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Best of Chaplin, Vol. 6 [VHS]

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The "Best of Chaplin, Volume 6" continues the practice in the series of bringing together two-reelers from his early work at Keystone and at Essanay. When Charlie Chaplin joined Mack Sennett's Keystone Company at the end of 1913 he was a successful music hall comedian and a year later he was becoming the most popular film comedian on the planet. Obviously these early works have received the least amount of attention, with restoration efforts focusing on Chaplin's comedies for Essanay and Mutual, but there is more going on here than mere slapstick, and even though these are not definitive versions of either of these silent comedies you can still get a sense for the early Chaplin.

"Dough and Dynamite" (Released October 26, 1914) credits the screenplay to both Chaplin and Sennett. This was the 29th comedy Chaplin did at Keystone and Charlie plays Pierre, a baker and waiter at the combined bakery shop and restaurant of Monsieur La Vie (Fritz Schade). Of course, as a waiter Charlie is a klutz, especially when he starts flirting with a customer (Vivian Edwards). The main conflict here is with Jacques (Chester Conklin), another baker and waiter, and the chief attraction is watching all the things that Chaplin comes up to do with the dough: boxing gloves, bracelets, a mallet, a slingshot, a discus, a chair, and something to occupy his hands while flirting with a girl. Note that the other bakers are played by a trio of faces familiar to early comedies, namely Charley Chase, Edgar Kennedy, and Slim Summerville. This is one of Chaplin's best Keystone comedies.

"A Jitney Elopement" (Released April 1, 1915) was Chaplin's fourth Essanay film. Charlie is not playing the Tramp in this one, but he is a working class fellow in love with Edna, but ther father (Ernest Van Pelt) wants her to marry Count Chloride de Lime (Leo White). So, Charlie impersonates the Count at dinner, until the real Count shows up and we get to the car chase in the second reel. Edna's father, the Count, and some cops all trying to catch up with Charlie and Edna only to end up taking a long drive on a short pier. The first part of the film emphasizes the differences between the classes before the second half comes a standard chase with a few Chaplin twists.

Yes, there is a lot of slapstick in these two shorts, since visual action was the staple of silent film comedy. But you can also see flashes of Chaplin's comic inventiveness. The more you are familiar with Chaplin's work, not just his feature films but the two-reelers he did for Mutual, the more you will be able to see the beginnings of some of his most famous routines in these early comedies. Somebody could do their dissertation just on Chaplin's comedy involving food and food service (e.g., take what you see in "Dough and Dynamite" and extend it through "The Immigrant" and "Modern Times," just to name a few choice examples).