THE KID BROTHER (1927) B/W "silent" 83m dir: Lewis Milestone

w/Harold Lloyd, Jobyna Ralston, Walter James, Leo Willis, Olin Francis, Eddie Boland, Constantine Romanoff

One of Lloyd's true masterpieces, this is the story of a country boy who falls in love with a beautiful carnival girl (Lloyd's first pairing with the delightful Ralston) and ends up saving her and the family honor from a robber. No synopsis can describe the warmth, perception, and charm of the interactions between the characters, not to mention the endless flow of hysterical sight gags.

From Variety's contemporary review of the film: "Harold Lloyd has clicked again with The Kid Brother, about as gaggy a gag picture as he has ever done. It is just a series of gags, one following the other, some funny and others funnier.

"Lloyd is somewhat different in the picture than he has been heretofore. In this case he is the youngest son in a family of three boys who live with their father, a widower.

"His opening scene shows him performing this last task [?] with the aid of a butter churn, an ingenious mechanical arrangement for the wringing out and hanging of the clothes with the aid of a kite which carries the clothes aloft as they come from the wringer.

"When dad finds out that a medicine show has made a pitch and that the boy has given them a license, he orders the youngster to go down and close up the show. There are a couple of gags here that get over for howls, especially that of causing the amateur sheriff to disappear and his final hanging up against the back of the stage securely handcuffed.

"Jobyna Ralston plays opposite Lloyd as the little medicine show girl and handles herself perfectly. Walter James as the comedian's father acquits himself with honors."