Why Girls Love Sailors

Like a lot of Laurel & Hardy's silent movies, you need to be in the right frame of mind to view them – i.e. you need to watch them not expecting the usual huge quota of belly laughs found in Laurel & Hardy films. I watched this film expecting to be, as is usually the case, reduced to a shivering wreck, but was slightly disappointed. However, when I watched it again, I was surprised at how much I was laughing, especially at Stan's little display at the start of the film to impress his love, and at his excellent capacity for drag later in the film. Oliver Hardy is, as usual, brilliantly underplaying his role and is suitably menacing as the 'heavy', and the little scene he shares with Stan is charming, sometimes touching, making one wonder why it took as long as it did for them to be paired.

This is a little delight of a film, which is made even better (as are all the silent films) with the addition of wonderful recreations of the Shields and Hatley tunes by the Beau Hunks orchestra – those who own a copy of WHY GIRLS LOVE SAILORS on VVL as I do are fortunate enough to have these marvellous little melodies playing in the background; if you don't, buy the CDs and play them while you're watching. It makes an already pleasurable experience that little bit more enjoyable.

Another film with a seafaring theme, although no boats leave the harbour. Stan and Ollie aren't a double act as such in this one: Ollie's a rather rough-and-ready looking first mate with a perpetual scowl, while Stan's engaged to a woman to whom the Captain of Ollie's boat takes a shine.. The captain kidnaps the woman, so Stan follows him aboard to claim her back.

This is an OK silent film which is lifted immeasurably by the presence of Laurel & Hardy, even if their double act isn't yet developed. After pretending to be a ghost, Stan disguises himself as a woman. He did that in quite a few of their films. As a woman he looks rather odd, all neck and thin legs, but the sailors aboard ship all seem enchanted by him/her. He lures them to a secluded part of the boat then, after knocking them out with a bottle, tricks Ollie into throwing them overboard. This isn't one of their best but, as always with Laurel & Hardy, it's worth a look.

Anyone who chooses to watch this short expecting to find a typical Laurel & Hardy comedy is in for a surprise, for although both gents appear in Why Girls Love Sailors, this film was made before they'd developed into the team we recognize—which is putting it mildly! Here we find Oliver Hardy as an unshaven roughneck, first mate on a decrepit cargo boat, described in a title card as "the nastiest brute on board," a guy who flings sailors overboard if he thinks they've insulted him. Stan is introduced as Willie Brisling, "the great periwinkle fisherman," and yet he plays a character somewhat closer to the one we know, grinning vacantly and even bursting into tears at one point. Stan has an amusing scene at the beginning, flirting joyously with his fiancée Nell (Viola Richard, a Clara Bow look-alike who was one of the cutest actresses on the Hal Roach lot). As it happens, the captain of Ollie's ship, the "Merry Maiden," is an ex-boyfriend of Nell's who abducts her and hauls her on board with evil intent, and it's up to Stan to rescue her. He does so by disguising himself as a woman and vamping most of the crew, including first mate Ollie and the captain himself.

I must say, this short qualifies as one of the weirdest silent comedies I've seen, whether featuring Laurel, Hardy, or anyone else. It's funny at times, but there are quite a few moments that leave me bewildered. When Stan first boards the ship there's a bit involving a sailor played by Jerry Mandy; Stan pulls his sweater over his head and cavorts strangely, apparently intending to confuse the man. It works, but the point of the scene was lost on me. Then Stan finds a clothes trunk from the "Jules Ellenge Theatre" filled with women's clothing; this was obviously meant as a reference to then-famous female impersonator Julian Eltinge, and indeed Stan soon emerges from the trunk in drag. Is it improper to ask why this trunk was on board in the first place? It's implied at the beginning that the crew of the Merry Maiden are smuggling booze, but are they smuggling transvestites as well?

Some of the funniest bits involve Stan's impact on the crew members, each of whom is instantly smitten at the sight of him. Stan and Ollie get their one extended scene together during this portion of the film, and although Stan would don drag on several later occasions in their career together, the guys never played a scene like this one again. Things turn really bizarre when Stan starts vamping the captain, and his angry wife (Anita Garvin) shows up unexpectedly. She finds her husband holding Stan in his lap, making hanky-panky. She pulls a gun and is ready to plug her spouse, and at first Stan is elated, but when she makes it clear that she intends to punish them both Stan whips off his wig, reveals his true gender, and announces that this was all a test "to see if you really love him."

And how does she react? She's embarrassed! She sheepishly lowers the gun, quickly apologizes to her husband for doubting him, and embraces him! This astonishing moment is followed by a other strange twists before we reach the final fade-out gag. I don't know about anyone else who's seen this, but I'm still trying to process that "testing your love" bit. My guess is that the filmmakers had to come up with an ending in a hurry and decided to just wing it with something really silly. Whatever the case, Why Girls Love Sailors may not be everyone's cup of tea, but it's well worth a look for the Curio Factor alone. At any rate, I'll wager you won't be bored!

"Why Girls Love Sailors" (1927) is a two-reeler with Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy eating the scenes, along with Anita Garvin, Viola Richard, and Malcolm Waite, all in a tizzy when captain Malcolm Waite brings his boat into port and goes to see former girl friend Viola Richard, but she's now engaged to Laurel. Oops, and Waite's a toughie - and he shows it! Now back on the boat with both in tow, Richard basically captive and Laurel in a position to be eaten by the sharks who run the boat, especially the captain and his first mate, Hardy, Laurel decides to show what a man he can be by dressing up as a woman and ensnaring all the men on the boat... Then... Things get in high gear and things begin to happen: Bing, bong, bunk, Although the boat's not sunk, The sailors are beaten And though not eaten, By Laurel are thwarted While the captain's sorted Out by his wife, A knife Named Garvin.

My print is the American print found in France in 1971, long thought lost forever. After I watched this print, I watched the French version which differs here and there. Some of the scenes are obviously other takes, plus Charles R. Althoff shows up for about 1 second in a shot in Laurel's abode on shore. The viewer can just see him before he's out of the scene, sitting in a chair at the bottom of the screen. I mention this because he's not in the American print at all! Plus - several others were in scenes originally that had been deleted before release, including Anna May Wong and Sôjin Kamiyama. Althoff's presence is never explained by the syntax of the film, nor would many care. The titles in French differ only marginally from the American ones.

This is on the Image Entertainment DVD release of several years ago.

Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy were comedic geniuses, individually and together, and their partnership was deservedly iconic and one of the best there was. They left behind a large body of work, a vast majority of it being entertaining to classic comedy, at their best they were hilarious and their best efforts were great examples of how to do comedy without being juvenile or distasteful.

'Why Girls Love Sailors' is nowhere near classic Laurel and Hardy, later films, short and feature, had stronger chemistry when fully formed and used their considerable talents better. At this point, Laurel was much funnier and more interesting while Hardy in especially the previous two outings of theirs had too little to do. 'Why Girls Love Sailors' is still worth watching though and is an improvement on the previous two short films, along with 'Duck Soup' it was Laurel and Hardy's best up to this point.

Personally would have liked more sly wit, more scenes with Laurel and Hardy together and Hardy having more screen time.

The story is a bit busy at times and both slight and formulaic.

Laurel however is very funny, and sometimes hilarious, like as was said for their previous outing 'Love Em and Weep', 'Why Girls Love Sailors' is worth seeing for him alone. Anita Garvin is up to his level too. Despite saying above about Hardy's screen time being too short he is at least not wasted, and he does give one of his funniest and most interesting appearances of his pairings with Laurel up to this point. There is not enough of him and Laurel together and one can see glimpses.

A good deal of the humour is well timed, hugely energetic and very funny, with everything going at a lively pace, and there is a lot of charm and good nature to keep one going. 'Why Girls Love Sailors' looks quite good as well.

To conclude, decent. 7/10 Bethany Cox