The team's last film for Hal Roach – and a farewell to many of their constant support-cast collaborators, including Finlayson (33 films), Charlie Bell (47), Jack Hill (34), Harry Bernard (26) and Sam Lufkin (40). The opening scene of this one ranks among their most inventive and amusing work. In fact, I've rarely laughed more hysterically. Unfortunately, after this engagingly witty start, the comedy slowly but steadily loses its grace, exploding first into frantic slapstick – laugh-provoking to be sure, but rather elemental – then into amiable but venerable vaudeville wheezes, and finally limping to port with a rather long, weak and distasteful "jest" about eating shoe-laces dipped in paint and lamp-wicks fried in kerosene! Nevertheless, on the whole, Gordon Douglas has directed Saps with a smoothly polished professionalism and he also has an occasional eye for pictorial effects. In this one, Babe has plenty of chances to show off his famous slow burns and double takes (as well as his inane tie-twiddling, of course).
Review of Saps at Sea
