Films of Laurel & Hardy

Hi, Everyone! It's November, which once again brings "Turkey Month" to our meetings. For this year's 'turkey' line up we are showing L&H's last film Atoll K. This movie is celebrating its 50th Anniversary , and, for one of their later films, it's not bad. L&H inherit an island and a yacht and go to the high seas with stowaways and refugees as their cooks and shipmates. They wind up in a terrible storm, and out of nowhere, their atoll rises from underwater! Everyone sets up camp and becomes adjusted to their new home.. A woman fleeing from her fiancé soon joins the crew, and they form their own little Republic.

Everything is fine until uranium is discovered, which creates a world uproar over this little island.. As soon as the island becomes attacked it starts to sink. The woman and L&H are rescued by a passing ship, and L&H find their own island, but soon realize that taxes take away their thoughts of an easy life.

Atoll K was released in 1954 as Utopia in America, and also shorter. Atoll K was a French film and it was hard for L&H to get along with its multi-lingual cast. Stan's health problems made production of the movie longer than it was supposed to be. He looks terrible in this movie because of how sick he was. William K. Everson said in his "Films of Laurel and Hardy" book that Stan looked better before he passed than in the movie. About a 15 year difference.. There are some funny gags, such as Stan shaving with sandpaper and having a pet crab. This movie does have its ups and downs, but it's good to know that L&H still had it in them to make one last film... L&H did have the idea to make 1 hour TV shows with them as storybook characters in the mid-fifties in color.. Due to Hardy's health this never got to be. See you in November.