Bevan is plump and moon-faced with a droopy caterpillar moustache. Clyde is a freaky-looking dude, mama, like a minstrel with half his facepaint scraped off. Both new to me. I'm learning though, I'm learning. Be patient.
They are a pair of wastrels on the scrounge here, but essentially this is a series of barely linked little sketches, with great imagination and variety. As the film reaches the final title you can't quite see how you've ended up here from there, but hell the journey's been fun. Bevan seems to be pretty much the lead man here, though they do work well as a pair- their styles are such that they can easily carry scenes on their own as well as together, and that's probably rarer than it seems with double acts.
Trying to pin a plot on this magnificent nonsense is hard- looking for free food they hit on the idea of one of them dressing up as a policeman while pushing the other round in a baby's carriage. Well, of course. Most obvious idea in the world. When that fails they find themselves in a pantomime cow costume that's about to be fed to the lions. And eventually they find some work. And that of course conveys not the merest essence of what's actually going on on the screen. There are magical little moments wherever you look- my favourite was Clyde trying to keep up with a police patrol wagon by pulling on a cop's braces, but let's be frank, everyone's going to have their favourite here. There's so much crammed into these two reels- sure it never reaches the heights of any of the great silent clowns, but just for sheer effort and imagination you have to love what's on offer here. And a Keystone cops chase to round it off too.
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