Review of Pay Day

This may be the short film from Charlie Chaplin, in which he plays the most tragic character of his career. At work, he's hungry and needs to steal his co-worker's lunch. He's married to a considerably older, not even remotely attractive gold-digger wife, who's a pest to poor old Charlie. And finally, when he receives the paycheck, which is as low always, and tries to hide it, the wife takes it away immediately. No surprise the little man goes to the bar at night to drink away his sorrows. When he decides to get home, all the trains are packed and Charlie repeatedly attempts to hop on one, but here he comes as short as everywhere else. So after a long walk through the rain, he finally reaches the dragon's cave and as the alarm clock rings, the dragon makes sure in resolute fashion that Charlie (without food and sleep) gets to work early in the morning again.

I feel most Chaplin short films haven't aged too well, but this one is an exception, mainly thanks to Phyllis Allen, whose characters interactions with Chaplin are a joy to watch. The scenes with the two are easily the highlight, i.e. the return from work and the scenes right at the end. She's truly sinister and I wouldn't have minded if she had starred in a couple more Chaplin films. The construction work scenes early on were okay. The pub scenes were the weakest part of the film, although the butcher wagon was kinda funny. I believe this is one of the better Chaplin short films and a good start to get in the legendary silent actor's body of work.