June 1, 2008
Video of the Day: Early 20th Century Traffic in "Speedy"
"Speedy," starring Harold Lloyd as a less-than-safe NYC driver, was released in 1928 and illustrates how New Yorkers gained their reputation as being somewhat reckless. The above clip features Babe Ruth himself requesting Lloyd the cabbie to get him to Yankee stadium in a hurry, and then soon regretting it as Speedy is more interested in chatting up his sports idol than keeping his eyes on the road.
The film was Harold Lloyd's last to be released in theaters and one of the few movies to be nominated in the soon-eliminated Best Director of a Comedy category at the Academy Awards. The scene where the horse-drawn bus carriage crashing into an elevated train pillar was caught unintentionally, but made the final cut of the film. The movie was shot entirely on location on the streets of NYC, and while some of the editing has vehicles jumping from borough to borough instantaneously, it's a great look at New York in the Roaring '20s.
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Wow. No traffic lights anywhere. No CGI either, all real stunts.
I do hope they bring back double decker public buses.
Wow - awesome find and awesome Babe Ruth cameo. Also - theres no way that the carriage drive wasn't injured in that crash. The studio was probably able to cover it up back then to avoid bad publicity.
I loved the last time the street lights went out. Traffic was a joy. Everything moved so easily.
where are the cyclists?
Is Harold Lloyd the great-grandfather of the Verizon Wireless nerd?
This might have been his last silent film, but then his less popular films with sound were released in theaters well into the 1930's.
99.5% of the credit of this post should be directed towards Gothamist weather-guy Joe Schumacher, who found the clip and suggested it as a noteworthy item.
I love when Babe Ruth says "If I ever want to commit suicide, I'll give you a call" to his cab driver. That's an evergreen joke that is still piney fresh more than six decades later.
Dave exaggerates as I only deserve 99.1% of the credit. Ha! Anyway, someone had posted the video to Metafilter, which is where I found it.
phew - look at them damned horses go.
The bus scenes were clearly shot in L.A.
If you watch the crash....the driver ducked into the carriage seconds before the crash. Something tells me it WAS planned.
Honestly, are we sure this was all filmed back then? That quality looks pretty good for 1930.