The Kid Brother (1927)

The last important film in the career of Harold Lloyd, The Kid Brother was a success with both critics and audiences. It grossed over two million dollars, which is the equivalent of $100 million in today's money. That is because in 1927, it only cost a dime to go to the movies, where you would see several shorts in addition to the main feature.

Many Lloyd fans consider The Kid Brother to be his best film, but I have to disagree. Safety Last is certainly better, as it has more inventive gags and a more coherent plot. Unluckily, I have yet to see The Freshman, a 1925 classic that is also often mentioned as his best work.

The analysis of the film that follows includes some spoilers. It also may make the film seem worse than it really is. Whatever its flaws, The Kid Brother is both a good movie and a clever comedy. It would even bring a smile to "The Great Stoneface" Buster Keaton, who more than Chaplin was Lloyd's comedic rival during the twenties.

One problem with The Kid Brother is its predictability. We quickly learn that Lloyd is the family milquetoast, overshadowed by his brawny and bullying brothers. A medicine show comes to town, which features a pretty girl. At the same time, a large sum of money is given in trust to Lloyd's sheriff father.

Anyone who has seen films before knows that Lloyd will win the pretty girl and show up his burly older brothers. We even know that he will do this by recovering the large sum of money. Only two pieces of the puzzle remain. How the money will be lost, and how Lloyd will get it back. These plot devices are as inevitable as his obtaining the love of his lovely (but purely decorative) girlfriend.

Speaking of the girlfriend, played once again by Lloyd comedy fixture Jobyna Ralston, we are to believe that she is as pure as the freshly fallen snow. This despite the fact that she has long toured as part of a medicine show, where she dances suggestively to ripen the audience to be swindled with fraudulent medicine. She also displays an astonishing loyalty to Lloyd, whom she has just met.

The film is loaded with villains that bully poor Lloyd. The baddest of them all is the medicine show's strongman, who has numerous showdowns with our bespectacled hero. The problem is one of casting, as the intimidating strongman should not be played by a skinny, balding man (Constantin Romanoff) who appears to be fifty years old.

Of course, it is a good film, and many scenes work. The monkey with the oversized shoes, the oafish and ugly brothers that try to steal Lloyd's girl, and Lloyd's misfortunes when he tries to stop the sideshow. But it is the sentimental and feel-good nature of the film that Lloyd fans have latched onto, and that has led them to overlook the film's significant problems. (66/100)