick finale which manages to remain completely in character. With about 18 minutes of pantomime and 2 minutes of dialogue, "Hog Wild" represents Laurel & Hardy at their absolute best. And we know how good that is!

As is usually the case, a series of unfortunate events lead to the near destruction of Oliver Hardy. Ollie would like the day off but his wife insists that he finally get on the roof and adjust the radio antenna. Of course, he will need someone to help and we know who that is. After destroying the chimney, there are continuous hilarious mishaps, including bricks falling on Ollie's head. It is classic to watch him sit there, thinking each brick is the last and the another falls. Oliver was the master of the despairing victim. Stanley means well but is a horror when it comes to fixing things. Eventually, Stan makes the mistake of tying a rope to the car to anchor the big guy. Well, it's expected and, once again, a delight. The car starting scene with Stan is stunningly funny.

Though all of "Hog Wild" is funny, it's the ending that leaves me helpless with laughter. Since Mrs. Hardy wants to "get Japan" on her radio, Oliver and Stanley are planning to install an aerial on top of the house. You can guess the kinds of mishaps that follow. Eventually, they decide to place the ladder on top of Stan's car. Bad idea. While Oliver is climbing the ladder, Stan mistakenly starts the car, and they go whizzing through the city streets. Stan cries, Ollie hangs on for dear life. When they come up alongside a double decker bus, the women on the upper deck are stunned to see a man on a ladder going by. Oliver, ever the gentleman, tips his hat to them. Well, eventually Oliver is safely on the ground, where his tearful wife informs him that she is crying not because of his horrible experience, but because the finance man has taken the radio away! Oliver squares his shoulders and resolutely marches over to the car where Stan waits. The preceding is funny, but what's coming up is sublime. Stan can't get the car to start. He tinkers. He fidgets. He moves levers, including one that causes the car to backfire with a noise like a sonic boom. Oliver sits there expressionless, while his wife continues to cry over the loss of her radio. Stan keeps working on getting the car to go, including blasting the horn several times. Multiple backfires ring out, to no avail. No matter how many times I've seen this, I laugh myself silly. Stan is so willing to please but incapable, while Ollie is simply above it all as he sits wordlessly. Eventually a streetcar bashes into them, crushing the car into a bizarre vehicle in which the front and back wheels almost touch. The streetcar conductor who has hit them doesn't ask if they are OK. Rather, in an enormous voice he roars for them to get out of the way! Ollie merely looks at him, and then silently motions for Stan to move along. And wonder of wonders -- the destroyed car starts on the first try. Stan signals that he is turning on to the road, toots the horn, and pulls out. Oliver is stoic. His necktie flaps in the breeze. I love Laurel and Hardy, and I'm not sure I can explain why. Perhaps it's their undaunted spirit. In this case, they destroyed Oliver's house for nothing, since the radio was taken away. They now have a destroyed car, which ironically runs better now than it did when it was whole. Stan has yet again helped to ruin everything that Oliver owned, but he is content to continue striving, even in a ravaged car that supposedly will take them back to the remnants of the Hardy house. Meanwhile, Oliver has not a word to say. Broken, but not beaten. The world is a better place because they lived.