Speedy

Speedy (1928) is Ted Wilde's silent comedy with Harold Lloyd, and you can watch online on iFILM. A scatterbrained New York kid throws himself into saving the city's last horse-drawn trolley.

Speedy drifts through one job after another because his head is stuck on baseball. He's also crazy about Jane, whose grandfather, old Pop Dillon, runs the one surviving horse-car line that a railroad company is itching to swallow. By law the route stays alive only if the car makes at least one trip a day. So when the company's hired thugs try to stop it cold, Speedy grabs the reins himself and recruits a pack of grey-bearded Civil War veterans to hold the line.

The film is soaked in late-1920s New York — Coney Island, real crowds, a chase that tears clear across Manhattan. Babe Ruth shows up as himself, nearly wrecked by Speedy on a hair-raising cab ride to the ballpark. Wilde landed an Oscar nomination for directing a comedy. It's light, inventive fun for anyone who loves silent slapstick and stunts done for real. Stream Speedy (1928) online on iFILM.