. . . THE BIG NOISE teaches the war-weary American public four main lessons. First, ANYONE can come up with an idea for a super weapon which will win the war. While "Alva P. Hartley" as the eccentric bomb inventor here is not as singular as Albert Einstein, his real-life counterpart, they BOTH come up with the same idea--one bomb that can destroy a major world city (well, technically, Alva beats Albert to this notion by a year). Second, ANYONE can be a mercenary traitor at a time when loose lips sink ships. The characters "Jim Hartman" and "Dutchy Glassman" seem like the most average Americans here, but they're the ones plotting against the United States. Third, men need to focus on Homeland Security in war time, while leaving all the less essential jobs to women, who keep the home fires burning. In THE BIG NOISE, it's the men who design the munitions, guard military secrets, patrol vital highways, and man anti-aircraft guns. Women deliver telegrams, keep colleges going, and drive cabs. Fourth, ANY American can be in the right spot in the right time to score a major victory against the Axis, if they have proper situational awareness. Laurel and Hardy brave intense "friendly fire" in THE BIG NOISE to scuttle an enemy submarine on the verge of destroying Hollywood. Bottoms up, boys!

I read the poor reviews before I watched this for the very first time, but I always try to keep an open mind and actually watch a film to decide for myself if it is good or bad. Admittedly it is still a far cry from L & H's glory days at Hal Roach Studios, but this film is still funny and very entertaining. I have seen many modern-day comedies that I would very easily rate well below this one. It is never a hardship to watch Laurel and Hardy together and the supporting cast is good and very capable. I urge any fan of the two great comedians to give The Big Noise a chance and watch it. You won't regret it. It is great that these long neglected films are finally being made available.

First, a summary of what this wartime Laurel and Hardy film is about, and then some background information and my impressions of the movie.Stan and Ollie are janitors at a detective agency and are working late at night when a crackpot scientist calls them--asking for a couple of detectives to guard his new top secret bomb (I wasn't sure at first if he was referring to a weapon or the movie itself). Ollie announces that he and Stan are detectives and will be right over. Unknown to them, the neighbors who live next to the crackpot are crooks and two of them plan on stealing the bomb to sell to an enemy power.Once at the home of the professor, he entertains the boys by showing off his amazing space-saving room as well as feeding them a meal of food in pill form. Neither of these key moments in the film are funny, though it's obvious they were intended as laugh riots. I think showing a documentary on skin diseases would have been funnier! Later, after the crooks try to steal the formula, Stan and Ollie take off on a cross country chase. During this time, they board a train and they blatantly rip off one of their earlier films, BERTH MARKS. While I wasn't a huge fan of BERTH MARKS (it's not one of their better shorts), Stan and Ollie manage to redo it and take out all the humor and originality. Supposedly, Stan tried to get the director to change the scene and do it quite differently (on a plane), but Fox simply wanted to churn this out regardless of whether or not it was funny or a quality product. Stan and Ollie's lack of enthusiasm is quite evident in their delivery.Ultimately, the boys blunder onto a radio controlled plane and the movie ends with a scene that really seems to come from out of nowhere, as they parachute from the plane and drop this secret bomb on a Japanese sub. So, literally and metaphorically, the film ends with the team dropping a huge bomb.From 1941 to 1950 was the absolute low-point for the team of Laurel and Hardy. Following SAPS AT SEA (1940), the team no longer was under contract with Hal Roach Studios and became free agents--mostly selling their services to 20th Century Fox, but also to MGM and a French production company. None of these products remotely resembled the finely crafted films the boys made in the 1920s and 30s, but a few (such as JITTERBUGS) managed to be almost passable entertainment. A few, such as DANCING MASTERS, ATOLL K and THE BIG NOISE managed to mostly make fans of the team cringe--as Laurel and Hardy looked old and rather sickly, plus the films simply weren't funny. Most of this was because the companies had no interest in input from Stan--who often contributed ideas to the Roach films but was completely ignored by the other studios. Of all the bad films made by Laurel and Hardy, however, THE BIG NOISE must rank as the very worst--mostly because it doesn't offer a single laugh...not even one! This isn't to say the film is unwatchable--it is watchable--sort of like a train wreck. The main reason I saw it was because I have seen almost every available Laurel and Hardy film as well as almost all of their existing shorts before they teamed up--so I would eventually like to say I've seen every one of their films. I think I have at most 3 or 4 to go.There is one other reason I wanted to see THE BIG NOISE and that's because it managed to be listed in "The 50 Worst Films of All Time" book by Harry Medved. I have probably seen about 30 to 40 of these bad films and just like my quest for Laurel and Hardy films, I'd like to one day see them all. Now, having seen it, I can honestly say it is the worst Laurel and Hardy film but it isn't bad enough to make the list in the book--there are probably a few hundred movies worse than THE BIG NOISE--though this isn't much of a consolation!! My advice is that if you are obsessive-compulsive about Laurel and Hardy films or you also want to see the supposed 50 worst films ever made, then by all means watch it. Otherwise, with so many wonderful films to their credit, please see some other Laurel and Hardy film instead--any would be preferable to this unfunny pile of bilge.By the way, I have noticed in reviews for the later Laurel and Hardy films that most of the reviews were amazingly positive--so positive I either wonder if they never saw the earlier films (which deserve high praise) or if the positive reviews were really a vote to say "I love the team no matter what". Well, I love the team, but can't see how a sane person could like this mess of a film. It just isn't funny.

Another of the infamous "Fox Laurel & Hardy" latter comedies, and in the running for one of the most enjoyable of the bunch in my book. Here, the older but no less amusing duo are hired to guard a bomb christened "The Big Noise" by its zany inventor. Some old tried and true classic funny routines are trotted out and revamped, with generally satisfactory results. Stan and Ollie seem like their old selves again in this, thankfully getting more screen time together.After enjoying this I just had to post a positive show of support and say that I think it's vastly underrated. This was echoed on the DVD's commentary track by author Randy Skretvedt, who actually apologized for trashing it once upon a time in his book entitled LAUREL AND HARDY: THE MAGIC BEHIND THE MOVIES, and now admits that during the '70s and '80s, this was a rough film to see in good quality or in its entirety, and so a lot of critics relied only on memory and reputation. THE BIG NOISE has been one of the most unjustly maligned movies in history (Michael Medved even had the gall to list it among the "Worst Films Ever Made" in his dispensable GOLDEN TURKEY AWARDS book). Luckily, the tide is presently turning for the better as moviegoers and Laurel and Hardy aficionados everywhere are finally giving the movie its due. *** out of ****