Sony resurrects Lloyd’s silent era

Harold Lloyd, one of the great silent film comedians along with Charlie Chaplin and Buster Keaton, will be returning to theaters next year courtesy of Sony Pictures Releasing.

The company said Wednesday it had acquired U.S. theatrical rights to the Lloyd library from the Harold Lloyd Trust and would be staging retrospectives in major cities, using prints struck from newly restored negatives and, in many cases, featuring newly composed scores.

Best known for a shot of him holding on to a clock tower in the 1923 film “Safety Last,” Lloyd appeared in more than 200 films. He died in 1971.