(Review originally written at 12 May 2008)
This film was presumed lost for a long time, until the second reel of this movie showed up again in the '90's. So halve of the movie can be seen now days and its highly unlikely that the first reel of the movie will also ever be found. So we'll have to do with the 9+ minutes of this movie that have survived, which is also in poor quality though unfortunately.
A shame since this seemed like a real fun early Laurel & Hardy movie, from the period the weren't a comical duo yet. Stan Laurel plays a clumsy stupid lawyer, while Oliver Hardy plays the tough cop, a role he played more than once, mostly in the early days of his career.
Especially Stan Laurel is in good comedy form and he has a couple of great fun moments in this movie.
It's a fast paced slapstick comedy with also a good comical story about a man (Charley Chase) who is being prosecuted for shooting his wife (Edna Marion). The comedy is well timed and often unexpectedly funny. It makes it all the more a shame that we'll probably be never able again to see this movie in its full glory.
What's still left of it is really good and fun!
8/10
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