{Cinemania Student Critic} Safety Last!

By JBFC Cinemania Student Critic Shea Stevenson

Safety Last!, starring Harold Lloyd, is an old movie in black and white with no sound save the music constantly playing in the background. And if this does not sound like it’s your cup of tea, I implore you to reconsider. Having not seen any silent movies previously, Safety Last! was not a movie that I thought I would enjoy, or find funny. I was wrong.

While there were occasional jokes that involved talking, they always bounced off scenes focused on physical comedy. Furthermore, the comedy wasn’t lazy or dumb, it was intelligent and based in logic, but wasn’t afraid to dip into exaggerations of those logical conclusions. Speaking of which, a surprising amount of the jokes in this movie seem to require a large amount of athleticism on the actor’s part; some of the jokes involve climbing up buildings, getting onto moving cars, going from one moving car to another, and getting onto moving trains. It’s a style of comedy and acting rarely seen in modern movies, with most comedy movies focusing on dialogue.

I would, without a doubt, recommend this movie to any fan of comedies, or just movies in general, as it’s a perfect example of what lengths directors and actors would go to make movies before they could just use special effects. Please watch this movie, for me—no, for yourself—no, for america. Watch this movie for america.

Safety Last! screened at the JBFC on March 5, 2016.