Over the past few weeks, I have been finding myself ending the night with silent movies. Much like any film that’s older that 45 years, there is this level of escapism to a world that doesn’t exist anymore. Given that it’s Hollywood, it can be argued that it never existed. However, there was this sense in the earlier days of cinema where a lot of what came out was more for entertainment, bridging the impermanence of the stage shows defined by what audiences loved with a medium that could capture anything stepping in front of it. A camera has the power to take any moment and immortalize the action. Suddenly history could live before our eyes and share the values and ideas that spoke to the times.
What amazes me about silent movies within the studio system is how often they feel the most accessible. It’s true that you could look at F.W. Murnau, Carl Th. Dryer, or Fritz Lang and find a ton of masterpieces that question more important societal needs, but they’re also heavier and entrenched in allegories that require thought. The studio comedies, meanwhile, were more to the point. I often think about Sullivan’s Travels (1941) where Preston Sturgess suggests that art’s greatest gift is escapism from life’s daily struggles.
Maybe that is why a lot of the past few weeks have been about discovering the odd corners of Buster Keaton and Harold Lloyd’s filmographies. While this post is more dedicated to Lloyd, it would be wrong to not acknowledge how much I love Keaton and, especially in the past year, have come to think of him as arguably one of the best romantic comedy stars of his time. It may not seem that way given how often he’s known for death defying stunts, but his stories are often about a small man trying to overcome plots worthy of epics to impress a girl. I recently watched Battling Butler (1926) and the thing that impressed me most was how much of the slapstick derived from him pitching woo to Sally O’Neil. The simple act of a table slowly sinking into a muddy field brilliantly depicted the social awkwardness of the situation in a visually striking manner. Taking things further was The Navigator (1924) which may have an awkward third act, but has this phenomenal chemistry with Kathryn McGuire that allow for a more mutual romantic comedy of slapstick to play out. I’d argue that McGuire is maybe the best female co-star I’ve seen in any of his silent films.
So yes, it would be easy for me to keep going about how much I love Keaton and find his work very enjoyable. Steamboat Bill Jr. (1928) remains my favorite silent comedy period. However, I think there’s one voice that I’ve taken up filling in gaps for lately that deserves more attention. Somewhere buried in the lore of the time behind Keaton and the arthouse-minded Charles Chaplin was someone that I’d argue works as the perfect center. The only thing holding him back from being more revered was that his aspirations were more story-driven than in finding innovative ways to enter traction. Whereas I could recount the endless stunts that Keaton did, the same can’t be true for Harold Lloyd…
To back up a bit, I don’t want to suggest that Lloyd was in any way a hack. Just because he was keen on finding gags that often found him jumping into comical hiding positions or assuming roles of powers despite being a total klutz, it doesn’t mean that his films are lesser. Safety Last! (1923) and The Freshman (1925) remain essential examples of slapstick. He really commits to these stories that on the surface are not dissimilar from Keaton, but I’d argue are more complicated than most of what he did.
What Lloyd lacked in being the bawdiest physical comedian, he more than made up for as someone who created the stories that Sturgess commented on decades later. At the time of his ascension, Lloyd embodied an everyman that felt more grounded than his peers. Even if he came to prominence during The Roaring 20s, it can be argued that his built-in subtext was more appealing for the next decade. As America entered The Great Depression, there was a self-awareness of how lost the working class was. Every sacrifice suddenly had this dour circumstance attached to it. There needed to be some way to forget one’s troubles.
In the timeframe I’m discussing, I specifically watched Grandma’s Boy (1922), Bumping Into Broadway (1919), and The Kid Brother (1927). While I have seen many others, I began to enjoy the formula of something expected. Where Keaton can be celebrated for being more unpredictable or Chaplin more sentimental, Lloyd had this way of conveying something more grounded. He wasn’t setting out for grandeur. Sometimes his set pieces were nothing more than chasing cars down a dirt road or trying to escape a house with only three rooms without running into five people. There is an artistry unto itself, but watching it in close proximity is likely to reveal how much of a formula Lloyd relied on.
When I put on one of his movies, it’s often more to willingly embrace the struggles of the everyday. In the case of Bumping Into Broadway, it features a writer whose typewriter has sticky keys. At one point he runs out of oil for his creaky machine, so he borrows some from his lamp. The small innovations carry from there as Grandma’s Boy finds him becoming a farmhand who must get the girl by taking down a brawnier enemy who at one point pushes him into a well. On some level, The Kid Brother is a much more accomplished version of this idea, albeit with more elaborate gags that include the reliable routine of hopping aboard a carriage only to have the horse drive off without him.
When I watch these films, I’m not only getting a lot of gags that put a smile on my face. They embody a man who is trying to survive in a changing world. He plays the men who tends the farms and believes in a semblance of The American Dream that potentially doesn’t exist anymore. Bumping Into Broadway finds him as a struggling writer who must sneak into a building to give a producer his pitch. It’s a familiar premise, but one that requires an elevated level of cleverness to pull off.
Lloyd achieves this much in the same way that Keaton or Chaplin did. By some luck, he found a visual persona that resonated with audiences. Here was a man with glasses with a physical prowess that could help him climb buildings. Without falling too heavily into the proverbial nerd stereotypes that later generations adopted, he embodied a dweeb who wouldn’t give up. Even as the world beat him down, he got back up. The farm may have been running into problems such as a clothesline flying away like a kite, but he was sure to find a way to solve everything before he got in trouble. His boyish face made him a trustworthy figure. Keaton might’ve been able to do a lot of the same gags, but Lloyd had the benefit of expressiveness that made things as simple as panicking over a towering stage fire in The Kid Brother into something artful. In some ways, he was the one actor allowed to react, to embrace the absurdity and let the audience know that everything was going to be okay.
Most of all, I’d argue Lloyd’s most underrated tool was that he was one of the best dramatists of silent comedy. Grandma’s Boy builds lore around his glasses character by featuring an extended Civil War era flashback involving his grandfather. The way he built a generational connection to reflect the protagonist’s history of bad luck was ingenious. There was a sense of growth throughout the story that made the finale feel more accomplished. It was more than a boy getting the girl. It was about overcoming battles of personal self-worth to achieve a dream. He was the ideal American wrapped up in everyday struggles. So long as he could do right by the community, he would be seen as a hero.
Lloyd’s stories relied on simple hooks. Even as he built arcs and depth within, there was this familiarity to something more recognizable. We’ve all had situations where we disagreed with neighbors or wanted to be accepted for our passions. Watching Harold Lloyd, I am not only laughing at the joke, but rooting for him as a person to succeed. I need the producer to see his script. I need him to catch the bad guy and get the girl. He is someone who isn’t going out of his way to impress you (unless we’re talking witty title cards, which he’s the best at). All he wants is to remind you that everything will be okay. Things may be falling apart briefly but eventually order will be restored.
Odds are that before I publish this, I’ll have seen yet another Harold Lloyd movie and have even more to say. However, my biggest takeaway is that he is the hidden gem of silent comedy for a reason. With exception to Safety Last! and The Freshman, his work often blends together worse than his peers. There’s a lot more repetition and familiarity, and I think that’s fine. He’s not lazy by any means and I’d argue it speaks to knowing what it is about his style that works. Instead, he speaks to the simple desires of his audience. They want to escape their problems and laugh at dysfunctional typewriters and bosses who look down on them. They want a world that’s even more absurd than the stunts. It’s true that maybe Chaplin was more impactful at depicting similar ideas, but they often came with larger, thesis-worthy dissections. Lloyd went straight for the jugular, and that’s what I want after a long day. Sturgess was right. There’s a room for art to have greater meaning, but it could also just be escapism. Lloyd drew the line beautifully and while it makes him seem sometimes less ambitious, his stories share a timeless recognition. Maybe the technology and environments have changed, but the motivations and desires haven’t. He’d still be fighting to get out of the same jams even today. In that regard, Harold Lloyd has made the past few weeks a lot more enjoyable and I’ll end by saying thanks. See you again real soon.
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