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Comedy films from the 1900s
The best 100 of 204
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A Trip to the Moon
Professor Barbenfouillis and five of his colleagues from the Academy of Astronomy travel to the Moon aboard a rocket propelled by a giant cannon. Once on the lunar surface, the bold explorers face the many perils hidden in the caves of the
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Fantasmagorie
An animated film by French auteur Émile Cohl, one of the earliest examples of hand-drawn film animation. Drawing inspiration from J. Stuart Blackton and the Incoherents of club Hydropathes, the film, with all its wild transformations, sees our protagonist materialize a movie theatre, meet an elephant and escape from jail; A morphing, stream-of-consciousness delight.
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The Diabolic Tenant
A man rents an apartment and furnishes it in remarkable fashion.
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The Bewitched House
A group of travellers go into a house for protection. Little do they know, it is filled with ghosts who make unusual things happen to them.
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The Melomaniac
The leader of a marching band demonstrates an unusual way of writing music.
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The '?' Motorist
A magical glowing white motorcar ignores policemen, drives up buildings, flies through outer space, and can transform into a horse and carriage.
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Drama at the Puppets' House
For a short comedy of rare merit this subject is unexcelled. A chalk line series of grotesque caricatures enacted in the land of puppets. A fickle maiden gets herself into numerous embarrassing complications with her host of admirers, but the artist with lightning rapidity overcomes all obstacles and brings the maiden out victorious.
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The Enchanted Drawing
A cartoonist defies reality when he draws objects that become three-dimensional after he lifts them off his sketch pad.
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The Dog Outwits the Kidnapper
Dog Rover, from Rescued by Rover fame, chases a kidnapper's car and while he is in a pub, drives it safely home and thus saves the baby.
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Elastic Transformation
A woman enters a room with a man. She creates a duplicate of him and changes his personality by throwing his clothes from one man to the next.
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The Bewitched Shepherd
A young peasant leaves his cottage after a quarrel with his wife, and meets a witch. She takes him to a cavern, where after a series of encounters with goblins and other elusive creatures, he is presented with a choice of beautiful women of various races. Finally the witch makes his wife appear.
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Voyage autour d’une étoile
An old astronomer has been transfixed by a star for a long time. He had but one thought: to travel to it, to declare his love for it! But how? A simple but ingenious solution-- A giant bubble. Velle remade the film for Italian studio Cines in the same year.
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A Holiday Pageant at Home
A few days before the Christmas holiday, a large family decides to put on a home-made play as part of their holiday together. The mother writes the play, and the children practice it. When they are ready, they enact first a prologue and then the play.
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Whimsical People
A moon-woman shakes a Pierot costume and manifests a Pierot clown. She does this four more until there are five Pierots crowded on the ledge of the moon. They fall to the earth and dance like tops turning one by one into Columbine maidens.
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Magnetized Man
A midsummer Phantasy. The man having been attacked by footpads, puts on a suit of medieval armor which has been magnetized at a dynamo by two boys. Every metallic article which he approaches flies to him, to the great consternation of many people.
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The Skipping Cheese
The interior of a trolley car. A menagerie of passengers notices a foul odour, and pinpoint the source of the stench at a cheese saleswoman. The gendarmerie removes her from the trolley and drags her to the precinct.
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Spanish Clair de Lune
Two lovers perform a fandango dance. A jealous quarrel follows and the heart-broken swain decides to end it all. He throws himself from the window of his room, but instead of falling to his death, the anchor of a passing balloon intercepts his flight and he is taken high into the clouds. Laughing at his plight, the moon arouses the anger of the desperate lover and a battle between the two ensues.
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Diabolical Pickpocket
A pickpocket manages to escape the police through a series of fantastic tricks. The director in this film is unknown.
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The Yawner
A top-hatted man gets dressed in the morning, and starts to yawn, causing his housekeeper to yawn as well. He sets off down the street where he proceeds to make others yawn as well, including a shop keeper, passers-by, and a small group of soldiers.
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The Pumpkin Race
A pumpkin vendor returns with her loaded car. Two pranksters overturn the car, and what follows is a truly hilarious and eventful pumpkin hunt. (Nouveautés Cinématographiques, February 3, 1908)
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How the Office Boy Saw the Ball Game
An office boy plays hooky from work so he can watch a ballgame perched high atop a telephone pole. Includes footage of an actual baseball game as if seen through a telescope.
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Four-Year-Old Heroine
A little girl runs away from the maid in charge of her care and, during her escapade, she will arrest two thugs, prevent a blind man from drowning, and save some drunks from being run over by a train. According to Etienne Arnaud's own notes, he filmed this short on the 18th and 19th of July, 1907. Alice Guy, who is mistakenly attributed to have directed it, had been living in the United States long before those dates.
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The Boutdebois Brothers
Prodigious feats of strength by two little wooden men who leave the most sophisticated puppets far behind.
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The Colonel's Account
This short film consists of a crazy old colonel being asked to entertain party guests about his exploits of daring. However, being a totally insane old coot, he runs amok acting out his war-time heroics--smashing and throwing everything in the room!
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The Sculptor's Dream
The artist studio is decorated with a rug, a chaise lounge, a small table, a plinth, a couple of copies of classic sculptures, a vase with flowers, a few prints on the walls, and on the wood paneled lower half of the wall, an 8-pointed star [Saturn-Film's logo]. The artist is wearing a white shirt over his grey trousers, shirt and necktie, and he is wearing black shoes. With hammer and chisel, he applies the last touches on his last piece of sculpture - The Three Graces, standing nude on a rectangular podium covered with a white bed-shirt. He steps back, contemplates his work, and rejoices on the beauty he has achieved. He goes out momentarily, and brings a bottle of champagne and a glass; before drinking, he makes a toast to his finished statue. He drinks, smokes a cigarette, and contemplates his work - until he falls asleep on the chaise lounge. Only then do The Three Graces stir, and
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Le Coucher de la mariée
On their wedding night, the newlyweds are ready to go to bed with the ceremony of taking off their clothes, the bride, and the groom wanting to see what he has not seen yet.
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The Vacuum Cleaner
In this funny picture we see the vacuum cleaner, the modern dust eradicator, performing some very droll tricks. As soon as the fellow turns on the air then the fun begins. It is all accomplished through some clever trick photography. First we see two attendants start out to do a cleaning job, and while they stop to take some refreshments, two men, who happen to be passing, take the machine and start down the sheet to have some fun. They meet a woman with a dog on a leash, and at a turn of the wheel, the dog and its mistress are quickly drawn into the spout. Next a nursemaid comes sauntering down the street, and when they level the spout at her she meets the same fate. A girl and her lover are the next to disappear off the face of the earth, and still they go along, looking for more victims. (Moving Picture World)
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The Policemen's Little Run
A policeman spots a dog stealing a piece of meat from a butcher's shop, and gives chase. Soon several more policemen have joined the pursuit. But the chase does not turn out as the policemen expect.
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Why That Actor Was Late
An actor tries to get to a show on time. Many mishaps along the way.
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Rogues' Tricks
Fun film from French master Georges Melies has a couple burglar's breaking into a man's home and having to hide when that man returns. Instead of a trick film or something that he's known for, the director really changes gears here and instead delivers what's basically an action movie.
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Soap Bubbles
A magician blows some big bubbles and makes heads of women appear inside them.
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Love's Surprises
A man, his wife and their two sons are having a meal. One of the sons leaves the room pretending to be ill and collects a bunch of flowers form a cupboard and goes out. The other son takes a bunch of flowers from under his bed and he too leaves, followed by their father, also carrying flowers. The two sons and their father call on the same young women one after the other; as each arrives, the previous suitor is hidden in a piece of furniture: the father under a chair cover, one son in a cupboard and the other in a piano. A girlfriend of the young woman visits and the two play pranks on the hiding men by playing the piano and sitting on the chair cover. The three men emerge and the father chases his two sons outside until they remind him of his own folly; he gives his sons some money and urges them to keep silent.
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His First Cigar
The film is quite sophisticated for it's time with a relatively large number of scene changes as we follow Max's misadventures. It also features a close-up shot to show his reactions to the effects of the cigar he is smoking.
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A Tricky Painter’s Fate
A painter boards a train and puts his paintings in the windows so that they look like passengers.
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Female Conscripts
A man in civil clothes, and three men in army uniforms are inspecting seven women to be recruited.
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His First Job
Georges Melies' film has a new guy showing up in a store on his first day and he obviously just doesn't fit in as he makes one mistake after another.
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The Strenuous Life; or, Anti-Race Suicide
A married couple faces the demands of what Theodore Roosevelt called 'the strenuous life'.
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Klebolin Sticks to Everything
A couple of kids lay their hands on a pot of very strong glue and proceed to wreak havoc.
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The Gallants of the Park
The heir of a rich family puts up a notice, where he says he is looking for a wife. As a result, he will soon find himself fleeing from a dozen women.
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The Little Soldier Who Became a God
A mixture of stop-motion and live action film from Émile Cohl with tin soldiers, children's drawings and cannibals in blackface.
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Is Spiritualism a Fraud? – The Medium Exposed
Men expose a fake medium's tricks and take revenge.
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A Crazy Composer
A silly-looking composer attempts to compose. He then falls asleep, and dreams of all manner of bizarre nonsense.
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An Impossible Balancing Feat
A magician along with three doppelgangers perform an elaborate balancing act.
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A Winter Straw Ride
Two groups of young women get into a pair of horse-drawn carts, and go off for a straw ride through the snowy streets. As they pass by a group of children, the children throw snowballs at the riders, and they and other persons begin to join in the fun. Then one of the carts tips on its side, spilling some of its occupants into the snow. Everyone soon decides that they enjoy playing in the snow even more than riding.
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Cyrano de Bergerac
Considered the first motion picture to employ both color and sound, the only film record ever made of the original star of Rostand's famous play performing a scene from his most famous role. It is accompanied by a sound-on-cylinder recording of Coquelin's voice reciting one of Cyrano's speeches.
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An Exciting Hunt
A young woman and her maid go for a stroll in the park. The maid goes away, and the girl, siting alone in her folding bank, starts feeling the effects of the heat. After a look around to make sure that she is alone, she strips naked, and has a refreshing bath. While she is at it, a middle-aged couple approaches and decides to rob the girl's clothes. The woman strips her own, poor peasant's clothes, and dons on quickly the girl's dress; they leave in a hurry. The girl is distressed when she finds that she has only her undershirt to cover herself. A policeman wearing a white casket appears before the girl can dress, and she runs away, hunted by the policeman. Nearby, a man in a white suit and Panama hat is having a picnic with his family, greets a passing friend, and offers him some refreshment. Before they can toast, they're trample on by the fugitive girl, and the policeman close by. The
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Wonderful Mirrors
A talented youth has compounded a wonderful fluid, a little of which he applies to the mirror in his room, and when he looks into it his image comes to life and comes out of the frame and imitates his every action. As soon as he rubs the fluid off the mirror his double disappears. When the servant come in, a little of the fluid is again rubbed on the mirror, and he has the same experience, his reflection stepping out and doing stunts, thereby scaring the poor fellow almost to death. The inventor of the fluid then takes the mirror with him and goes out on the street.
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The Fur Hat
A grenadier had come to see his lover, a servant in the homes of wealthy bourgeois people. Hearing a noise, he is afraid of the masters and allows himself to be locked in a cupboard so as not to be seen. This is a hiding place that will spark many adventures.
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Mr. Flip
Mr. Flip flirts with every woman he sees, and ends up with a pie, shaving cream, and seltzer in his face.
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Personal
A man who has placed a personal advertisement for a prospective wife goes to wait at the meeting place that he designated. Soon a woman comes in response to the advertisement. Before the two have a chance to converse, several more women arrive on the scene. Now completely flustered, the man flees, initiating a lengthy chase.
- 56
The Rolling Bed
An impecunious chap is unable to pay his rent, whereupon he is ejected, but all his furniture is retained and he is allowed to remove only his rolling bed. Pulling this a few blocks, he is exhausted and lies down on the bed to rest. He is soon the center of attraction, and the crowd continues to gather, when the police order him away, and as he refuses to move he is started off by the officers, who guide him for a time, but are forcibly deterred by indignant citizens from further interference. The impecunious man and his bed, which gains momentum as it runs down the inclines, cause much excitement en route, and finally arrive at the business center, where it comes to a stop alongside the walk. Our friend has purloined a fur coat and an auto horn on his tour, and now presents a modern chauffeur. (Gaumont catalogue)
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A Sticky Woman
A lady uses her maid to lick her stamps, when an overtly excited man notices the maid, forcibly kisses her, and they wind up stuck to each other.
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Man Monkey
A gentleman visits a hair consultant for his baldness problems. The latter recommends a new lotion. The gentleman lets himself be convinced and a bellboy is immediately dispatched for the delivery which arrives at the concierge's lodge. The concierge, curious, and believing it to be good wine drinks a good part of it. He then tops up the bottle with water from the carafe. His wife goes to take his package to the gentleman. The concierge who does not feel well goes to bed quickly. When he wakes up he is perked up. But dismay, he is completely covered in hair. At first frightened, his wife and he come up with an idea. They get hired by an impresario in a music hall number, to a big success.
- 60
The Vain Parlor Maid
A housemaid is cleaning a studio. When she sees a sculpture of a nude woman in life-size, lying on a couch, she starts to compare this idealized body with her own. She takes off her clothes one by one, thus revealing her own naked body, and she compares the various parts of her body with those of the statue. The master of the house enters the studio. When he sees his housemaid naked, he tells her to go into the next room, and then goes into that room himself.
- 61
The Dentures
Mother in law gets a new set of dentures. Despite being initially happy, the family soon discovers the teeth have a life of their own and jump from their owner's mouth and bite everyone who comes near--from ladies to gentlemen to policemen.
- 62
Long Distance Wireless Photography
Into a photography studio full of large fantastic machines steps an elderly couple. The bearded proprietor explains the equipment and gives them a demonstration: he starts machines whirring, and projects a painting of three women onto a large screen; suddenly the women begin to move. The customers are impressed. First the women sits in the special seat: she's projected onto the screen, and her good nature comes out in the laughing image. Then it's the man's turn, but the machine discloses a vastly different nature in him. Will his reaction threaten our proprietor's inventions?
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A Funny Shave
A man is trying to shave, but grotesque faces keep appearing in his mirror.
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The Happy Microbes
A scientist has acquired a microscope and is showing it off to his friend. He takes various body samples - hair, phlegm, etc. - and puts them under the microscope. The "microbes" coalesce and form different shapes, creating caricatures of various people, such as mothers-in-law and drunks. These animated characters goof around in traditional cartoon fashion.
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Turn-of-the-Century Surgery
George Mélies made a version of this a few years later, often titled Une Indigestion, but Guy-Blaché’s earlier film Chirurgie Fin de Siecle (1900) is more widely available. And it’s not one to watch the night before an operation. In this clinic, a sign pleads “On est prie de ne pas crier/Please do not cry”, and the doctors set about the patient with saws, cheerily hacking off limbs, and then slopping them into a bucket, all the while arguing ferociously with each other. They then reattach arms and legs from a bucket of “exchange pieces” (using glue) before re-animating their victim, I mean patient, with bellows. (from http://silentlondon.co.uk/2015/01/23/10-disgusting-moments-in-silent-cinema/)
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Good Glue Sticks
A peddler of "the best glue" sets up his outdoor stall. A crowd gathers for a demonstration. As he gives his pitch, two observant cops decide drive off his customers and close him down, much to his fury. He seeks revenge as they sit on a park bench.
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Get Me a Step-Ladder
An old man attempts to hang a picture on the wall and asks for a step-ladder. His assistant takes a little too long to get it to him.
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The Fantastic Diver
Ferdinand Zecca's remake of his own film "Plongeur fantastique" (The Fantastic Plunger, 1901) with the same premise, showing a diver with reverse motion editing for a curious effect
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Wordplay
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The White Suit
The mishaps of a man who steps into the street wearing his brand-new white suit, and who instantly encounters every conceivable insult to his suit's integrity: a coalman bumps into him, a waiter spills food on him, a painter walks into him.
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What's Your Hurry?
Papa is proud of his new birthday present, a shotgun. Mary's boyfriend arrives for a visit and she is anxious to introduce him to Papa. When Harry sees Papa walk in with a shotgun he misunderstands and departs in terror. Harry continues to encounter Papa everywhere and runs away, baffling the old man. At last Papa hauls Harry back home for an explanation and a reunion with Mary.
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Little Tich (and his Big Boots)
This film belongs to the PHONO CINEMA THEATRE programme that ran during the Universal Exhibition of Paris in 1900, with synchronized screenings of films and recorded voices of famous actors and singers.
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Levi & Cohen, the Irish Comedians
Showing two typical concert hall knock-about teams in a very poor performance. It ends up in their being egged by the audience.
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Meet Me at the Fountain
Frenchman Count Hardup advertises for a wife. He gets more than he bargained for when women start chasing him. He's caught by an old maid.
- 81
The Haunted Lounge
A tramp in his haste to escape from the clutches of the law, rushes into a second-hand store and hides in a folding lounge. The lounge changes hands several times with each owner believing it is haunted. Finally it arrives in the home of a policeman. The policeman attempts to sleep, but the lounge starts to move, the policeman clinging to it. After riding about the room, the lounge starts for the door, goes down the stairs to the hallway out the back door into the yard. The policeman decides to burn the lounge, and after it is burned to ashes, behold the tramp standing in the center of the ash heap unharmed. The police arrest him for disturbing the peace.
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Il Natale di Cretinetti
Comedy from a series about the character Cretinetti (Gibrouille). He is organizing a Christmas party but it ends up being a total mess. He buys a Christmas tree, but the tree is so big that he can hardly transport it to the party. As he runs around the city with the tree he creates one disaster after another.
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The Terrible Kids
Two boys and their dog set out to play a series of practical jokes on their neighbors. After they have caused several disruptions, the police are called, and soon the boys are on the run, pursued by the police and others. In their efforts to escape, the boys receive considerable help from the resourceful dog.
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The Wig Chase
While a balloon merchant sleeps on a river bank, a group of children steal his balloons and attach them to the hat of an old lady. Her hat and wig come off and a chase through Paris begins.
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Attempted Suicide
Suffering from unrequited love, Max hangs himself from a tree, and ends up hanging for hours while local townspeople squabble over whose responsibility it is to rescue him.
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The Misadventure of a French Gentleman Without Pants at the Zandvoort Beach
'Zandvoort in an uproar! On Saturday morning at roughly 10 o’clock, with beautiful weather and calm seas, a Frenchman sat in a beach chair to gaze upon the magnificent view that the sea always affords, until he slowly began to fall asleep’ So begins a report in the ‘Zandvoortsche Courant’ of July 25, 1905. The article explains how the man was faced with the oncoming tide, and – to the amazement of the audience – took off his trousers to prevent them from being ruined by the saltwater. While trying to escape from the policeman who had rushed to the scene, he jumps into a passing car, and hides out in a small changing cabin. Eventually he's nabbed by the police. Accompanied by a band and a large crowd, he is escorted to the police station. The article ends by saying that ‘Messrs. Alberts Frères’ had staged the whole incident for a film in which two of the most popular genres of that period
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The Haunted Hotel
Pathé film #2871. In a hotel, a weary traveler settles down to rest. But, hallucinations brought on by fatigue: monsters appear around the bed, which vanishes, while the traveler, thrown to the floor, gets up and grabs a chair. But it gives way beneath him and rolls to the other side of the room. The traveler tries again: the chair multiplies endlessly, multitudes of chairs fill the room but remain elusive to our traveler. Soon, they pile up around him, burying him as he struggles desperately… (Fondation Jerôme Seydoux-Pathé).
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Le Boudoir mystérieux
A lady sits down at her make-up table and regards its mirror. Various women appear in the glass, dancing, primping and doing other feminine activities.
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Gustaf III and Bellman
The poet Bellman enjoys life in 18th Century Stockholm, while a conspiracy to murder King Gustaf III is taking form.
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Jack the Kisser
An energetic man steals kisses from passing ladies, until bystanders give chase.
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Le Matelas de la mariée
A mattress maker briefly leaves the mattress she's mending. A drunkard leaving the café sits down on it. The woman returns and finishes her work. Then, after numerous mishaps, the mattress is delivered. Finally, it's placed in a bedroom. Shortly after, a newlywed couple arrives. But at the crucial moment, the man emerges from the mattress, disheveled, much to the bride's alarm.
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Foottit et Chocolat, II. Acrobates sur la chaise
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The Latest News
A man reads a newspaper whose moving letters form 'Bill Bailey has come home'.
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A Catastrophe in Hester Street
Two workers leave boxes of explosives with a push cart street vendor while they visit a bar. They return drunk and accidentally drop a box of nitro powder, causing an explosion that wrecks the block and blows off the vendor’s arm. A policeman shows up to the carnage and tries to replace the vendor’s arm with a severed leg.
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A Great Discovery
The son of an astronomer hides the family cat in his father's telescope.
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Spot at the 'Phone
A man inadvertently leaves his dog behind at the phone and calls him from the restaurant to give him directions so they can be reunited.
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The Politician's Love Story
A haughty politician, on seeing a satirical cartoon in a newspaper, rushes to the paper's offices to shoot the cartoonist. On discovering the cartoonist is a pretty woman, he falls instantly in love and wastes no time in trying to woo her.
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