Filmverrückt

In Littleton, Kansas, accident prone Harold Hall (Harold Lloyd) is desperate to be in the movies but is lacking in acting skills. He sends in a photo but accidentally sends in the picture of a heartthrob. The movie studio offers him a screen test. He arrives and causes havoc on set. He befriends actress Margie after a bumbling attempt at fixing her convertible in the rain. He stumbles his way through his screen test. Studio head O'Brien is angered at getting fooled with the wrong photo but Harold mistakenly thinks the screen test went well. He gets involved in the life of movie star Mary Sears.

This is Harold Lloyd in one of his early talkies. He made the transition well and continued his stardom. He has his physical comedy. He makes a sympathetic leading man. I think it could have done better to spend time with Harold and Margie together. There's a bit of romance but I would like more. I love the whole slapstick in the rain and I want more with the pairing. Overall, this has plenty of good physical comedy from Harold Lloyd and his appealing manner makes him a great leading man.

MOVIE CRAZY is one of Harold Lloyd's very best films, and that includes his silents. Sound complements his visual gags and adds depth to the story's characters without slowing down the humor.

What really makes this film singular is his relationship with the femme lead. Constance Cummings, one of the great, forgotten thirties performers, provides a complexity of character unique in this kind of comedy, certainly for the time. She's not a tacked-on "love interest;" her relation to Lloyd is integral to the story and essential to the success of the film. Her character is cosmopolitan, and an interesting aspect of it is her relationship to her slim, attractive and cultured black maid (NOT your usual thirties movie maid!) who seems more of a companion than a maid. At first Cummings finds Lloyd ridiculous, then irritating, but after a while she finds his natural affinity for disaster strangely interesting and she becomes fond of him. She's amused by him, and toys with him in an affectionate way.

Laughter is a mysterious, fragile thing. Among other things, it can be injured by too big an advance expectation. And some comedy needs an audience for fullest effect: Lloyd's comedy is that type. (Keaton, on the other hand, works as well in solitude.) Seeing this film with a large audience, I was helpless with laughter at numerous points in the film. The effect may not be the same if you see it on television, alone.

This is not a perfect film (but then really great films are rarely perfect). The sequence where he accidentally dons a magician's coat is funny, but too long and a bit too mechanically calculated. His battle with the villain on a waterlogged movie set meets the requirements for an action-filled finale, but is not the film's most inventive sequence. But the best sequences are terrific.

Partly because of the long-time unavailability of his films until recent years, Harold Lloyd has received critical short shrift from the silent comedy mavens. Keaton and Chaplin are demi-gods, and Laurel & Hardy and Langdon have been fully rehabilitated (if ever they were in disrepute), but Lloyd is still in the shadow, and that's unfair. Whatever else he is, Lloyd was consistently the FUNNIEST of them all, and his gags are always fresh, inventive and original. (I say this having seen nearly all the films of all these great performers.) The Lloyd character, too, though it varied from film to film, was never just a cipher, but a real, fully developed persona.

Seen in the right circumstances, MOVIE CRAZY can hold its own with filmdom's greatest classic comedies.

MOVIE CRAZY (1932) isn't one of Harold Lloyd's greatest comedies, or even, in this reviewer's opinion, his best talkie. It's a cliché story: small-town boy comes to Hollywood for stardom and falls flat on his face. Nincompoop wreaks havoc on movie studio. It's been done countless times, from Buster Keaton in FREE AND EASY (1930) to Red Skelton in MERTON OF THE MOVIES (1947).

Harold Lloyd plays the part of the fool, who ruins everything he comes in contact with. This type of character (similar to the talkie roles MGM would write for Buster Keaton) is sometimes hard to watch. Hopelessly naïve and pathetic. Viewed as a freak and played for a sucker. Always knocking over stacked objects or falling in puddles.

The gags are old and predictable (at least nowadays) and there are no groundbreaking stunts or anything. How many times have we seen the "oops, we must've switched hats" routine? And what do you think happens when Lloyd offers to help a woman unfold the top to her convertible? Or open an umbrella? Does that trick magician's jacket look just like Harold's, hanging in the restroom? (You bet it does.) This comedy just isn't all that funny, lacking some of the magic evident in Lloyd's silent classics.

The best thing in this movie is the beautiful Constance Cummings, who gives a rather impressive naturalistic performance as a Hollywood starlet whose path is crossed by Lloyd's accident-waiting-to-happen character. Cummings grows fond of Lloyd (whom she nicknames "Trouble") and her character manages to bring a cute romantic element to the film.

The first half-hour or so is pretty dull, but there's a fun little twist where Lloyd cannot recognize Cummings in her exotic on-set make-up and falls in love with the same woman twice. Cummings realizes this and plays around with Lloyd's heart. But does she actually love him, or is it all part of some game? This interesting "love triangle" is the strongest part of the script, and Cummings manages the dual role beautifully.

MOVIE CRAZY isn't all bad, but it is something of a letdown. Most of the "comedy" is tiresome, although certain bits work better than others. Interestingly, this talkie lacks some of the wit of Harold Lloyd's silent films. The story is nothing special, but Constance Cummings shines in her role and anchors the sweetness that makes the film's second half worth watching.

Harold Hall is a man who desperately wants to be an actor.Soon he is off to Hollywood.They are expecting somebody who doesn't look anything like Harold, because he accidentally sent a wrong photo.In Hollywood Harold causes lots of trouble and falls in love to an actress named Mary Sears.Movie Crazy is a hilarious comedy from 1932.Harold Lloyd shows that he wasn't the master of silent movies only, he could handle talkies too.He runs from a funny situation to another.Constance Cummings is brilliant as Mary.She does her job just as good as Harold does.This movie made me laugh many times.If a comedy movie does that, then that's a good comedy.

Harold Hall (Harold Lloyd) is movie crazy, so much so that he sends a photo of himself (or so he thinks) to a movie executive hoping for a chance to get his foot in the door. With a photo of a different man, the executive encourages to come to Hollywood for a screen test, but Hall's anxiousness does not translate well to the people there. He ruins films in which he is simply an extra, destroys the executive's office, and yet somehow manages to win over a budding actress (Constance Cummings).

Movie Crazy is a disappointment after hearing rave reviews and seeing several wonderful Lloyd talkies. It has its moments, but it is by no means a great film. As an early talkie, it shines. There are some silent moments, but the camera is hardly static and some of the dialogue is very funny. However, as a film from master comedian Lloyd, it lacks. Too many of the jokes seem familiar and dull, some having been used in silents. Also, the timing is completely off for most of them, making them difficult to laugh at.

Watch this film expecting to have fun, but not expecting to see a favorite. It will entertain you for the night at least.