The 'Brats' of the title are mini-Laurel and mini-Hardy, working with over-sized props to give the impression of kids into everything from a bathtub to a wooden chest of drawers.

We find their dads playing a game of draughts (with suitable cheating) while the sons cause havoc and noise. After they are banished upstairs, the kids manage to half-wreck the place and set up a predictable, but still funny, pay-off.

For the facial reactions, the clever set-ups, and Mr Hardy's singing (trying in vain to get the tots to sleep),'Brats' scores high on the comedy list. There's genuinely good stuff in this short.

Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy were of course already big kids in their movies but this time they also play kids.

Beside the roles of the two young children, Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy, of course also portray the two fathers. This guarantees some hilarious sequences between the two kids and the two fathers. Most of the time Laurel & Hardy are playing against, well, Laurel & Hardy. It makes some of the sequences work out all the more hilarious.

For the sequences with the children the sets are made to look larger. So large toys, a large bed and a large bathroom, among other things. It makes the movie good looking and above all also very original.

Of course Laurel & Hardy look nothing like children, after all they both were close to 40 years old at the time of this movie. Yet it becomes very believable because of the acting of the two with each other. They both help each other out in this movie to make their performances work out as both good and hilarious.

The movie features some really great and funny sequences, such as Oliver going done a staircase on a roller-skate and Laurel & Hardy being washed away by a large flood wave. The movie has some truly unique and hilarious comical moments in it that makes "Brats" an original as well as an hilarious comedy short. It also features plenty of enough slapstick to please the fans but it above all is a movie that should entertain just basically everybody.

Not just your typical average Laurel & Hardy comedy short!

8/10

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Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy were comedic geniuses, individually and together, and their partnership was deservedly iconic and one of the best there was. They left behind a large body of work, a vast majority of it being entertaining to classic comedy, at their best they were hilarious and their best efforts were great examples of how to do comedy without being juvenile or distasteful.

Although a vast majority of Laurel and Hardy's previous efforts ranged from above average to very good ('45 Minutes from Hollywood' being the only misfire and mainly worth seeing as a curiosity piece and for historical interest, and even that wasn't a complete mess),'Two Tars' for me was their first truly classic one with close to flawless execution. Didn't find 'Brats' as one of their best and a bit disappointing compared to their late 1928 and the best of their 1929 efforts, which were among their best and funniest early work. It is still very good and has much of what makes Laurel and Hardy's work as appealing as it is.

The story is extremely slight and the first part takes a little bit too time to get going and is a little formulaic.

When 'Brats' does get going, which it does do quite quickly, it is great fun, not always hilarious but never less than very amusing, the best being classic hilarity like the ending. It is never too silly, there is a wackiness that never loses its energy and the sly wit is here, some of the material may not be new but how it's executed actually doesn't feel too familiar and it doesn't get repetitive.

Laurel and Hardy are on top form here, both are well used, both have material worthy of them and they're equal rather than one being funnier than the other (before Laurel tended to be funnier and more interesting than Hardy, who tended to be underused). Their chemistry feels like a partnership here too, before 'Two Tars' you were yearning for more scenes with them together but in 'Brats' and on the most part from 'Two Tars' onwards we are far from robbed of that. Their comic timing is impeccable.

'Brats' looks good visually with some clever trick photography, is full of energy and the direction gets the best out of the stars, is at ease with the material and doesn't let it get too busy or static. The supporting players are solid, the kids are brats but also quite cute and not overplayed to annoyance.

Overall, very good. Not essential or classic Laurel and Hardy, but a very good representation of them. 8/10 Bethany Cox