High and Dizzy

Mildred Davis sleepwalks. Her father, Wallace Howe, brings her in to Doctor Harold Lloyd for a consultation.

It's an ambitious comedy for Harold, timing in at almost half an hour.... which is, alas, a fawning way of saying that it's not as good as it might have been trimmed a bit shorter. But there's no doubt that Harold was getting popular. Yet so long as he stayed in short subjects, the money would remain likewise short, renting for so much a reel. The twenty-six minutes this one takes might not seem much to the modern audience for a blockbuster, but it allowed everyone at Hal Roach's studio to stretch a bit and see what they could do at longer lengths.

Unfortunately, it sags in the middle. Harold gets drunk with friendly bootlegger Roy Brooks, and the gags when they are together are pretty good. However, eventually Harold is off on his own, and the jokes are not as good.... and then out of nowhere, it's time to wrap up the movie.

Harold and his writers hadn't learned how to pace a longer comedy. They soon would learn; they could write a straight drama and when it didn't work out in previews, turn it into a comedy by dropping in gags, but stories don't stop and start like that.