Cast overview: | |||
Charles Chaplin | ... | The Star Boarder | |
Minta Durfee | ... | Landlady | |
Edgar Kennedy | ... | Landlady's Husband | |
Gordon Griffith | ... | The Son | |
Alice Davenport | ... | Landlady's Friend |
Charlie stays at a boarding-house, where he is the landlady's favorite. Her husband grows jealous when observing this. Their little son has a camera. He happens to take some photos of his mother and Charlie in situations which are innocent but look indecent. He also takes a photo of his father and a female boarding-guest in a similar situation. In the evening the boy arranges a slide show in the boarding-house. Suddenly also the equivocal photos of his parents appear on the screen. His jealous father gets furious and starts chasing Charlie. Soon all the boarding-guests are involved in the fight. Written by Maths Jesperson {maths.jesperson1@comhem.se}
This is a film from Chaplin's first year in films. During this VERY hectic year, he churned out film after film after film for Keystone Studios and the quality of the films are, in general, quite poor. That's because the character of "the Little Tramp" was far from perfected and the films really had no script--just the barest of story ideas. While some Chaplin lovers might think this is sacrilege, all these movies I have seen are pretty lousy. Yes, there are some cute slapstick moments but barely any plot--absolutely NOTHING like the Chaplin we all came to love in his full-length films of the 20s and 30s.
Compared to other Keystone Chaplin films I have watched, this one is slightly better because it has a little more plot. And, it is fun to see the jealous husband and Charlie fight in the end. But, that's really about all there is to the movie. Certainly this is NOT an artistic of interesting film.