User Reviews

Tillie's Punctured Romance, produced and directed by Mack Sennett for his Keystone Studio in 1914, is a movie milestone. It's the first feature-length slapstick comedy (restored prints run 70 minutes or more), and boasts three top players in the lead roles: Charlie Chaplin, Marie Dressler, and Mabel Normand. Although it's remembered primarily as a Chaplin film he was still an up-and-coming young performer at the time, and made no contribution to the script or direction. This project was based on a stage success called "Tillie's Nightmare," which was known for Dressler's high-energy performance and her rendition of the mock tragic lament "Heaven Will Protect the Working Girl." Of course the hit song couldn't be used on the silent screen, but this adaptation offers lots of slapstick and a wild climax featuring a full scale chase, on land and sea, by the Keystone Cops. By Sennett standards this was obviously a major production, with scores of familiar players in supporting roles, extensive location shooting, and an elaborate set serving as Tillie's mansion for the grand finale.

Historic significance aside, however, Tillie's Punctured Romance is something of a letdown when viewed today. For starters, Marie Dressler was not entirely comfortable with the new medium, and simply repeated her stage performance for the cameras, gesticulating wildly, dancing drunkenly, and occasionally shouting her lines-- which, of course, we can't hear. (Her true movie stardom wouldn't come until the talkie era.) Dressler's bizarre antics are amusing to a point, but a little of this sort of thing goes a long way. Mabel Normand is cute in her stylish outfits, but her role gives her little comic business of her own to perform beyond reacting to the activities of her co-stars. And Chaplin, playing a cold-hearted villain who seduces, robs, and then abandons a homely farm girl, is about as far from the lovable Tramp as one could imagine. It's interesting to see Charlie in such an uncharacteristic guise, and it speaks well for his versatility, yet we wait in vain for those genuinely funny moments we find in his own films, even the early ones. He plays the scoundrel with relish, but the part could have been taken by any number of other comedians. Even so, in one late scene Chaplin managed to slip in a gag that suggests the Charlie we know: parading before servants in his new finery, he trips over a tiger rug, then 'punishes' the beast, lifting it by the tail and giving it a quick spank. That was practically the only laugh I found in Tillie's Punctured Romance. Otherwise, most of the humor comes from watching grotesquely-dressed people kick butts, fire pistols and fall off the pier into the ocean, all of which represents Sennett's taste in comedy, not Chaplin's.

'Tillie' is best appreciated by film scholars. It has its moments, but can't compare with Chaplin's own later features such as The Gold Rush and The Circus. Viewers who have never seen a classic silent comedy may get a distorted impression of what they were like from this one, in the same way that The Great Train Robbery of 1903 suggests that all silent drama was laughably primitive. Personally I find these very early movies fascinating, but they need to be seen in the larger context of their time; the silent cinema shouldn't be judged by its earliest products.

P.S. Autumn 2010: A newly restored version of Tillie's Punctured Romance has become available, one that is substantially longer than the various re-edited and truncated editions which have circulated for many years. Modern viewers can now get a better sense of what audiences of 1914 saw when the film was new. The restored 'Tillie' remains very much a vehicle for Marie Dressler, but it's gratifying to report that a fair amount of the "new" footage involves Mabel Normand. She has more to do during the party sequence at the end, disguised as a maid as she sips punch and spars with her employers and fellow servants. The flirtation sequence between Charlie and Marie at the beginning has been extended, and Dressler has more footage at the police station when she's jailed for drunkenness. The over all impact of 'Tillie' is essentially the same, but nevertheless it's good to see this historically significant film get the archival attention and respect it deserves.

This was the last film Chaplin was in that he neither directed nor wrote, made at the end of 1914, his first full year in America. There are a dearth of title cards in this one, and just about everything is projected via pantomime. And because it is a Mack Sennett film there is lots of pants kicking.

The plot is pretty simple. Chaplin plays a ne'er do well who convinces plain plus sized Tillie, who is physically abused by her father, to elope with him and to help herself to a big dowry. When they get to the city he steals her money and abandons her for his old girlfriend, Mabel Normand. As Tillie's fortunes wax and wane, so does Chaplin's interest in her.

Why was pants kicking and pie throwing considered such a big laugh getter in early silent film? According to a film historian on some silent Charlie Chase films I bought, it was push back at Victorian values of the day. When Victorian values fell away after WWI, this was no longer considered funny.

Things I noticed? That three million dollars in 1914 was considered a great fortune, worthy of newspaper headlines. Today it would be the cost of a home in the San Francisco Bay area that is nothing to write home about. Also, notice that men AND women are put in the same drunk tank. I have no idea if that is a dash of realism or just the Keystone Cops mismanaging a precinct as usual. When there is a big society party towards the end, the band is all dressed up like a bunch of Cossacks, but the servants are dressed like they are from the French Revolutionary period. I have no idea what was up with that.

At any rate, it is a real treat to see three great comics on the silent screen together. It's a shame sound had to come in for Marie Dressler to really get her due in comedy, a top box office draw the last few years of her life. Of course, Chaplin made the transition successfully, but pantomime was really always his forte. Poor Mabel Normand, a great silent comedienne, will not live long enough to compete in talking pictures. She died in 1930 of tuberculosis.

For today's audience there are two things that are striking about Tillie's Punctured Romance. The first is that Charlie Chaplin does not get first billing here. He was not yet the star he would become, he was just another of Mack Sennett's comedy stars. He does not play the tramp character yet though there are some tramp like aspects in who he does play.

The second is that this is a chance to see Marie Dressler a whole lot earlier in her career than we know her from sound films. Marie was a very big vaudeville star and her character her was a whole lot like her act on stage. The homely big boned girl who seems to be born a total klutz.

There's not really much to the outrageous plot of this 83 minutes of unadulterated slapstick. It seems like every other minute someone was either tripping or being kicked in the derrière. That was the way it was with Mack Sennett comedies.

Chaplin plays a city slicker who takes Marie off the farm and to the big city. But when he gets there his eye roves towards Mabel Normand. Mabel back in the day was a full figured girl herself and a bit more attractive than Marie.

But when news of her rich uncle falling off Mount Baldy makes her an heiress, Charlie finds his passion for Marie and her money rekindling. Kind of leaves Mabel the odd girl out. And in the climax the Keystone Kops are called in after a brawl develops at a society party that Marie is throwing to introduce herself to society.

Tillie's Punctured Romance could have told the story in half the screen time it takes. There's only so much pure slapstick you can take at one time. Still it's not a bad film and it does display the talents of Chaplin, Dressler, and Normand and a host of other comedy names from the Mack Sennett studio.

What a treat that this 1914 feature-length comedy still exists. Historically important as the first feature comedy, it also boasts three great stars: Charlie Chaplin, Marie Dressler, and Mabel Normand. Directed by legendary Mack Sennett, this broad comedy was adapted from Dressler's stage hit. It's rough, with missing pieces, but enough exists to showcase the comedy talents of this trio of stars. The story is trite but Dressler and Chaplin are so funny, you forget the plot and laugh along with the mugging and pratfalls. So far as I know, Dressler and Chaplin never worked together again. What a shame. Dressler adapted to talkies (winning an Oscar for Min and Bill) so much better than Chaplin did. Normand died before the advent of talkies. Anyway, certainly worth a look. Co-stars Chester Conklin, Charles Murray, Minta Durfee, Edgar Kennedy, Charley Chase, Mack Swain, and possibly Milton Berle as the newsboy. Berle always said he played it. Edna Purviance may be the leading lady in the film Chaplin and Normand go to see. I love this film.

TILLIE'S PUNCTURED ROMANCE (Keystone, 1914), directed by Mack Sennett, credited as the "first feature length comedy," also ranks a motion picture first for Marie Dressler (1869-1934), and the initial feature comedy debut of the up-and-rising Charlie Chaplin (1889-1977). Though Dressler, new to the movies, was, at the time, figuratively speaking, a bigger attraction Chaplin, the film remains relatively known simply as a Chaplin comedy. Still under the supervision of Sennett, it offers little material by Chaplin to call his own. Though he does wear a derby during the latter portion of the story as opposed to his straw hat during the opening sequences, Chaplin doesn't sport his legendary tramp costume. Even his mustache is different from his traditional one, physically looking more like another comedian, Charlie Chase (who also appears), than his true persona. By contrast, Chaplin and Dressler are equally matched here in a story structure containing more Sennett formula of physical kicking and slapstick comedy supported by a huge assortment of other notable comics (Charles Murray, Slim Summerville, Hank Mann, Edgar Kennedy and Al St. John), and those participating in the wild chase as the Keystone Kops.

Taken from a musical play, "Tillie's Nightmare," that starred Marie Dressler, Charlie Chaplin gets his introduction as "The stranger - a wise guy who sought country lanes while city streets became too hot for him." Then comes Marie Dressler as Tillie Banks, a farmer's daughter, "the pride of Yokeltown and the apple of her father's eye," or one "built like a battleship," who unwittingly knocks a brick over a city slicker's heat while playing with her dog. As the apologetic Tillie makes amends by inviting the man into her home, Charlie notices her father's (Mark Swain) huge bankroll. Seeing this a chance on getting rich, Charlie proposes marriage to Tillie, who willingly accepts. As she leaves her home with him, Tillie takes her father's savings, refusing to share it with him until after the elopement. Once in the city, Charlie encounters Mabel (Mabel Normand), his "girl confederate partner in crime. After getting Tillie drunk in a restaurant, Charlie takes the money and runs off with Mabel. Unable to pay her bill, Tillie gets arrested and put in jail while Charlie and Mabel seek refuge inside a movie house where, attending the motion picture titled "Double Crossed," they imagine seeing themselves as characters portrayed on screen. Released from jail, Tillie gets a job as a waitress where one of her patrons turns out to be Charlie and Mabel. After running away and resting on a park bench with Mabel, Charlie sees a newspaper article that his Tillie has become the sole heir to $3 million by her rich uncle, Donald Banks (Charles Bennett), who met his fate fate mountain climbing on Mount Baldy. Charlie ditches Mabel, returns to Tillie. Duped once, will Tillie be fooled again? Time will tell. Let the antics begin!

Regardless of its advanced age and certain flaws, TILLIE'S PINCTURED ROMANCE is fun viewing throughout. Considering how many movies from this era have been lost and gone forever, this very early feature comedy is fortunate to have survived at all. It also gives contemporary viewers a hardy glimpse of some outlandish costumes worn its leading ladies, with Normand sporting huge hat and feather. It's also Mabel who gets to have a couple of really worth-while point-of-view close-ups often credited to director D.W. Griffith.

While Chaplin's movie career ranged from developing his craft under Sennett (1914) to starring, directing and writing his own material (1915 onward), Dressler as a silent movie comedienne was short-lived. Having appeared in several comedy shorts/features (1915-1918), two being TILLIE'S TOMATO SURPRISE (Lubin, 1915) and TILLIE WAKES UP (Peerless, 1917), Dressler wouldn't appear in another motion picture until a decade later at MGM in highly successful sentimental comedy-dramas (1927-1933), and a Academy Award before her death to cancer in 1934. It's interesting pointing out the title of TILLIE'S PUNCTURED ROMANCE being used for a 1928 Al Christie/Paramount feature starring WC Fields. The new carnation finds Louise Fazenda playing the new Tillie joining the circus and becoming part of antics set during the World War. The only similarity this and the original contain is the presence of Mack Swain once again cast as Tillie's Father, and Chester Conklin, seen here as Mr. Whoozis, assuming a different character role. Though film historians have long awaited for the rediscovery of the long lost Fields version, it's the original Mack Sennett comedy that remains relatively known today.

During the years of home video, TILLIE'S PUNCTURED ROMANCE had been available from public domain editions with no scoring to 50-minute 1938 reissue with new scoring, new opening titles listing cast and crew. There's also been availability through Blackhawk/Republic Home Video containing piano scoring by William Perry; and KINO Video on VHS and later DVD with clear visuals and organ score, but minus some descriptive inter-titles and Chaplin's opening character introduction. Often broadcast on Turner Classic Movies since October 1995 as part of either Chaplin or Dressler tributes, TILLIE'S PUNCTURED ROMANCE is another reason why this old-styled comedy should not ever disappear from public viewing for that Tillie's romance may be punctured, but she is no flat tire. (***)

Mack Sennett, head of Keystone Studios, decided to take the plunge and produce a big budgeted feature film based on the Broadway comedy "Tillie's Nightmare." He was able to entice the play's star, Marie Dressler, for at that time one of her rare movie performances (she had previously appeared in two shorts). Augmenting her would be the studio's main stars, Mabel Normand and Charlie Chaplin. Sennett would spend a hefty $50,000 ($1.2 million in today's figures) for production, an enormous departure from his studio's trademark quickie, cheap movies.

Released in December 1914, "Tillie's Punctured Romance" became an instant hit with movie audiences. Chaplin discards his Tramp outfit to play a shyster intent on swindling the father of Dressler's life savings. Normand's role as Chaplin's girlfriend adds humor to the plot.

Critics were equally admirable in their reviews of "Tillie's," with one writing, "The film's final reel is a comedic crescendo, building from a brief pie fight to mayhem caused by Tillie firing a pistol indiscriminately, culminating with a farcical chase on a pier featuring the Keystone Cops on land and sea." "Tillie's" would be one of 500 movies nominated by American Film Institute for its Best 100 All-Time Film Comedies.

"Tillie's" was cinema's first feature film comedy. On a personal level, the movie would be Chaplin's last motion picture with Keystone as well as his final movie he neither wrote nor directed in his long film career. Sennett directed "Tillie's" and co-wrote the script.

Dressler would star in three more "Tillie" movies in the next three years, all produced by different studios. She returned to the stage and vaudeville after the last "Tillie," and wouldn't return to the screen until the late 1920's, making a successful transition to sound soon after. She won the Academy Award for Best Actress in 1930 in "Min and Bill," and received a nomination in the same category two years later in "Emma."

Chaplin, seeing his star rising during his year at Keystone, wanted more money when his contract with the studio expired at the end of 1914. Sennett claimed he couldn't afford the comedian's salary demand of $1,000 per week. Essanay Film Manufacturing Company knocked on Chaplin's door and offered $1,250 per week with a $10,000 signing bonus, guaranteeing greater artistic freedom for the actor. He took the studio's offer. He headed for Chicago, the headquarters for Essanay, to begin working on his first film for the company. Yet, Chaplin later reflected emotionally he couldn't personally say farewell to his buddies he had developed friendships with at Keystone when it was time to depart. "It was a wrench leaving Keystone, for I had grown fond of Sennett and everyone there. I never said goodby, I couldn't."

Charles Chaplin plays The City Guy, who sees his opportunity to get rich when he meets a big-sized girl named Tillie Banks (Marie Dressler).He wants to elope with her so he could have the fortune of her father (Mack Swain).Mabel Normand plays The Other Girl, beautiful and villainous.Mack Sennett's Tillie's Punctured Romance (1914) was the first feature-length comedy.It was made in the time when Chaplin was just a new-comer in the field of comedy and was only looking for his style.Nevertheless this is a good comedy, even though it's not near Chaplin's best stuff.Other actors aren't left in Chaplin's shadow.That goes especially for Marie Dressler.She's truly funny in this movie.This movie has some great moments.For the silent movie fans this is a little treat.

I just finished watching this at the Internet Archive, a 71-minute version, and I'm very glad I finally did. I'm a devoted silent movie fan and first heard of this movie when I was a "little" younger around age 10. ;-) lol

Yes, certainly it's worthy from a historical standpoint, but not just because it was the first full-length comedy. What stood out most to me was the great chemistry between Chaplin and Dressler. She was great! Plus I never dreamed she was so agile (as with her dancing), for lack of a better term. She held her own against the younger Chaplin, and I wish they would've made at least one more movie together.

So yes, while it wasn't Chaplin's best movie, with some scenes seemingly going on too long or being too repetitive, I think it's still worth at least one viewing by anyone who is a big silent movie fan. Just think... there's no visual record of the very first opera or the very first Shakespearean play, but we have a complete history of the motion picture from its inception, which I think's quite cool.

. . . AS FAR AWAY from this movie as you can get! Yes, "Tillie's Punctured Romance" is today considered a classic, but mainly because it has the reputation of being the "first feature-length comedy," and because it is the only film in which the three leads (Normand, Dressler, Chaplin) appeared together, and because it contains one of the earliest "film-within-a-film" sequences. Other than that, it's pretty much useless, unless you want to study Marie's acting style, drool over the always-lovely Mabel, or watch Charlie play the opposite of his beloved "Little Tramp" character.

Don't get me wrong. I like slapstick, I love Chaplin, I think Marie Dressler was a fabulous actress, and you've already heard what I think about Mabel Normand. But not a one of the three is used to any great advantage in this movie--and even Swain, Bennett, and Conklin (all of whom deserve more credit for their work in early cinema than they normally get) are wasted here.

The trouble with this movie is not in the plot (hackneyed as it may seem to current audiences) nor with the actors (who did what they could with the script at hand). No, the trouble really lies with the writing and directing. I can't comment on the original play, having never read or seen it, but I do know that Mack Sennett knew what he was doing with short films--the deservedly classic status of his hundreds of early flicks attests to this. However, when you ask people to sit still and watch over an hour's worth of your movie, there should be something more to hold their attention than your having people fall down over and over and over again. Here's a math problem for someone with much more time on their hands than I have: count the people who fall down in this movie, and divide by the number of minutes the movie lasts, and I think you'll see what I mean.

Please, please, please--do yourself a favor, if you're at all interested in silent movies, or trying to find a way to get your friends to enjoy them with you. Treat yourself (and them) to "City Lights," "The General," "The Gold Rush," any of the one- or two-reelers by Sennett or Hal Roach. Or, for that matter, practically any other silent comedy. (Hey, even Mel Brooks's "Silent Movie" is better than this, although that's not saying much.) Put on some of your (or their) favorite music, if there's not a synchronized score (my copy of "Tillie" seems to have purloined Scott Joplin tracks from a noisy LP). But unless you're ready for over an hour of mostly meaningless pratfalls, don't subject yourself or your friends to this. It's wonderful that it still exists; film students can analyze it to their hearts content. Now go watch something good.

The comedy in "Tillie's Punctured Romance" is admittedly mediocre, but many who love classic cinema will still find this feature worth seeing once just for its cast. Besides Mabel Normand, it has Charlie Chaplin and Marie Dressler in some of their earliest film roles, plus Edgar Kennedy and Mack Swain in smaller roles, and of course the Keystone Cops. Most of these wonderful performers are not shown to their best advantage here, but it is still a rare chance to see them all together.

The film in itself is only fair. The story-line had possibilities, but Mack Sennett's disjointed, knockabout style just doesn't work very well in a full-length feature. Most of the material is quite predictable after a while, and except for the "Cops", who have a few funny moments, the cast members do not have roles that give them a chance to do what they do best. There are a handful of decent gags amongst the routine physical humor, and a film-within-a-film sequence that comes off all right, but in general there just was not enough worthwhile material to fill up a running time of this length. With this cast, though, it might have made a very good two- or three-reeler.

First off, I must mention that I may have seen an edited version of Tillie's Punctured Romance because in the print I saw, there was no film-within-a-film scene here. Also, the score picked for this version seemed suited more for a melodrama than the slapstick comedy that this surely is. Now, while I admit that some of the falls done by Marie Dressler seemed to be a little overdone, considering this was her first feature that can be excused and I found myself laughing pretty loud despite that. Charlie Chaplin also does nicely in the physical department which makes his jerk of a character a little easier to take. And Mabel Normand can take care of herself with all the slaps and kicks she gives to Charlie. I just wish the characterizations were more subtle and pacing was a little more subdued but I guess producer/director Mack Sennett didn't believe in that. For those performances, however, and those of Chester Conklin, Mack Swain, and many of the others who played the Keystone Kops at the end I recommend Tillie's Punctured Romance to any fan of silent movie comedies who are curious about this first feature film played for laughs.

A stranger (Charlie Chaplin) sees the farmer put away a large wad of money. He comes up with an idea to sweet talk his daughter gigantic Tillie Banks (Marie Dressler) into going away to the big city and taking her father's money. In the city, the couple runs into his ex Mabel. While Tillie gets drunk, he runs off with Mabel. Tillie is thrown in jail. It turns out that Tillie is the niece of a millionaire. The uncle doesn't want anything to do with Tillie and she ends up as a poor waitress. The uncle dies leaving everything to Tillie. Charlie reads about it in the newspaper and runs away from Mabel. He marries Tillie before she knows about the fortune. They move into the mansion followed closely by Mabel who gets hired as the maid. However the uncle isn't really dead and he returns to throw everybody out. He calls in the Keystone Kops.

This is definitely not the lovable tramp that everybody comes to adore. Chaplin is a real scoundrel in this one. It's early in his career and the last time somebody else directed him. Heck it's early in movie history period. There are some funny slapstick. The huge Dressler provides a lot of opportunity for some funny moments between her and Chaplin. The movie is a dark comedy where nobody is likable. There are a lot of pratfalls and mayhem. It is the Keystone Kops after all.

Am a big fan of Charlie Chaplin, have been for over a decade now. Many films and shorts of his are very good to masterpiece, and like many others consider him a comedy genius and one of film's most important and influential directors.

He did do better than 'Tillie's Punctured Romance', historically interesting for the first feature length comedy and Chaplin moving on from short films. Can understand why the Keystone period suffered from not being as best remembered or highly remembered than his later efforts, but they are mainly decent and important in their own right. 'Tillie's Punctured Romance' has a lot of nice things about it and is to me one of the best efforts in the 1914 Keystone batch.

'Tillie's Punctured Romance' is one of his funniest and most charming from this period. Sure the production values are still not as audacious. Appreciated the busier story than most from some other 1914 efforts of his, though occasionally it was a bit hard to follow and still a bit flimsy and perhaps better suited to a short film. 'Tillie's Punctured Romance' is pretty good and it showed that Chaplin was starting to settle. There is a good deal of charm and the chemistry between the characters is fun.

While not audacious, the film hardly looks ugly, is more than competently directed and is appealingly played. Chaplin looks comfortable, with more shades than before of his distinctive style here, and shows his stage expertise while opening it up that it doesn't become stagy or repetitive shtick. There is more sympathy and emotion than most of his efforts from this period. Mabel Normand and Marie Dressler are good support.

Although the humour, charm and emotion was done even better and became more refined later, 'Tillie's Punctured Romance' is still very funny, cute and hard to dislike. It moves quickly and you don't feel the length.

Overall, pretty good. 7/10 Bethany Cox

Great silent Mack Sennett slapstick with Charlie Chaplin and Marie Dressler. Sennett is Sennett; it is great Chaplin, though he was dissatisfied (probably because he wasn't directing it, too); but the thing that really makes this movie great is Marie Dressler. The way she carries her considerable girth is a major element in the comedy and her big face and huge eyes are strictly for howling. Marie was born in 1868 and died in 1932, half in each century, a life in theatre and film. Such a shame she didn't have more time to live in the talkie era: I think she would have become one of the huge names of film. There's only one Marie Dressler. She shines in 'Dinner At Eight' and 'Min And Bill' both of which, among others, included Wallace Beery, a great foil for her talents.

"Tillie's Punctured Romance" was novel merely for being a feature-length comedy. Feature-length films were just beginning to become the established norm and comedies were one of the last to follow suit; not until a few years later would Chaplin and others secure the transition from shorts to features in the genre. Additionally, this picture features one of the many collaborations between two pioneering titans of screen comedy: Mack Sennett and Charlie Chaplin.

Yet, "Tillie's Punctured Romance" is low on entertainment. It's crude, cheap and outdated--and unusually static for a Sennett film. That surely has much to do with it being an adaptation of a play, and it being an unusual project for him. The movie finally picks up when the Keystone Kops enter the action, with the rapid editing and more frantic slapstick characteristic of Sennett, but that's only in the last few minutes. The crude and violent slapstick and grotesque burlesque throughout the picture is rather representative of Keystone, but there's better if you also want to be entertained while examining the history of comedy and film ("Barney Oldfield's Race for a Life" (1913) is one of my favorite Keystone shorts). "Tillie's Punctured Romance" just wasn't funny for me.

Chaplin began his film-making career under Sennett, which I'm sure was very important, but probably not until his Mutual shorts would he outgrow Sennett's style to become the great screen comedian and filmmaker we now know he was. His talents are visible here, but are wasted. That's more than I can say for Marie Dressler's somewhat embarrassing performance. Yet, she would do better, as well, although not until the talkies. Mabel Normand does the best job in this one.

This movie is obviously an adaptation of a play in its staginess, and it's boring to watch the actors do all the work while the camera mostly remains stationary for extended periods. One thing I kept looking at were the unessential characters, or extras, who were watching the main characters act out the play. Although I found it boring enough, at times, to concentrate on the background, in actuality, people would watch the antics of such queer characters. And, it might be meant to also reinforce for the audience that this stuff is funny, but it also reminds one that this is a filmed play.

This is also a movie, though, in more than the literal sense. That should be expected from Sennett, who was one of the earliest to define what movies are. In the film, Chaplin and Normand watch a Keystone short, which reflects the outer film's story. It reminds me of such other early films as D.W. Griffith's "A Drunkard's Reformation" (1909), which delivered the moral of the story through a play-within-the-play. Although "Tillie's Punctured Romance" doesn't have much of a moral, its film-within-the-film delivers what there is of one. Sennett has other more interesting self-referential films to his credit (e.g. "Mabel's Dramatic Career" (1913), "A Movie Star" (1916) and "The Extra Girl" (1923)), and his films were often about making fun of other films, so this demonstrates that "Tillie's Punctured Romance", while a play, is also a movie authored by Sennett--just not a good one.

I just watched this film for my first time on Turner Classic Movies. Unfortunately, the version I saw was several minutes shorter than 73 min.--so I'm not sure what I missed. Hopefully there was a scene near the finish so the ending wouldn't have seemed so abrupt. I rated the film an '8' anyway. In a showcase for vintage comedic movie acting, director Mack Sennett lets two comedic giants shine. Marie Dressler is tubs of fun in the title role. Strong as Popeye yet more clumsy than Kramer, Dressler is a walking disaster who, thankfully, has Lady Luck to guide her. Her performance seemed a bit Vaudeville at first but she quickly grew on me. By the time she danced drunk I was completely won over. An underdog with a heart of gold who can take care of herself, thank you. Mabel Normand also registers strongly in her nameless role. Though at 20 she was the youngest of the star trio, Normand was the film veteran of the group. It shows in her ease and manner and still modern screen personna. She knew a little could go a long way. Chaplin seemed miscast. I kept thinking a more handsome cad (Wallace Reid?) could have been funnier. Still... He's Chaplin.

Charlie Chaplin plays a close approximation of his Tramp character in this quick cut of superficial slapstick with an undercurrent of dark humor. I wasn't aware until after the fact that this was actually the very first feature-length comedy in cinematic history, but in retrospect that explains a lot. In some ways the film is downright visionary, but in many others it clearly isn't quite sure what to do with itself. The plot is barely one-note, cyclical and redundant to the end - the same characters keep getting put in the same situations over and over again - which leads me to believe it was just a case of a single-reel premise stretched over the length of a full flick. Chaplin, still discovering his on-screen sea legs, shows a ton of command and potential, but his performance is often raw and uneven. Mabel Normand is adorable as his on-screen counterpart, a fellow con-artist out to get her cut of the riches Chaplin so gracelessly pursues. A curiosity as a vivid piece of living, breathing history, it doesn't have much up its sleeve and really drags despite a very short runtime.

Charlie Chaplin began his acting career in 1914 with the shorts "Making a Living" and "Kid Auto Races at Venice." Before the year was over, he played in "Tillie's Punctured Romance," which was really a vehicle for Marie Dressler. In the slapstick film, Chaplin already shows aspects of his famous "Little Tramp" character (funny mannerisms, odd walk, baggy pants), although his personality here is that of a scoundrel, unlike that of a helping and sympathetic gentleman. He plays a city slicker out to dupe portly and clumsy Tillie Banks (Marie Dressler) out of her money. Diminutive Charlie was 25 years old at the time; Dressler was nearly twice his age!

On her father's farm, Tillie throws a thick block of wood for her dog to fetch. It accidentally strikes Charlie the stranger as he walks by on a dirt road. She helps him up and invites him into her house. He notices her papa's thick wad of bills, and suddenly is in "love." Chaplin and Tillie soon elope to the big city, where we see the Los Angeles of 1914. There are cars and trolleys, but we do not see any horses and wagons. Anyway, Chaplin takes Tillie to a small restaurant (notice her duck hat), where he abandons her after getting her drunk and taking the money. He hooks up with his accomplice and love interest (Mabel Normand), and they go into an early 20th century movie house, with the mandatory piano player. Now we are seeing an apropos drama – a film within a film (a feature first?), where our two anti-heroes imagine themselves acting nastily on screen. Meanwhile Tillie's drunkenness gets her a visit to jail for a time. Then Charlie reads in a newspaper that Tillie's rich uncle fell mountain climbing from the summit of Old Baldy, leaving her three million dollars. So it is "bye-bye" Mabel and back to Tillie.

Will Tillie again become a patsy? Soon the scorned woman has a pistol in her hand (a feature first?), and starts shooting at the group attending the festivities at her (presumed late) uncle's mansion. There is even a Keystone Cops zany rescue in the finale. Tillie may yet be saved from herself, but will she stay dry?

We see the many slapstick gags: butt-kicking galore, the waiter pulling out a chair from under a customer (Chaplin), and a soapy floor in the restaurant kitchen that claims many victims. Chaplin even strikes a newsboy in the face, and later chest kicks and beats up a mustached fellow. (Towards the end Chaplin even kicks Tillie in the stomach!) In reality the movie is weakly scripted, and is crudely edited in places (missing scenes?). Although the film has three praised stars in Chaplin, Normand, and Dressler, it is not really that well crafted. This is Mack Sennett's film, not the fledgling Chaplin's. But it has enormous historical value, and remains a real curio.