On the Wrong Trek

ON THE WRONG TREK

Aspect ratio: 1.37:1

Sound format: Mono

(Black and white - Short film)

Forced to take part in a Californian driving holiday with his eager-to-please wife (Rosina Lawrence) and domineering mother-in-law (Bonita Weber), Our Hero (Charley Chase) encounters a series of crises which ruin his vacation.

Featuring a brief cameo from Laurel and Hardy (repaying a debt to star Chase, who had appeared in some of their earlier pictures), ON THE WRONG TREK follows its protagonists through Depression-era California, where itinerant workmen are dismissed as 'bums' by law enforcement officers and refused permission to cross state boundaries, and where desperate criminals stage fake traffic accidents to ensnare unwitting victims. Unfortunately, Weber isn't nearly as domineering as she needs to be, which renders Chase's reluctant obedience all the more difficult to comprehend, and most of the comic situations (including an unlikely song and dance number between Chase and Lawrence at a gathering of hobo's!) are only fitfully amusing. Chase co-directed the film with Harold Law.