Er heilt die Mondsüchtigen (Short 1920)

Er heilt die Mondsüchtigen: Directed by Hal Roach. With Harold Lloyd, Roy Brooks, Mildred Davis, Wally Howe. A tipsy doctor encounters his patient sleepwalking on a building ledge, high above the street.

“Harold does his balancing act off the side of a building trick in this short, joined this time by wife-to-be Mildred Davis (or her stunt double). I didnu0026#39;t realise he performed this stunt in so many movies – this is the fourth Iu0026#39;ve seen – but it still leaves you with your heart in your mouth when you see him waving his arms wildly as heu0026#39;s perched on the very edge above a multi-storey fall. No doubt it was largely done with clever camera angles, but it still looks good, especially when Haroldu0026#39;s drunken character doesnu0026#39;t realise the danger heu0026#39;s in.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eHe plays a doctor in this one, and given his propensity for binge drinking and chain-smoking he could have stepped straight out of the pages of a red-top tabloid. Heu0026#39;s not the most ethical of doctors either, declaring his undying love for his patient (the aforementioned Davis) within moments of meeting her. For some reason he feels itu0026#39;s important to pretend he has lots of patients and adopts a number of disguises to do so, even though his real patient is already sitting in the waiting room.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eAfter a while the action shifts to his friendu0026#39;s office down the hall. Heu0026#39;s a home-brewing enthusiast, and when the corks start popping off the bottles heu0026#39;s got stashed in a filing cabinet, he and Harold decide its best to drink them all rather than let them go to waste. Lloyd makes a pretty funny drunk: not as funny as Chaplin maybe, but then heu0026#39;s not as spiteful either, even though he does do some distinctly un-Lloyd-like things while under the influence. In fact at times heu0026#39;s quite removed from the boyish, straw-hat sporting Lloyd we usually see. Thereu0026#39;s no real plot to speak of, but, given the strength of the material, Lloyd probably didnu0026#39;t feel he needed one…”