Why Worry?

1923 silent comedy

Rating: 15/20

Plot: A guy probably named Harold travels to the tropics with his nurse and valet for convalescent purposes but ends up accidentally becoming part of a violent revolution. Viva la Harold Lloyd!

His character isn't really as likable here, but this swiftly-moving excursion is still fun. The protagonist (probably named Harold) is the type we laugh at because he's oblivious to what's going on around him, nearly for the entire movie. I liked the sight gags as he's exploring the town, mistaking men knocked unconscious for men taking their siestas. It's not until near the end that Harold (I'm guessing) undergoes a bit of an unbelievable undergoing and turns into Rambo. I easily could have done without the romantic subplot which seems like it was tacked on in a script rewrite or something. The best part of this movie isn't even Lloyd actually unless you've ever wanted to see what a Harold Lloyd movie would be like if Harold Lloyd was a little person. His costar, a giant named John Aasen, steals the show. IMDB lists his height as a bit over seven feet, but he dwarfs Lloyd and seems a lot taller than that. Guinness apparently had him at nearly nine feet. Somebody's tape measure was broken apparently. The absurd situations, including an attempt to pull out one of Colosso's hurt teeth, between the odd-looking duo are a lot of fun. "Colosso" was the first acting job in Aasen's versatile career. He also played a Giant Swordsman, Giant, The Giant, Circus Giant, Giant Man, Very Tall Golfer, Giant, Circus Giant, Giant, and Shorty. That's some diversity! Wait a second. Very Tall Golfer?

So, Cory...what did you think of this one? Worth seeing, but I reckon you don't like his character all that much. Amazingly, Maltin's got this rated higher than Safety Last! and Speedy.

Safety Last! (Again)

see original review here

1923 movie that is better than 2008's College Road Trip

Rating: 17/20

Plot: Students at an inner city school go on a field trip to the high school they'll be attending next year. When they get back to their school, they're treated to a movie. One group of students with an especially mean teacher doesn't like the movie that they're being shown (certified classic College Road Trip)and force-feeds them a silent comedy instead. The students whine and whine, and the teacher, probably because he's the devil, just sits back and laughs.

I even gave them a slip of paper to write some comments and rate the movie. When asked to describe the movie in one word, I got these answers:

boring
lame
boreing
old
funny
useless
silent
interesting
awful
old fashioned
wierd
retarted
quiet
relaxing
bum!
wordless
different
depressing

Their ratings: 15, 7, 14, 10, 8, 10, -20, 2, 15, 10, 1.5, 2, 8, 10, 17, 10, 1, 1, 3, 13, 2, 0, 9.5, 10, 3, -20, 1

But just like the last time I forced silent comedy on the youth of America, they watched for the duration (I read lots of noise from my two neighbors watching College Road Trip) and laughed at the appropriate times. They really got into the climactic building-climbing scene, oohing and aahing. Sure, Harold Lloyd got called "gay" a few times, and I know the music drove them absolutely nuts. Nevertheless, I think a lot of them liked the movie a lot more than their scores might indicate.

Other gripes (from their sheets):

"I didn't like having to read."
"The end was really good."
"It's not a movie. It's a big waste of time."
"It has no sound to make up for the silence."
"Black & white movies are boring and old."
"I don't like that the guy lied to the girl."
"It was funny. He was always doing something or getting into trouble, but he got by with it."
"I liked that he was trying to impress the girl but was an epic fail at life."
"I liked the music."
"It's too hard to understand."
"It was a horibile movie."
"People were moving too fast in some parts."
"It was mildly entertaining. Not bad--better than I expected." Same person: "I didn't like that the guy was lying through the whole thing."
"It had some funny stuff that made me laugh."
"No talking is boring!!!!!!!!!"

One more thing: Looking back at my old write-ups for Harold Lloyd movies, I always get annoyed with myself when I see how mean I was to the poor guy. I never called him "gay" or anything, but I was completely wrong in refusing to put him in the same class with Keaton and Chaplin. Dude's a comedy stud even though he moves too fast in some parts or stars in movies that are too hard to understand.

And here's a shot from the Harold Lloyd appearance on The Simpsons. Unless he's just yellow on my computer.

Girl Shy

1924 silent romantic comedy (with horses)

Rating: 16/20

Plot: Because of a speech impediment and a less-than-impressive status as a poor tailor's assistant, some character probably named Harold has trouble meeting women. He's girl shy. But that doesn't stop him from writing a piece of nonfiction with the ambiguous title How to Make Love to Women and attempting to find a publisher for the tome. He eventually does meet a girl on a train and engages in the lengthiest and most awkward sex scene in silent cinema history. A horse is involved.

Question: If a stutterer stutters in a silent movie, and there's no sound enabling you to hear it, does it make a sound? Another solid Harold Lloyd movie with his typically likable protagonist, some very sweet romantic moments, and an explosion of craziness at the end where the actor does something wildy funny (i.e. climbing up the side of a building [Safety Last] or clang-clang-clanging on a trolley through New York streets [Speedy]). In Girl Shy, he's racing against the clock, stealing cars and endangering the lives of everybody around him. I bought the sweetness of his character a little more than in some of his other movies, but I also enjoyed how he had no issues with misbehaving like a four-eyed gangster rapper. And I'm really impressed with the amount of vehicles they managed to throw into that wild chase scene at the end. I think it was a zeppelin away from breaking some sort of vehicular record. This also may have gotten a bonus point for a Harold Lloyd spanking scene. Hot! No way any warm-blooded male could watch that without becoming aroused. Which reminds me--a baseball coach at my school was telling me today that one of his players couldn't make it to practice because he injured himself by "diving onto his bed with a hard-on," hurting the member. It's doubtful, but I wondered if he was watching Girl Shy when that happened.

Another really gay movie poster, by the way. It might not deliver the gay that Feet First delivers, but it's still really gay.

Feet First

1930 talkie comedy

Rating: 15/20 (Abbey: She didn't watch enough of this to give it a rating, but she sat down and watched a little bit, declared this "the worst movie ever," and left.)

Plot: Harold (I'm guessing that's his name since that seems to be the name of every other Harold Lloyd character) is a shoe salesman with much, much loftier ambitions. He meets and falls for a girl, the daughter of a wealthy businessman, and through no fault of his own, convinces her that he is a big wig in the leather industry. Through some fault of his own, he winds up on a cruise with them and has to fight to not blow his cover.

Abbey's wrong about this being the "worst movie ever," but this probably has my vote for the "gayest movie poster ever." Look at that thing! The thing Harold Lloyders (that's the term I've come up with for his fans) will notice is that Lloyd pretty much plagiarizes his own Safety Last! with an up-the-side-of-a-tall-building stunt that takes up the last twenty or so minutes of the film. But it's different because he gets to talk in this one, so we get to hear both his fear and racial insensitivity. A dimwitted black janitor (played by Willie Best in one of the most racially-insensitive movies of all time [The Littlest Rebel, with Shirley Temple in blackface]) shows up for comic purposes, and Lloyd gives him the nickname Charcoal. Since, according to the Wikipedia page for this movie, Lloyd had parts of this redubbed to change his name from Harold to Charlie for reasons never explained, it seems like he could have redubbed it so that he said "Hey, black janitor!" instead of "Hey, Charcoal!" But it's a minor quibble, and my man Buster had more embarrassing moments in his career. Anywho, Lloyd's building hijinks, here the result of accident rather than in Safety Last! when he climbs the building intentionally, are just as entertaining, straddling a line most film makers wouldn't have even known existed between dangerous and hilarious. So I can forgive the whole "My first talkie stunk, so I'd better recycle an idea that worked well in an earlier film" thing. There's not much to see with the plot here. There are a lot of funny moments and sight gags, but you have to trudge through a lot to get there. The movie really picks up when Lloyd gets on the boat. Like Safety Last!, this is not a movie I would not recommend to my acrophobic (or homophobic, I guess, because of that poster) readers.

shane-movies trivia: This is the second movie in a row with a Samuel Taylor Coleridge reference. That beats my previous record of one.