The Harold Lloyd Collection, Vol. 1 (Slapstick Symposium)
This collection of vintage Harold Lloyd comedies is worth the price just forGrandma's Boy, a splendid hourlong feature from 1922. Lloyd plays a small-town fellow who lives with his frisky grandmother; convinced of his own cowardice, he yearns to compete for the hand of a pretty girl. His courtly call to the girl's home is the occasion for battle with a ridiculous "formal" suit, mothballs, and a litter of kittens attracted by the goose grease on his shoes. There's also a long (and quite funny) flashback to Lloyd's ancestor, tangled in a Civil War fracas. Lloyd, whose aquiline features were rounded off by horn-rimmed glasses, was more handsome and less clownish than many of his slapstick brethren, which made his acrobatic outbursts all the more surprising. That talent is well-displayed in the seven short (mostly between 20-25 minutes) films on this DVD, includingNumber, Please, which climaxes with a brilliant sequence involving a stolen purse, andHis Royal Slyness, which also offers a look at Lloyd's brother Gaylord.--Robert Horton