Film Forum

(1923, Fred Newmeyer & Sam Taylor) Needing dough to marry his sweetheart, lowly salesclerk Harold Lloyd cooks up a million dollar “human fly” publicity stunt. Shot on rooftop sets looming over a real downtown L.A., the death-defying climb up the skyscraper – interrupted by Lloyd’s über-iconic encounter with a huge clock – is, nine decades on, still one of the funniest and most suspenseful sequences in movie history, but only the topper to a succession of priceless gags. 35mm. Approx. 70 min.