Ask Father

Ask Father (1919)

*** 1/2 (out of 4)

Before he can marry the woman he loves Harold Lloyd must first ask for her father's permission. The only problem is that her father is the busiest man alive so getting near him will take some time. Here's a very funny one reel that has plenty of laughs throughout. The stuff with the two bouncers, one a midget, is hysterical as is the moving floor in the father's office. The scene where Lloyd climbs up the side of a building is also great.

You can get this film in New Line's Harold Lloyd Collection.

For those not too familiar with life almost a hundred years ago, the phrase "Ask father," meant you better get the old man's approval if you want to marry his daughter. That was a MUST, and sets up the premise for this Harold Lloyd short. He, along with several other guys, are all after the same woman but must get to the father. Unfortunately, he's a tough business leader who runs an office like a dictatorship and one runs the risk of being thrown out on his rear trying to get in and see him.

That's the gag of the movie, which doesn't really have much spark until the last six minutes when Harold gets inventive in ways to see the boss, such as wearing a suit or armor.

Without giving anything away, I will say this movie might be the ultimate in showing how lightly marriage has always been treated in the films. This is a comedy, however, so nothing to take serious anyway. I did laugh, too, at the end, when we see how much true love meant to Harold (hint: not a whole lot, as it turns out.)

Film historians who have studied Harold Lloyd movies cite the year 1919 as being pivotal to the comedian. He began to balance delicately on a fine line between sentiment and sentimentality. There is no finer example of this transition than in his February 1919's "Ask Father."

The ritual of asking a girlfriend's dad for his daughter's hand has always been a high tension, nerve racking ritual for the prospective son-in-law. Lloyd puts the formality to the test when his girlfriend says she won't marry him without her father's permission. The hitch is her dad is almost impossible to see during his working hours, the only time he can be seen.

Witnessing several people being physically kicked out of the father's office, Lloyd knows this won't be easy. Fortunately, he has two things going for him. Next door to the office is a costume shop. And secondly, the office's secretary, Bebe Daniels, has a pillow she sets up strategically to cushion his fall whenever he gets thrown out. "Ask Father" is also one of Lloyd's first movies he's shown scaling a building's wall, something he exaggerates in his most famous film, "Safety Last!"

A Hal Roach HAROLD LLOYD Comedy Short Subject.

Infatuated with the daughter of a bullying millionaire, Harold must first ASK FATHER for permission to marry the girl.

The main attraction in this very short & funny little film is watching Harold attempt to sneak into the fierce old man's office. Movie mavens will notice that this film was made shortly before the studio accident which blew off half of Harold's right hand.

Bebe Daniels plays a sympathetic switchboard operator; Snub Pollard appears as an eccentric private secretary.

Robert Israel has composed an excellent film score which perfectly complements Harold's antics on the screen.

This one-reel Harold Lloyd comedy packs a lot of good gag ideas into its short running time. There is a good variety of slapstick, sight gags, running jokes, and gadgetry, and even a brief version of the 'human fly' routine that Lloyd later made so memorable in "Safety Last". Lloyd, Bebe Daniels, and the rest of the cast all do a good job with the material.

Lloyd plays a young suitor for the hand of a rich and very preoccupied businessman, the kind of person who has a legion of assistants whose purpose is to keep everyone else away from him. Lloyd's ever-hopeful character, determined to see him to ask for his daughter's hand, is helped in his efforts by Daniels, who plays an upbeat office worker amidst all of the drudges. It's impressive how much material they squeezed out of this fairly simple setup. After a somewhat slow start, there are non-stop funny moments the rest of the way.

There are a lot of imaginative gags, and a number of them are also tied together in clever ways. The cushion gag by Daniels's character, the treadmill gadget, and the confrontations with the two tough guys who guard the entrance are all repeated in a variety of different and creative ways. It's enjoyable both for the comedy and for the ingenuity that it reveals.