BEST Films OF 1923
by Mike Lorefice

The Hunchback of Notre Dame
Wallace Worsley

***

Our Hospitality
Buster Keaton & John G. Blystone

A huge step forward for Keaton and a worthy precursor to The General. Buster begins to develop his storytelling skills here with this full length look at 1830's America that's a manners comedy loaded with sight gags, all of which revolve around and add to the narrative. This Hatfield-McCoy feud parody starts slowly with New York City boy Keaton returning home to reclaim the family home in the Blue Ridge Mountains. This thrusts him into the midst of a never ending vendetta he'd been sheltered from between his family, represented only by him, and the family of his new love interest (Norma Talmadge) represented by her father and two brothers. The basic premise is that Southern hospitality is so strong the "Canfields" can't do anything to Keaton when he's under their roof, but the second he steps out he's fair game. Once every tableside sight gag has been exhausted Keaton heads south on a steam train, and the wild adventure ends up in a perilous rapid river. Keaton's shorts are better and more exciting when it comes to displaying his inventive stunts, but here we have a well-rounded comedy with superb timing and attention to detail. [7/5/06] ***1/2

The Pilgrim
Charles Chaplin

Chaplin's last film for First National has him as an escaped prisoner, metaphor intended. Chaplin dons a pastor's outfit to help get away, only to be roped in by locals who need a man of the cloth. Chaplin doesn't play The Tramp in his final short, getting most of the mileage out of mistaken identity gags. There's no one sequence to recommend this for, which doesn't enter it into the pantheon (you know that .001% of American silent films that are slightly recognizable) with The Gold Rush, Modern Times, Safety Last, and The General. However, it lacks Chaplin's usual downfalls; it's not a sappy love story, Chaplin clashes with the bratty kid rather than letting his own juvenile side take over, and though Chaplin acts honorably it's not a sentimental film. The sequence in the family's home where Chaplin tries to help them but everything goes wrong with a rolling pin falling on his head leading to him icing the missing hard hat rather than the cake could easily be out of a Keaton film. In addition, Pilgrim is a nice display of Chaplin's athleticism, particularly his nimble footwork. [12/18/06] ***

Safety Last
Fred C. Newmeyer & Sam Taylor

Harold Lloyd rightfully takes a back seat to Buster Keaton when it comes to film stunts, but he did top Keaton at least once. His hanging from a twelve-story high department store clock (horn-rimmed glasses, straw hat, and all) is arguably the most memorable stunt of the silent era, largely because it's framed so the entire distance of the potential fall is almost always in view (behind him). What makes Lloyd's stunts so interesting is not the feat itself, but the fact that his regular guy character is such a clutzy amateur. One reason today's generic heroes are so completely dull is they are all supposedly larger than life, unreal in every way, but with the silent stuntmen there was a great deal of tension leading up to the stunt because there was some humanity to them. Beyond the fact that it was obvious to the viewer most, if not all, of their stunts weren't completely artificial (and were even done by them), this was largely because they weren't smooth and had probably already bungled several things earlier in the film. In this case, among other goofs, there's a hilarious scene where Lloyd walks on all fours hiding behind a box that's being pulled, which works until he continues going straight despite the box puller making a turn. Lloyd hanging from the clock is big spot, but the threat exists for several minutes because the entire ending is built around the improbability of him scaling the building, which includes a wild new obstacle on each floor not just the specific stunt everyone remembers. A must for fans of sight gags. [10/20/05] ***1/2

Why Worry?
Fred C. Newmeyer & Sam Taylor

Lloyd made a career playing ordinary characters the audience could identify with, but here he imbues almost all the same traits in a rich American abroad as if there were no difference between the two. I suppose one could argue he's making fun of the wealthy rather than portraying the less fortunate, but it could be telling that his producer Hal Roach was also behind the works of Will Rogers. If he is making fun of the enemy, Chaplin and Arbuckle were certainly more successful at it because they would find plots that put them at odds with money, which is important considering the audience winds up siding with the hero no matter what side he's on. The Mexicans felt he was making their ongoing revolution look foolish, much more asinine than his own character which he parodied as well as always. The foreigners are as cliched as could be, dirty, lazy, poor, and dumb. Lloyd plays a millionaire playboy brat who is a massive hypochondriac, so loaded on legal drugs he doesn't know what's going on and can't even walk properly. He travels to a tropical climate (obviously Latin America despite his late protest driven revisions) hoping the calmness will cure his latest imaginary illness, and finds himself amidst a revolution that he believes is the local pastime, some kind of tourist attraction. With the help of his nurse Jobyna Ralston and eight-feet-nine-inches-tall Johan Aasen, they mop up the country of the lone American villain (imperialism of one!) and his useless local minions almost in time to change for dinner. This would be some kind of bad propaganda film if it weren't so damn funny. It has the zany absurd anarchic flavor of the Marx Brothers at their best, with the sight gags that are about as good as anything ever done. The best stuff involves Lloyd befriending the giant, winning him over by helping wrench the sore tooth from his mouth with the aid of a rope. Lloyd never played characters that were stupid; he preferred oblivious pragmatists. When his heart was set on something there was no stopping him. He'd try new things until he succeeded even if it meant jumping off a roof to get enough weight behind him to pry free the tooth, but still the most obvious things could fly right over his head. The giant eventually carries a cannon on his back, bending over when it's time to fire, and they defend their fort by fooling the enemy into believing their forces are much larger than they are with the multiple gun trick. Still, my favorite stuff is the stabs at the medical field. Lloyd carries a trusty book that tells him how every situation will make him sick, highlighted by the "dangerous condition" of getting your feet wet, which will give him pneumonia if not remedied with speed. [11/25/05] ***