Jane and the Lost City (1987)

An adaptation of a wartime comic strip about Jane who... loses her clothes a lot. Happily that tradition continues in this film which is completely puerile and silly but that is exactly how it should be to be honest. 

With the war ongoing, both the British and Germans are in need of money, Luckily there is a fortune in diamonds to be found in a lost city of Africa. Evil Nazi agent Lola Pagola (Maud Adams) and her bumbling assassin Heinrich (Jasper Carrott) are sent to Africa, the British send The Colonel (Robin Bailey), his servant Tombs (Graham Stark) and Jane (Kirsten Hughes)...

The British leg of the expedition gets off to a bad start when their plane crashes due to Nazi scheming, but they are rescued by the hunky American Jungle Jack (Sam Jones). He claims expert knowledge of the African bush though this often seems a bit suspect. When they finally find the Lost City it is ruled by the Leopard Queen (Elsa O'Toole) who is more a bit of a Sloane Queen and longs to get back to Blighty, ok ya?! 

The film is complete farce, overall not the funniest of films but as an adaptation of a comic strip it works really well and it has it's moments. The cast let the film down a bit with some indifferent performances, if the film had been made by the Carry On team - for example - it would have been hilarious. As it is, its perfectly passable.

Twice Two (1933)

The gimmick in this Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy comedy short is that Stan and Ollie are married to each other's sisters - who just happen to look exactly like their brothers except for the voices. As their joint first wedding anniversary (yes of course they got married on the same day!) is today they hold a dinner party. This quickly descends into chaos and a destroyed cake (or two). The two wives don't really like each other...

A simple thing with good slapstick and classic Laurel and Hardy interactions. Although not the best of their comedy shorts, this is a good bit of fun. The only annoying bit is Mrs Hardy's voice which is terribly high pitched. The actress who provided the voice, Carol Tevis, also provided the voice for the Munchkins in The Wizard of Oz!

Dr. Who and the Daleks (1965)

The first big screen outing for Dr Who, though in this carnation he seems to be merely an eccentric human inventor rather than a Timelord. Dr Who (Peter Cushing) has developed a time and space machine called the TARDIS. He is showing this to his grand-daughter's new boyfriend Ian (Roy Castle) when they - along with Barbara (Jennie Linden) and Susan (Roberta Tovey) are accidentally sent to another time and space... to a desolate planet.

Amid the desolation they discover a city... inhabited by cruel machines called Daleks. The Daleks hold a vital part of the TARDIS which means Dr Who and company can't escape. They encounter the Thals led by Alydon (Barry Ingham) and team up to defeat the Daleks and save what is left of the Thals' world...

An enjoyable science-fiction romp, unfortunately a little comedy was added to lighten the tone (not that it really needed it and this usually falls quite flat). As a straight forward Dr Who adventure it works pretty well, lacking much of the wit of the canon Dr Who but retaining some of the awe and fun and the slightly larger budget helps of course. 

Breaker! Breaker! (1977)

Chuck Norris fighting a bunch of in-bred hicks. Young trucker Billy (Michael Augenstein) ends up in a one horse town hilariously called Texas City, California. He is fitted up with various crimes by the drunk judge Trimmings (George Murdock) and beaten up by his pet corrupt cops Strode (Don Gentry) and Boles (Ron Cedillos). Billy's big brother J.D. (Norris) comes looking for him. He immediately gets into trouble with moonshine runners, who apparently have the blessing of the Trimmings regime.

Indeed the whole town is in on the scheme, except for Arlene (Terry O'Connor), but J.D. has little trouble in beating up the cops and the town's menfolk with his martial arts skills. However, the tricky rednecks finally capture J.D. but Arlene manages to call on other truckers using CB radio and they end up wrecking the town!

A silly film which is unintentionally hilarious, the lazy sterotypes are laid on a mile thick. Chuck Norris despatches various dudes with bad facial hair over a banjo soundtrack. It is equally terrible and brilliant.

Saps at Sea (1940)

Some consider this the last good Stan Laurel and Olivier Hardy film (the last for Hal Roach) though if truth be told their powers were already on the decline. 

Ollie suffers a nervous breakdown while working at a horn factory, the sound of horns driving him into a frenzy. He is told to seek sea air but he resists, but after Stan semi-demolishes their apartment, Ollie decides that maybe he does need to get on a boat after all...

Meanwhile, tough escaped con Nick (Richard Cramer) is looking for a place to hide. He chooses Stan and Ollie's boat... which gets cut loose from the dock thanks to a hungry goat and heads out to sea. Faced with the menacing Nick, Stan and Ollie concoct a plan to knock him out by making him eat a meal of string, fly paper and sponge...

Although not the best Laurel and Hardy film it is still very good, with the usual facial expressions and slapstick destructions. There isn't quite the energy and freshness of their earlier work due to age and worsening health and some of the comedy situations are stretched a little too far. Enough of the magic remains to make this very worthwhile though. This was also the last film by well-known silent movie star Ben Turpin.