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Silent Comedy
see all genres ›What many still consider the "Golden Era" of film comedy took place during the silent years when a stellar lineup of comedic talent (most famously Charles Chaplin, Buster Keaton and Harold Lloyd) churned out umpteen funny shorts and features. Considered disposable entertainment then, they've by and large stayed remarkably fresh over a century's course since.
Discover Silent Comedy Films
Genres / Silent / Silent Comedy
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Automated Hat-Maker and Sausage-Grinder
Filmmaker Alice Guy creates something of an oddity with this one-minute comedy. An inventor and his assistant create a machine that, true to its title, makes hats and grinds sausages! The absurdity of the device is beside the point. Or, rather, it is the point.Start your free trial to watch
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Away We Go
Bobby Vernon was a talented comic actor during the silent era, who became a writer and comedy supervisor at Paramount for W.C. Fields and Bing Crosby, when the sound era arrived. Here Vernon stars with Duane Thompson, Lila Leslie and Victor Rodman in a 1924 classic originally released as RENO OR BUST.Start your free trial to watch
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The Bangville Police
Those bumbling Keystone Kops fly under the banner of the Bangville police force in this early Keystone comedy directed by journeyman Henry Lehrman. The film gleefully parodies the crosscutting structure pioneered by D.W. Griffith in films like THE LONELY VILLA (1909). In this case, the race to the rescue...Start your free trial to watch
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Battling Butler
The greatest box-office success of all his independent comedies, BATTLING BUTLER is a rarely-seen gem that mingles Buster Keaton's deadpan demeanor and awesome physical agility with a particularly dramatic storyline. Keaton stars as Alfred Butler, a fragile young man whose father sends him into the country where he hopes...Start your free trial to watch
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The Bell Hop
A gang of foreign spies attempt to steal an important government document at a resort hotel. Larry Semon stars as the hotel's lazy bellhop, with a 29 year old Oliver Hardy cast as a dapper-looking desk clerk. Larry Semon also wrote, directed and produced this funny two-reel comedy. The co-director was future Oscar winner...Start your free trial to watch
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Better Behave
Physical comedy drives this vehicle for then-famous clown Poodles Hanneford, part of a legendary British circus family. Already pushing forty but impeccably nimble, he plays suitor to beauteous, heavily daddy-guarded Betty (Betty Walsh) and the duo try their hardest to elope. This is an essentially plotless series of gags but...Start your free trial to watch
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Between Showers
BETWEEN SHOWERS was inspired by a series of torrential rainstorms that soaked Los Angeles. The comic situation for this violent, improvised film involves a display of gallantry toward a young woman (Emma Clifton) and an umbrella stolen from a policeman (Chester Conklin). This was the last Charles Chaplin film directed by...Start your free trial to watch
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Black Eyes
As the feature film was becoming dominant over the course of 1915, Edison, like other American producers, had clearly mastered the one reel format (as BLACK EYES demonstrates). This is an enjoyable domestic comedy about marital discord and reconciliation. Nothing is allowed to get too serious and all ends happily. The story...Start your free trial to watch
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Blacksmithing Scene
That the old-fashioned blacksmith shop was the first subject to be shown in Edison's kinetoscope was a quiet kind of joke. The Edison Laboratory was the center of innovative technology in the late nineteenth century but here the laboratory staff takes some time off to play at blacksmithing and pass around...Start your free trial to watch
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The Boat
THE BOAT, conceived as a companion piece to ONE WEEK, finds Buster Keaton building a thirty-five foot family cruiser. It was Keaton's most commercially successful silent two-reel comedy and ranks among his best works. The classic sequence of this boat launch has Buster (the proud owner and captain) standing at the nose of the...Start your free trial to watch
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Bombs and Brides
When a new reformist mayor refuses to cave to corruption, his opponents plot terroristic reprisal. Their efforts go awry in very goofy ways (including some wild stunts). This rambunctious comedy from Mack Sennett's Keystone Studios features his stars Charles Murray as a scheming campaign manager and Louise...Start your free trial to watch
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Bout de Zan Steals an Elephant
Bout de Zan is a young boy by description and a petty thief by vocation. In this short, he does indeed steal an elephant from a circus. However, an elephant is a bit more than one kid can handle. The elephant has ideas of its own and, soon enough, decides it can do anything a person can do. Perhaps even...Start your free trial to watch
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Bromo and Juliet
Though introduced as a “successful young business man of rare judgment and great dignity,” Charley Chase’s diminutive gentleman is out of his league the moment his sweetheart says she’ll only marry him if he plays Romeo to her Juliet. The night of the play he’s squirming in his sponge-packed tights....Start your free trial to watch
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Bumping Into Broadway
Harold Lloyd’s first "glass character" two-reeler, BUMPING INTO BROADWAY stars Lloyd and Bebe Daniels as theatrical hopefuls. He's a playwright; she's a chorus girl. The action is fierce as Harold attempts to save Bebe from a wicked society chap and gets into lots of trouble in the process. Look for Our...Start your free trial to watch
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The Burglars
Alice Guy's brief THE BURGLARS takes a classic cops-and-robbers set-up and places it upon the roofs of Paris circa late-1800s (albeit a Méliès-like set that approximates the city skyline). Second-story men have considerable difficulties once the French police get involved!Start your free trial to watch