Chaplin combines many stock elements in his first film for First National Pictures: He plays a tramp, gets chased by several policemen, plays an everyman trying to improve his lot in life, choreographs incredible scenes requiring precise comic timing, includes several riotous sight gags, saves a girl, and lives happily ever after apparently. The film opens with policemen trying to nab Chaplin from stealing food from a sidewalk vendor. The precise comic timing involved is extraordinary, but Chaplin and his company pull it off perfectly. For a scene so rehearsed to appear so spontaneous is incredible. Even when Chaplin saves a dog from a wild pack of dogs, it seems like a chaotic ballet on film. The lunch wagon scene is also well-choreographed. The wagon vendor is none other than Sydney Chaplin, Chaplin's brother. The scene builds slowly and becomes increasingly hilarious as Chaplin continues to eat items from a tray at the counter while his brother's head is turned. Chaplin hides his dog in his pants when he enters a dance hall, which is where he meets Edna Purviance, a singer of songs of sort. Henry Bergman has a very funny bit playing an overwrought patron affected by one of the songs. Chaplin finds money taken by thieves and finds an ingenious way to rob the other by becoming a puppeteer of sorts. Another chase ensues with everyone after the money, including Chaplin, the thieves, and the police. Chaplin also has time to rescue Edna Purviance from the dance hall proprietor who fails to pay her for her work. Chaplin ends up a happy farmer married to Edna Purviance, which does seem like a tacked on ending, but the film is otherwise terrific in every sense of it being a Chaplin film. ***1/2 of 4 stars.
Review of A Dog's Life
