The knock on Harold Lloyd is that he is a rather mechanical artist and that he gives us long sequences of deftly executed physical gags with one dimensional characters and thinly developed plots. I think this film manages to put in more plot and more developed characters without sacrificing the brilliance of the strings of gags that are delivered like musical notes in a song.
What makes this film unique is the great performance of Constance Cummings. She plays an actress named Mary Seers. Lloyd falls in love with her while she's playing the part of a dark haired Spanish Senorita shooting a movie scene. He falls in love with her again when he meets her later as a blonde. Thus she becomes her own rival for Lloyd's affection. She manages to upset and torture the poor fellow in both roles.
One could well argue that Cummings is the real star of the film. She starred in 18 released films between 1931 and 1933, while this was the only one that Lloyd made during that period. Her character (or characters) is really fairly complex and well developed. One understands why she loves Harold and also why she gets angry at him.
In a way this is really two films, about 60 minutes contains the usual brilliant slapstick of Lloyd and the other 35 minutes explore the relationship between two young actors, Harold and Mary, trying to be successful in Hollywood. At a couple of points in the movie, Mary pleads with Harold to just be his bumbling self and not to try to change to please Hollywood honchos. One can't help but feel that she is giving advise to Lloyd himself. Fortunately, he took it and we great one of his most touching and delightful comedies.
There are two classic gag sequences. The first is the pouring rain sequence where Harold loses his shoe while trying to protect a coat he has borrowed from a movie studio and must return. As he hops around on one shoe, holding the coat, he tries to help Mary put up the hood on her convertible car. It is simply a wonderful sequence. There is also a scene in a dinner party where he mistakenly exchanges coats with a magician. One can compare it to the terrific nightclub scene in Chaplin's "City Lights," that Chaplin had done the year before.
What makes this film unique is the great performance of Constance Cummings. She plays an actress named Mary Seers. Lloyd falls in love with her while she's playing the part of a dark haired Spanish Senorita shooting a movie scene. He falls in love with her again when he meets her later as a blonde. Thus she becomes her own rival for Lloyd's affection. She manages to upset and torture the poor fellow in both roles.
One could well argue that Cummings is the real star of the film. She starred in 18 released films between 1931 and 1933, while this was the only one that Lloyd made during that period. Her character (or characters) is really fairly complex and well developed. One understands why she loves Harold and also why she gets angry at him.
In a way this is really two films, about 60 minutes contains the usual brilliant slapstick of Lloyd and the other 35 minutes explore the relationship between two young actors, Harold and Mary, trying to be successful in Hollywood. At a couple of points in the movie, Mary pleads with Harold to just be his bumbling self and not to try to change to please Hollywood honchos. One can't help but feel that she is giving advise to Lloyd himself. Fortunately, he took it and we great one of his most touching and delightful comedies.
There are two classic gag sequences. The first is the pouring rain sequence where Harold loses his shoe while trying to protect a coat he has borrowed from a movie studio and must return. As he hops around on one shoe, holding the coat, he tries to help Mary put up the hood on her convertible car. It is simply a wonderful sequence. There is also a scene in a dinner party where he mistakenly exchanges coats with a magician. One can compare it to the terrific nightclub scene in Chaplin's "City Lights," that Chaplin had done the year before.