"In moving pictures the police are sometimes made to appear ridiculous, and in view of the large number of young people, children, who attend these moving picture shows, it gives them an improper idea of the policeman".Note that in early cinema, police are only "sometimes made to appear ridiculous" - as well-meaning, but inept, buffoons. At other times they were extortioners, thieves, and thugs: the bad cop.
Mack Sennett (director/producer)
Mabel Normand (lead)
Roscoe 'Fatty' Arbuckle (lead)
Charles Inslee (lead)
Virginia Kirtley (lead)
Keystone Cops (lead)
Keystone (production)
Roscoe and the Keystone Cops in an orgy of pratfalls, while Mabel mugs, bounces, and shows off her wild left roundhouse.
Mack Sennett (director/producer)
Mabel Normand (lead)
Ford Sterling (lead)
Charles Inslee (lead)
Charles Avery (lead)
Mack Swain (lead)
Edgar Kennedy (lead)
Keystone Cops (lead)
Echo Park Lake (location)
Keystone 5-step Porch (location)
Keystone (production)
Yet another park improv comedy that delivers much more park than comedy.
George Nichols (director)
Roscoe 'Fatty' Arbuckle (lead)
Minta Durfee (lead)
Edgar Kennedy (lead)
Virginia Kirtley (lead)
Keystone Cops (lead)
Echo Park Lake Bridge (location)
Keystone 3.5-step Porch (location)
Keystone (production)
As simple as it gets: no story, just the title, that leads to a chase. Yet it still manages to deliver the laughs, thanks to Roscoe's comic skills and a manic pace.
Mabel Normand (director/lead)
Charles Inslee (lead)
Alice Davenport (lead)
Charles Avery (lead)
Hank Mann (lead)
Al St. John (lead)
Keystone (production)
Starts slow, but builds: from the comic pairing of Mabel the farm beauty and her geeky Alfred E. Newman-clone “ideal” in the first third, to a symphony of quirky Keystone chaos in the final third. Second half is mostly a rework of The Bangville Police (1913).
Henry Lehrman (director/lead)
Enrique Juan Vallejo (cinematographer)
Frank D. Williams (cinematographer)
Charles Chaplin (lead)
Alice Davenport (lead)
Virginia Kirtley (lead)
Chester Conklin (lead)
Minta Durfee (lead)
Keystone Cops (lead)
Keystone (production)
Bone-thin, starving comic makes an appropriately titled film debut where a little-known fact is revealed: Chaplin got his start doing a cheesy impersonation of Richard Pryor.
Roscoe 'Fatty' Arbuckle (director/lead)
Minta Durfee (lead)
Alice Davenport (lead)
Keystone Cops (lead)
Keystone (production)
A fast-moving, mercifully brief slapstick version of Rescued By Rover
Mack Sennett (director/lead)
Frank D. Williams (cinematographer)
Mabel Normand (lead)
Charles Chaplin (lead)
Chester Conklin (lead)
Edgar Kennedy (lead)
Keystone (production)
Unencumbered by story or intertitles, Mabel and Chaplin go freestyle in this nonstop brawl. Not the funniest, but the sheer energy of this intensely physical comedy threatens to transgress all laws of nature (For extra credit, watch in slow motion and count how many times Mabel and Chaplin leap up in sync).
Roscoe 'Fatty' Arbuckle (director/lead)
Mabel Normand (lead)
Al St. John (lead)
Alice Davenport (lead)
Frank Hayes (lead)
Keystone (production)
Like an old country mule, this just plods along (obscured by poor print), until Al St. John enters. But he soon exits and story degenerates to a generic chase, with no laughs. Mere months later, this is remade as Fatty and Mabel's Simple Life. And five years later, in the Comique era, the fetch-the-fallen-from-the-well gag gets developed into grand absurdity in Love.
Roscoe 'Fatty' Arbuckle (director/lead)
Mabel Normand (lead)
Harry Gribbon (lead)
Minta Durfee (lead)
Al St. John (lead)
Frank Hayes (lead)
Keystone Cops (lead)
Echo Park (location)
Keystone 5-step Porch (location)
Keystone (production)
Ah, spooning...brings to mind some of life's sweetest intimate moments, doesn't it? Huddled over your heroin as it gently cooks up, or guiding that coke to the nostril flared in eager anticipation...But here “spooning” is used in the dated sense: i.e., what you do by the light of the silvery moon with your honey while you croon love's tune in June. That is, what other generations have called “making out”, “necking”, “petting”, “smooching”, “suck face”, “swapping spit”...you get the idea. So think of this as “Fatty's Suck Face Days”, where we get the rare cinematic treat of seeing crazy cops who are also bad cops: inept buffoons who also frame, rob and beat you.
Roscoe 'Fatty' Arbuckle (director/lead)
Mabel Normand (lead)
Harry McCoy (lead)
Alice Davenport (lead)
Edgar Kennedy (lead)
Luke the Dog (lead)
Echo Park (location)
Keystone 5-step Porch (location)
Keystone 6-step Porch (location)
Keystone (production)
Way back in the days of Mabel's Strange Predicament, Harry McCoy played Mabel's boyfriend: a smiling, dapper, charmer prone to violent jealous fits. Now that Mabel's living with him, he's a foul, deadbeat slob - and still prone to violent jealous fits. Meanwhile, in the time of Predicament, Alice Davenport played an overbearing wife who was quick to catfight her neighbor Mabel. Now she's dumped the old man for Fatty - and still quick to catfight her neighbor Mabel. So when Fatty washes his hanky at the same time Mabel washes her panky, hanky meets panky. Somewhat atypical Keystone: more farce than slapstick.
Roscoe 'Fatty' Arbuckle (director/lead)
Mabel Normand (lead)
Al St. John (lead)
Josef Swickard (lead)
Phyllis Allen (lead)
Keystone (production)
Modern science has yet to determine the precise sequence of events in the origin of the Loonyverse, but a general consensus has formed around this work. For the first 13 minutes of this remake of Those Country Kids, the humor stays around the level of Lumière's 1895 The Sprayer Sprayed (L'Arroseur arrosé): so slow and painfully corny that the cows protested that the stupidity was beneath their dignity. The only break in the drudgery is a rare glimpse at a dapper Al St. John (minus his clownish rube garb), who was surprisingly handsome beneath the makeup and mugging. But then, by some mysterious comic alchemy, the energy leaps exponentially as soon as Mabel dons a funny hat and cheerfully tosses a suitcase out one window, sending Roscoe crashing through another window, and the two of them steal Al's self-driving and self-willed car - starting a chase that pushes the silliness out of Keystone-realm into Comique-surreal. Clearly, this is such stuff as toons are made on.
Roscoe 'Fatty' Arbuckle (director/lead)
Mack Swain (lead)
Slim Summerville (lead)
Edgar Kennedy (lead)
Al St. John (lead)
Glen Cavender (lead)
Frank Hayes (lead)
Charles Lakin (lead)
Luke the Dog (lead)
Keystone Cops (lead)
Keystone (production)
In late 19th century Europe, capitalist terror gave rise to bombings and assassinations in revolt. By 1914, the bombings had reached the US, sparking the Keystone gag factory to grind out bomb comedy. Herein lies a sample, that purports to show how hilarious a hoax bomb threat would be. Fatty, the tramp plays a new role as barkeeper. Roscoe, the actor, plays a new role as tramp.
Roscoe 'Fatty' Arbuckle (director/lead)
Mabel Normand (lead)
Glen Cavender (lead)
Charles Lakin (lead)
Al St. John (lead)
Frank Hayes (lead)
Keystone Cops (lead)
Echo Park (location)
Keystone 5-step Porch (location)
Keystone (production)
Although the title may suggest this is the sequel to the 1914 “Mabel's Married Life” (with Fatty replacing Chaplin's Tramp), it's actually more like an upgrade of Mabel's 1912 “Help! Help!”, where she now more actively defends herself - so this time she's not the one hiding in a dark enclosed space. Featuring:
Roscoe 'Fatty' Arbuckle (director/lead)
Billie Bennett (lead)
Harry McCoy (lead)
Minta Durfee (lead)
Frank Hayes (lead)
Glen Cavender (lead)
Echo Park (location)
Keystone (production)
The second half of Mabel And Fatty's Wash Day gets reworked and grows into its own full reel. Harry McCoy's part has degenerated from a dapper charmer in Mabel's Strange Predicament, to a deadbeat slob in Mabel And Fatty's Wash Day, down to a purse snatcher in this one.
Roscoe 'Fatty' Arbuckle (director/lead)
Helen Carlyle (lead)
Al St. John (lead)
Joe Bordeaux (lead)
Frank Hayes (lead)
Keystone 6-step Porch (location)
Keystone (production)
Little-known Helen Carlyle gives an animated Mabel-style performance in this aptly-titled fast-paced fun April Fool's Day flick, that also features a chase that looks like the inspiration for It's A Mad Mad Mad Mad World (1963).
Roscoe 'Fatty' Arbuckle (director/lead)
Mabel Normand (lead)
Alice Davenport (lead)
Edgar Kennedy (lead)
Joe Bordeaux (lead)
Glen Cavender (lead)
Golden Gate Park (location)
Keystone (production)
If you've been wondering how many funny gags could be improvised around local park benches, this one's for you (Spoiler: Apparently, none). And where else can you view the funny side of wanton police brutality?
Roscoe 'Fatty' Arbuckle (director/lead)
Edgar Kennedy (lead)
Joe Bordeaux (lead)
Harold Lloyd (lead)
Keystone (production)
Fatty cross-dresses again, this time as an heiress encountering mashers. Nothing happens. But the sign says “farce comedy”, so it seems I missed out twice.
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