Review #958: Duck Soup (1927)

Title: Duck Soup
Year: 1927
Director: Fred Guiol
Country: US
Language: N/A

Duck Soup is perhaps the most well known of the Marx Brothers' comedies and widely regarded as one of the best comedies of all time...but this isn't THAT film. Rather it's a Stanley Laurel and Oliver Hardy joint, their first time as true co-stars in this long forgotten comedy short. Laurel and Hardy's careers had intersected before; The Lucky Dog (1920) starred Laurel, but had Hardy in a much more insignificant role. This is the first film where they were on equal footing on the billing. 

Pursued by forest rangers who want to press them into fire-fighting duty, Stanley and Oliver hide in the home of a big-game hunter who has just left town.

The story of this film is not unlike many other silent pictures; it was missing and presumed lost until it was recovered in the 1970s. Up until this film was found, Historians mistakenly thought the footage of Hardy was "severely limited". Once everyone got a look at Duck Soup again, many film lovers recognized the familiar duo the world over had loved, albeit in this form they are a bit rough around the edges. 

Laurel and Hardy worked best during the advent of sound because their slapstick was balanced with the quirkiness of their wordplay. Though Duck Soup is quite a funny picture, its more brilliant moments come from when the action isn't too frenetic. The short ends with a mad chase through the mansion, and while this would be acceptable for Chaplin, the Laurel and Hardy brand (albeit it wasn't quite established at the time) was known for being fairly slower paced. 

Duck Soup was based on a stage comedy, Home from the Honeymoon, written by Arthur J. Jefferson, Stan Laurel’s father. It is most interesting as historical curiosity; an attempt at the duo gaining footing in the industry just before they would reach super-stardom. Certainly worth a gander. 

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