A Double Treat for Fans of Laurel & Hardy’s Genius

Hal Roach, who turned 100 Tuesday with much fanfare and whoop-di-do, may be best known for pairing Arthur Stanley Jefferson and Oliver Norville Hardy in the ‘20s. Many would say that the creation of Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy was his finest achievement. After watching a new MGM/UA Home Video double-feature laser set (“The Devil’s Brother” and “Laurel & Hardy’s Laughing 20’s,” $40) spotlighting their comic genius, it would be hard to argue the point.

Once you get past the switched labels (at least on a review copy) and watch the duo in action, you can understand why audiences couldn’t get enough of their silly antics.

“Laurel & Hardy’s Laughing 20’s,” an affectionate, at times overweening, compilation created by Robert Youngson in 1965, offers a too-quick, 90-minute thumbnail look at their careers. Unfortunately, the whoops, whistles and other oddball bits of ludicrous effects and background music tucked in to pass for sound effects on these silents only detract, and the narrative matches that noise with hyperbole and overwriting. Too bad, because Laurel and Hardy’s silly stuff and non-predictable physical comedy speaks for itself.

Nearly seven decades later, you still get vertigo watching them do their own stunts on girders and beams overlooking a relatively unspoiled Los Angeles (“Liberty,” 1929). Laurel and Hardy building a house has more sight gags in its two reels than most features (“The Finishing Touch,” 1928). The climax of “You’re Darn Tootin’ ” (1928) with a dozen men pulling off one another’s pants is funnier than sophisticated ‘90s viewers might think. Hardy repeatedly slipping on a banana peel and an “undressed” Laurel serving the salad as ordered (“From Soup to Nuts,” 1928) re-creates a nightmare of a dinner party. And the famous pipe-fight sequence from “The Battle of the Century” (1927) lives up to all expectations.

“The Devil’s Brother,” considered one of “the boys’ ” best, was long out of view because of legal hassles; its laser release puts it into general circulation for the first time since it played the Bijou in 1933. Once called “Fra Diavolo” for the Auber opera on which it was based, this talkie serves up 90 minutes of romantic musical escapades set in the 18th Century.

The famous duo look like reverse incarnations of Don Quixote and Sancho Panza traversing the countryside. Dennis King, who plays the duplicitous singing highwayman Diavolo, is every bit as engaging as any hero populating Sigmond Romberg operettas.

The team’s antics in “The Devil’s Brother” include a funny routine in which they fail dismally at banditry; Laurel taking a sleeping portion; Laurel getting drunk, much to Hardy’s dismay; and two of Laurel’s silliest and funniest bits of business: the infamous “kneesie-earsie-nosie” and “finger-wiggle.”

If all of this sounds too ridiculous, it is, which is why it’s still among the most watchable silly stuff.