SAFETY LAST (1923) B/W "silent" 70m dirs: Sam Taylor, Fred Newmeyer

w/Harold Lloyd, Mildred Davis, Noah Young, Bill Strother, Anna Townsend, Mickey Daniels, Westcott B. Clarke

From Variety's contemporary review of the film: "This Harold Lloyd high-class low comedy has thrills as well as guffaws. It leads up to big shrieks through Lloyd apparently climbing the outside wall to the top or 12th floor of a building, probably in Los Angeles. This bit is chockerblock with trick camera work but skillfully done. The comedy business of the department store where Lloyd is a clerk nearly equals the remainder.

"Lloyd as a small-town boy leaves his sweetheart in the country, going to the city, and obtains a $15-a-week position as a counter jumper. Back home the girl receives a little cheap piece of jewelry and believes Lloyd has made the great success he said he would in the big city. Upon the advice of her mother she goes there.

"Lloyd, in an attempt to have her think he is the boss instead of a clerk, wanders into all kinds of complications. It leads up to the building climbing, a plan suggested by the clerk to the general manager as a means of obtaining publicity for the firm."

From Georges Sadoul's Dictionary of Films: "Harold Lloyd's first complete masterpiece and one that made him world-famous as the timid 'ordinary guy' in spectacles who is always inadvertently getting involved in dangerous stunts."