Review of The Fixer Uppers

"The Fixer Uppers" is a black-and-white short film from 1935, so this one is already over 80 years old and it is one of many many short films from that time starring Stan laurel and Oliver Hardy, mostly known as Dick und Doof here in Germany (Fat and Stupid). It is not one of their earliest works, which is shown by the fact that this is a sound film. The people who worked on this one in front of (Middleton, Housman, Busch) as well as behind the camera (Roach, Rogers) worked with the legendary comedy on many other occasions too. It runs for slightly under 20 minutes and is the story of a jealous husband who challenges Hardy to a duel when he catches him with his wife. Honor may be more important than jealousy here as the wife felt neglected by her husband and it was all just a bad misunderstanding. Of course, there is no real cheating or real murder in the comedy movies with Stan and Ollie. Staying away from the duel won't save Ollie as an unlucky coincidence brings him right back to his adversary. There are some funny parts here like Ollie blaming Stan for everything once again or the two looking right at us, but as a whole the story was nothing too memorable really. It is thanks to the individual talent of the protagonists that it was still a decent, occasionally entertaining watch. The supporting cast also is pretty decent. Overall, a thumbs-up, but a cautious one. If you like these two mugs in other stuff, then it is worth checking out.