Product Details

• Actors: Charlie Chaplin, Stan Laurel, Oliver Hardy, Buster Keaton, Harry Langdon
• Directors: Robert Youngson
• Format: DVD, NTSC, Black & White
• Language: English
• Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only. Read more about DVD formats.)
  
• Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Rated: NR (Not Rated)
• Studio: Televista
• DVD Release Date: October 9, 2007
• Run Time: 85 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B000UYX4M2
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #129,909 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)

Editorial Reviews

Studio: Music Video Dist Release Date: 10/09/2007 Run time: 85 minutes

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars 30 Years of Giggles, January 5, 2008

By 

Brent R. Swanson "coffee shop inspector" (Crooper, Illinois) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: 30 Years of Fun (DVD)

Robert Youngson stitched together some excellent documentary/anthology features, including "When Comedy Was King" and "Laurel & Hardy's Laughing '20s." When his best compilations were done, he took the odds and ends and leftovers and, under the pretense of documenting the first years of the motion picture, came up with this trifle.

Like his previous documentaries, "30 Years" is a good introduction to silent comedy for a newcomer; however, it's not as good an introduction as, say "When Comedy Was King." Quite a few of the excerpts, and even the players, go unidentified (and quickly, too--Lloyd Hamilton is on for mere seconds). Quite a bit of the material is funny, but the source elements were in fair to poor condition for some segments. Anyone who has seen the recent restorations of the Chaplin Mutual comedies will shudder at the pale, choppy quality seen here.

The gold of this movie is the all-but-forgotten footage of the early Harry Langdon, Charley Chase, and pre-team Laurel & Hardy. These comedians were hitting high notes even before they hit their stride, and the excerpts from "Smile, Please," "Lucky Dog," and "Bromo and Juliet" show them off splendidly. This helps offset the hokey "storyline" and some of the lesser material.

Chapter stops on this particular DVD are faithful to Youngson's categorization of material, which doesn't make them very useful if you're searching for a particular performer. The overall image quality is okay; again, it doesn't help that some of the source elements were in sorry shape to begin with.

There are worse ways to pass 90 minutes; a better way would be to watch one of Youngson's better collections.

0 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars very funny, January 27, 2008

By 

G. Hancock "Gene" (Baltimore, Maryland) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: 30 Years of Fun (DVD)

Silent comedy, as well as being interesting, can be quite clever, as some of these go far to prove.