HIGH AND DIZZY (director/writer: Hal Roach; screenwriter: story by Frank Terry/H.M. Walker; cinematographer: Walter Lundin; music: Robert Israel; cast: Harold Lloyd (drunk doctor), Mildred Davis (sleepwalker), Roy Brooks (bootlegger doctor pal), Wally Howe (her father), Charles Stevenson (Cop); Runtime: 25; MPAA Rating: NR; producer: Hal Roach; Criterion Pictures; 1920-silent)
“More obnoxious than funny.“
Reviewed by Dennis Schwartz
Known as one of Harold Lloyd’s early “thrill pictures,” that anticipates Safety Last-Lloyd’s classic thrill picture that came 3 years later.Hal Roach (“Turnabout”/”Ask Father”/”Bumping into Broadway”) directs the slapstick comedy with his usual flare for cartoonish gags. It’s based on a story by Frank Terry.
The young doctor, Harold Lloyd, irks the father (Wally Howe) of his sleepwalker patient Mildred Davis, his only patient, and they leave the office before he can examine her but not before declaring his love for her. Seeking solace from his neighboring office doctor pal, Ray Brooks, the two get plastered on the home booze the pal bottled from his office still. On the street they harass a street cop (Charles Stevenson) and manage to get out of the way of a sidewalk lift, and somehow wind up in the same hotel of the would-be sleepwalking patient.The doctor and patient wind-up on the hotel ledge. When safely back in the hotel room, the lovesick doctor proposes and she accepts.
I found the two-reeler more obnoxious than funny.
REVIEWED ON 3/14/2015 GRADE: C+
Dennis Schwartz: “Ozus’ World Movie Reviews”
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