The Adventurer (1917)

A lot of fun.

There are women in the film, but none has anything you could call a personality.

There is just so much movie here. For some it may be too much. But in the same secretly sarcastic way most telemarketers say the phrase, the title of this one is particularly apt.

This is a must-see and one of the best documentaries - and films - of this year.

Chaplin, a prison escapee, saves a drowning matron, is invited to her home, courts the comely daughter, is discovered by the police, and escapes.It's among Chaplin's best. His facial expressions, his motions, and his locomotion are memorable. When he suddenly realizes he's in danger, turns around and runs away, he runs chest first, arms pumping, as in a cartoon, and practically leaves zip marks behind.Don't miss the splendidly timed scene in which he traps two pursuers in sliding doors or, for that matter, where he becomes a floor lamp.

While The Adventurer (1917) may not be the strongest of Charlie Chaplin's shorts in terms of plot, characterization, or coherence, but by God, is it a fun romp. Ably supported by the lovely Edna Purviance and the deliciously villainous Eric Campbell, Chaplin gets into all sorts of trouble by the sea and in a seaside resort. The gags come at the viewer nonstop and all are inspired. The whole thing is a breathless bit of fun, effortlessly transitioning from one set-up to the next without ever feeling choppy.Of course, Chaplin would move on from Mutual after this. I cannot think of a finer finale to that phase of his career.

Chaplin is a funny man that can do a lot with very little. His humour is slapstick and he is very good at it.Here we follow a convict on the run through diverse escapades in which he amongst other things saves a woman's mother and steals the woman from her suitor.His jokes are very simple and effective, that said they can be a bit repetitious and today obvious.Funniest part is in the beginning when he bumps into police everywhere and repeats his mistakes all the time and also the bit with the sliding doors.

When I was a young boy (about five years old), my parents couldn't afford a TV and, in order to give me entertainment, my dad bought a second hand silent cine projector and showed me some silent westerns (which I have all but forgotten) and - oh joy, oh bliss - the Essanay and Mutual Chaplin films. The greatest of these - by a long way, in my estimation is 'The Adventurer' indeed, it is one of the very few short films worthy of the term 'masterpiece'.The Adventurer is a sonata on the number 3. There are three main locations - the beach, the pier and the house. The cliff location in the beach scene is triangular, Charlie and his two pursuers make an hilarious trio, with every combination of characters and apexes of the triangle being explored...Then we go onto the pier... There we have three sub-locations - the top of the pier, the car and the sea. Charlie explores all of these and then moves onto the house.Here we also have three locations - upstairs, downstairs and the terrace. You can see dozens of other 'threes' in the film, but the coda, in which Charlie is chased three times round the set is like the delirious coda to Mozart's 41st Symphony when the orchestra seem to take off. There is noting like it in all cinema.Of course I had no idea about all this subtlety when I was a kid, I just looked and laughed in wonder and said with a pleading thrill in my voice.... 'Play it again, Dad.'Without these wonderful Chaplin films, I doubt that I would have given my life to the cinema for the last fifty years.