When Comedy Was King

Oscar winner Robert Youngson actually got his start at Warner Brothers in the 1940s producing sports short subjects. He latched onto a terrific idea as this lead to award winning short movies about crazy, daredevil stunts tied to silent movies, particularly comedy.

The rest is history.

This is one of the earliest film documentaries on silent screen comedy icons, although some graduated to sound films with even greater success. However, Youngson clearly wanted to accentuate the golden era of screen comedians, via a series of historical clips which are outstanding.

More over, this film was instrumental in pushing for the preservation of silent movies. Many old films, dating back to the teens when this documentary was produced, were in need of remastering or had simply deteriorated to the point where they could not be saved. As much as this was a labor of love, this film made history itself.

Best of the best, and not surprising, are priceless clips of Charlie Chaplin, the outrageous Keystone Cops and Buster Keaton. Honorable mention to the early days of Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy, whose silent films were a prelude to their classic sound films.

Never to forget the great Fatty Arbuckle and his insane complications with pretty Mabel Normand. Fatty and Mable were the first screen male and female comedy team, and they shine.

The gang's all here, and you'll want to see this one again.

Remastered on dvd and blu ray for film completists and all us big kids who grew up on this stuff.