An Eastern Westerner (1920)

An Eastern Westerner is a breezy, no nonsense Harold Lloyd comedy, that makes up for a lack of big belly laughs with the charm, upbeat persona, and energy of its star

Lloyd plays a spoiled young New Yorker, living the high life at his increasingly frustrated parent's expense. After one party too many, they decide to send the boy to a relative’s ranch out west in the town of Piute Pass ("It's considered bad form to shoot the same man twice on the same day."), where he falls foul of every cowboy cliché and trope you can think of.

The plot is flimsy, and the gags take precedence, as often the case with short silent films of this era. Although he did not have the vaudeville background of Keaton or Chaplin, Lloyd was still incredibly agile and athletic, as showcased here with some hair-raising stunts and great chase sequences (even if one does involve a disconcertingly Klan-like hooded gang).

Obviously, it looks a little crude and underdeveloped compared to his later, more assured works such as Safety Last, An Eastern Westerner is still well worth a look, both for the laughs and to compare it to the later films and see how people like Lloyd helped shape the medium.