Habeas Corpus
About Habeas Corpus
Professor Padilla (Richard Carle), a scientist who wants a body for an experiment, offers Stan and Ollie $500 to bring him one from a cemetery. His butler is a policeman, and the police arrest Padilla. At the graveyard, Ledoux (Charley Rogers) hides in a white sack in a fresh grave. Stan and Ollie carry the sack away, see legs come through it, and run. Ollie and Ledoux fall into a deep pit full of water.
Cast & crew
More about Habeas Corpus
Leo McCarey and James Parrott co-directed. McCarey and H. M. Walker wrote it. Hal Roach produced. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer released it on 1 December 1928. Filmed 16–24 July and 30–31 July 1928. It has intertitles and no spoken dialogue. It was the first Laurel and Hardy film, and the first Hal Roach film, released with a synchronized music and effects track for wired theatres. Richard C. Currier edited. The Victor discs were thought lost until a set surfaced in the 1990s and was rejoined to the picture. Running time 19 minutes.
Themes
Background
Released 1 December 1928, it is the first Laurel and Hardy short the public heard with a recorded score and effects, still without spoken lines.
Making
The sound was on Victor discs, separate from the picture, which is why the track could vanish for decades and then be put back when a set of discs turned up in the 1990s.
Reviews
Christopher Workman, writing on horror film, said the attempt to get over the graveyard wall takes up too much of the running time, and that the gags accumulate until the short reaches the length it needs.
Technique
First Hal Roach release, and first Laurel and Hardy film, issued with a recorded music and effects track.
Music
A synchronized orchestral score and sound effects, with intertitles and no dialogue. Rosario Bourdon is credited with the music. The Victor discs were missing until the 1990s.
Preservation
Picture and, since the 1990s, the Victor sound discs both survive. A copy is on the Internet Archive.
Notes
- Charles A. Bachman plays a detective. Leo Sulky is the detective on the telephone.
- The idea of two men hauling a supposed corpse through a cemetery was reworked by the Three Stooges in Three Pests in a Mess (1945).
Scenes
- Padilla offers $500 a corpse over a meal, while his butler, a policeman, listens.
- Ledoux's legs stick out of the white sack they think is a body.
- Ollie and Ledoux drop into a water-filled pit.
Influenced
- Three Pests in a Mess (1945)
Also available
- Internet Archive (habeas-corpus_1928)
