Big business
1929 USA Black/White 19 Minutes
Review
I don't think he wants a tree
Stan (Stan Laurel) and Oliver (Oliver Hardy) are door-to-door Christmas tree salesmen in sunny California. They have been angrily rebuffed by their woul-be customers, but things can get worst. They meet an extremely agressive prospect (James Finlayson).
An errant branch of the Christmas tree, gets caught in the customers front door, several times. The irritated man cuts the tree in half. Stan and Ollie retaliate by carving off the street-numbers from the man's door, and a full-scale war erupts. The salesmen destroy the house and its furnishing while the customer demolishes
their car and merchandise.
Cast
Directed by James W. Horne
- Stan Laurel .... Stan
- Oliver Hardy .... Ollie
- James Finlayson .... Homeowner
- Tiny Sandford .... Policeman
- Charlie Hall .... Neighbor
- Retta Palmer .... Neighbor
Links and more
Trivia
Release date: April 20, 1929
The movie was entirely shot on location in Culver city and Los Angeles (USA)
The film was selected to United States National Film Registry.
For years producer Hal Roach told the funny story that he hired a house and its contents but that the actors and crew had actually destroyed the wrong house. Stan Laurel remembered things differently: “The anecdote Hal Roach sr. Told on the Les Crane show was definitely not true. The chap who owned the house was employed at the studio and worked on the film with us.”Source / More (Book)
Bio
Laurel and Hardy
Stan Laurel:
If any of you cry at my funeral, I'll never speak to you again! Remarkable:
Asteroids 2865 and 2866 are named after Laurel and Hardy.
Stan Laurel
Born:
June 16, 1890
Born as:
Arthur Stanley Jefferson
Died:
February 23, 1965
Oliver Hardy
Born:
January 18, 1892
Born as:
Norvell Hardy
Died:
August 7, 1957
Stan Laurel performed in circuses and vaudeville before settling in the U.S. (1910), where he began appearing in silent movies.
Oliver Hardy owned a movie house and acted in silent comedy films from 1913.
They first appeared in the same Hal Roach film in Forty-five minutes from Hollywood (1926) and attained enormous popularity by the end of the silent era. They made a great number of shorts before their first long feature, Pardon Us (1931) (made largely out of economic necessity). In 1933 their The music box won an Academy award.
Selected Movies:
- Big business (1929)
- The music box (1932)
- Helpmates (1932)
- Tit for tat (1935)
- Them thar hills (1934)
- Towed in a hole (1932)
- Sons of the desert (1933)
Academy award:
1961 Stan Laurel -> Honorary Award
Books:
John McCabe -> Mr. Laurel and Mr. Hardy (1965/1985)
Randy Skretvedt -> Laurel and Hardy: The Magic Behind the Movies (1987/1994)
Rob Stone ->Laurel or Hardy: The solo films of Stan Laurel and Oliver "Babe" Hardy (1996)
Scott MacGillivray -> Laurel and Hardy: From the Forties Forward (1998)
S. Louvish -> Stan and Ollie (2002)
