Habeas Corpus (1928) is a fast-paced and slightly morbid two-reeler from Hal Roach Studios and comedians Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy, who were already a consistently hot box-office draw in only their second year as a team. The short was personally directed by frequent Roach gagman Leo McCarey, the future director of such big budget features as The Awful Truth (1937), Love Affair (1939), Going My Way (1944), and An Affair to Remember (1957).

The setup for the short plays it straight: Professor Padilla (Richard Carle) expects to startle the medical world with his new theory, that the human brain has a level surface ("in some instances practically flat!") He needs a body for his experiments, so when a couple of panhandlers (Stan and Ollie) come to the door (Stan: "Could you spare a piece of buttered toast?"), the professor offers the boys five hundred dollars if they can come back that night with a body from the graveyard. The professor is obviously a loon. Police Inspector Ledoux (Charley Rogers) is observing in the household by posing as the professor's butler. After calling the authorities to haul the professor to the loony bin, Ledoux follows Stan and Ollie to the graveyard.

Habeas Corpus was the first Hal Roach film that was available with synchronized music and sound effects for theaters that were wired for the Victor sound-on-disc process. The film provides ample opportunities for sound effects; the gags are plentiful and include midnight sightings of a turtle, a black cat, a bat, and a ghostly apparition (Ledoux in a sheet). One extended and very funny sequence has Ollie trying to give Stan a boost over the cemetery wall - the boys run through many variations before the wall is destroyed. Morbidity comes into play during a few sight gags. In one, Ollie has removed his shoe as Stan digs a grave. When Ollie's big toe wiggles amidst the freshly dug dirt, Stan spies it and whacks it with a shovel (thinking it is what - a worm? A piece of living corpse?) The injured toe then throbs like an inflating balloon. In another memorable bit, Stan has slung a large sack containing the "corpse" over his back as the boys trek back to the professor's house, and the protruding legs from the sack help Stan along, walking in lockstep.

Charley (aka Charlie) Rogers, seen in the extensive role of "Ledoux" in Habeas Corpus, was not just a frequent player on the Hal Roach lot - he was also a prolific gag writer. In 1929 he also began directing pictures and helmed such classic Laurel and Hardy shorts as Them Thar Hills (1934) and Tit for Tat (1935), as well as the features The Devil's Brother (aka Fra Diavolo, 1933), Babes in Toyland (1934), and The Bohemian Girl (1936).

Producer: Hal Roach
Director: James Parrott
Supervising Director: Leo McCarey
Screenplay: Leo McCarey (uncredited)
Cinematography: Len Powers
Film Editing: Richard C. Currier
Titles: H. M. Walker
Cast: Stan Laurel (Stan), Oliver Hardy (Ollie), Richard Carle (Professor Padilla), Charley Rogers (Butler/Ledoux), Charles A. Bachman (Policeman).
BW-20m.

by John M. Miller