Laurel & Hardy: Year Three [Blu-ray]

Unparalleled in their ability to adapt to the changing cinematic landscape, Laurel and Hardy's upwards trajectory was only bolstered by the arrival of sound. Their first sound short, appropriately titled Unaccustomed As We Are, begins to incorporate sync sound gags and was so well received by audiences that the duo would go on to win the Academy Award for The Music Box just a few years later, an impressively rare feat for the time. Restored shorts on the Laurel & Hardy: Year Three set include: Liberty, Wrong Again, That's My Wife, Big Business, Unaccustomed as We Are, Double Whoopee, Berth Marks (Silent Version), Bacon Grabbers, Angora Love. The 1929 shorts include many of Laurel and Hardy's best known films and, thanks to painstaking restoration efforts by Blackhawk Films®, each short offers pristine picture and audio, backed by fascinating and contextual bonus features, including audio commentaries, alternate edits, and rare archival footage. What's more, the set includes both silent and sound versions of Unaccustomed As We Are and two bonus full sound shorts from 1929, They Go Boom! And The Hoose-Gow Each film features newly recorded scores from some of the best silent film composers working today, including Neil Brand, Andreas Benz, Robert Israel, and Maud Nelissen, three of the scores featuring a 5.1 audio mix. The release is curated by film historians and Laurel and Hardy specialists; Randy Skretvedt, Richard W. Bann, Serge Bromberg, and Eric Lange. A fascinating historical glimpse into a rapidly evolving cinematic landscape, Laurel & Hardy: Year Three delivers timelessly hilarious gags, as undeniably funny today as they were nearly a hundred years ago. Give the goat a donut, shake the crustaceans out of your pants, and put the horse on the piano: the final silent masterpieces from Laurel and Hardy are here to complete your collection.