Historians Find Lost Laurel & Hardy Film

[Adenoid_Hynkel]

Historians Find Lost Laurel & Hardy Film

2 hours, 48 minutes ago


By MATT SURMAN, Associated Press Writer

BERLIN - Laurel and Hardy, masters of foreign languages?


German film historians have tracked a long-lost copy of Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy's early sound work to an archive in Moscow housing a 1931 film the comedy duo performed entirely in German, the Munich Film Museum said Monday.


But lest anyone get too impressed, Germans who have seen clips from the film are far more approving of the comedy — some of it unintentional — than by the pair's accents.


"It's important as a curiosity," said Klaus Volkmer, a spokesman for the Munich Film Museum, which discovered the film. "You can't actually understand what they say. It's funny."


The mismatched team shot their 1930s films first in English, then reshot them with the same dialogue translated into German, French and Spanish — which they spoke phonetically — because it was so difficult to synchronize voices and actions in the early days of the talkies.


It is an artifact from the early years of Hollywood, when such stars as Greta Garbo, Edward G. Robinson and Buster Keaton would act their films in several languages to be shown around the world.

http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20040809/ap_on_en_mo/germany_laurel___hardy

[Gloria]

1. I heard it this morning on the BBC World Service...they played

a clip and discussed how the German was phoneticized. The commentator said it was pretty good, although not perfect. They also said that it was unlikely that any more L & H films like this would be found.

They also said the L & H were extremely popular in Germany during that period.

(bless shortwave radio....)

[Adenoid_Hynkel]

2. now if only they could find lost keaton or pickford films

of which there are many

chaplin's my fav, but most of his stuff is accounted for

[HelenBedd]

3. Many greats are lost forever

85% of all films made between 1890 and 1930 are lost forever.

Fires, a disposable medium mentality, and film stock issues helped us miss out on seeing some greats like:

"Cleopatra" starring Theda Bara
"London After Midnight" starring Lon Chaney.

Sadly time is not on our side in finding any of the thousands of lost films and documentaries made 80 to 100+ years ago.

Any find like the Laurel and Hardy find is a huge victory for preserving a great history.

[DivinBreuvage]

4. "Laurel and Hardy Go To Iraq"

"Well, Stanley, this is ANOTHAH fine mess you've gotten us into."

[Flubadubya]

5. Bwahaha...

[Kellanved]

6. it was in the German media a few weeks ago

Really a curiosity :shrug: .