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Busy Bodies
Movie

Busy Bodies

1933 • Unknown

Woke Score
1
out of 10

Plot

In this short film, Laurel and Hardy wage battle with inanimate objects, their co-workers, and the laws of physics during a routine work day at a sawmill.

Overall Series Review

The short film is a pure piece of 1933 slapstick comedy. Laurel and Hardy enthusiastically start a new job at a sawmill and immediately unleash a storm of escalating chaos involving machinery, inanimate objects, and their hapless co-workers. The plot is a simple sequence of gags, including Stan gluing a paintbrush to Ollie’s face and Ollie being violently ejected from a ventilation duct. The narrative’s sole purpose is physical comedy and destruction, concluding with their car being sawed in half. The film contains no evidence of modern political or social commentary.

Categorical Breakdown

Identity Politics1/10

The narrative focuses on the universal incompetence of the main characters and the physical comedy of their mishaps. Characters are judged solely by their ability to cause or suffer slapstick chaos. The film does not incorporate race, immutable characteristics, or an intersectional hierarchy into the plot or character definitions.

Oikophobia1/10

The setting is a classic American industrial workplace, a sawmill, used as a backdrop for physical destruction. The humor comes from the main characters' personal ineptitude, not from a critique that frames Western civilization, home culture, or institutions as fundamentally corrupt or racist.

Feminism1/10

The film's cast and action are entirely focused on men in a work setting. Female characters are absent from the narrative, meaning there is no opportunity for 'Girl Boss' tropes, anti-natalism, or an analysis of gender dynamics. The film simply exists outside the scope of gender political commentary.

LGBTQ+1/10

The plot is a simple 19-minute sequence of physical comedy and work-related mishaps in a 1933 context. There is no presence of sexual ideology, centering of alternative sexualities, deconstruction of the nuclear family, or lecturing on gender theory. The relationship between Stan and Ollie is a classic comedy duo partnership.

Anti-Theism1/10

The narrative is completely secular, focused on a day of work and accidental destruction. The film offers no commentary on religion, faith, morality, or objective truth. The consequences of the characters' actions are purely physical and immediate, without a spiritual or anti-theistic subtext.