I think this is one of their very best shorts. I'm not sure why it took them until 1932 to come up with this premise. Think about it -- once you come up with the premise, the short practically writes itself!
You can almost think of THEM THAR HILLS as a sequel to this -- Billy Gilbert is the doctor in both, and Ollie again has a cast on his foot. He
does have the gout in that one, though, since it is stated. I doubt, however, that Billy Gilbert would have still been his doctor 2 years later. It would be fun to show the 2 shorts in sequence to the uninitiated just to confuse them, though!
As others have pointed out, you really can't pan the entire short due to the last 2 minutes. Remove the ending, and you have a fantastic short that's still as long as most Stooges shorts. There's a difference between 2 minutes and the 12 in BE BIG that many complain about.
L&H's best shorts can usually be summed up in one short sentence like this one -- "Stan visit Ollie in the hospital." When it takes more than that, you usually wind up with a clunker, like THICKER THAN WATER -- though that one isn't too bad and there are a few much worse, but try describing it in one short sentence!
"L&H try to put up an antenna on the roof."
"L&H try to carry a piano up a long flight of steps."
"L&H try to repair an old boat."
"L&H work in a sawmill."
"L&H are chimney sweeps."
"Stan helps Ollie clean up his house."
Other than the last 2 minutes, there are no flaws to this short. And the last 2 minutes can be enjoyed depending on how you interpret it. Ollie's reactions are hilarious nonetheless, especially since no one, including the audience, could expect Stan to cause Ollie more distress than he has already been subjected to! Contrast this scene to the finale in THE FLYING DEUCES, which is more or less the same -- the boys are in a vehicle on a soundstage, and make scared reactions to poorly-done special effects that wouldn't fool a 5-year-old. In DEUCES, however, the scene lasts much longer, and what comes before it is no great shakes, either!
In that Lord Heath review link above, he states that the sequence is 2 minutes, then later makes it sound like it is the whole 2nd reel. Everson did the same thing in his book, never stating that it was only a 2 minute sequence.
Like I wrote recently in another thread, inaccurate statements and sometimes opinions (an opinion is inaccurate when it leads you to believe 2 minutes equals 10) caused me to miss out on some wonderful L&H shorts like this one was I was a kid buying them from Blackhawk films. My whole family had read the description of COUNTY HOSPITAL in the Blackhawk catalog, and it was to be our next purchase when the time came (like a birthday or Christmas), but then we got the Everson book, and decided not to get it.
What a mistake!!!!!! He says has great the first half is, then says, "But once outside the hospital..."
That's only 2 minutes out of 20 Bill, not half! Did your watch break? Did you fail basic math! Then he implied that BELOW ZERO might be considered one of their funniest, and I sure got dirty looks from my family when we viewed that one after I convinced them to buy it!
I'd like to know what "medicine" Ollie's British roommate was on -- I'd like some, too! (Like the woman in Katz's Deli in WHEN HARRY MET SALLY!) What is it about them using an actor with a British accent to laugh so much -- like the annoying Lord Leopold Plumtree in ANOTHER FINE MESS?
BTW, Ollie obviously got his pants back from his roommate, but we never find out what his roommate did for pants!
Interesting also that Ollie would have been in the hospital for "at least a couple of months" after he obviously had already been there awhile, since we find out that Stan had previously visited him, and was never paid back by Ollie for the candy he brought him! A couple of months for a broken leg? Now they kick women out of hospitals the next day after giving birth! What health insurance did Ollie have? Did they even have health insurance in 1932???
Also, ever notice that when Stan lifts the weight holding up Ollie's leg, that there's a chair by the window, but in the next shot, when Bill Gilbert falls out the window, the chair has been moved aside? Stan couldn't have moved it, since he is still holding the weight.
Another tidbit: when the eggs falls off the table, and we here a clank, everyone I've showed this too thinks it fell in the bedpan. But it didn't -- it fell in a pitcher. So everyone thinks they wouldn't show a bedpan on-screen. Then a few minutes later, Ollie hits Stan over the head with an actual bedpan! That's well-crafted comedy at its finest!
Since the Stooges occasionally borrowed from other comedians, including L&H, I'm surprised that they never did a remake of this one. Just picture Moe being the one in the hospital, with Curl and Larry visiting him! But no -- they remade THE LAUREL-HARDY MURDER CASE instead!
After THE MUSIC BOX, this is perhaps their most iconic talkie, the one that most people seem to remember vividly. Take a look if you haven't seen it, and you will see why!
