5/5 Wow
  by Steven Hellerstedt
Fifteen hours and 53 films worth of silent slapstick is a LOT of silent slapstick. Before you go any farther you should realize this isn't the greatest 15 hours worth of silent slapstick available. If you want to get the best - the funniest stuff - buy the boxed sets of Chaplin, Lloyd, Keaton and Laurel & Hardy, and then see if you can find a compilation disk with some Harry Langdon and Fatty Arbuckle on it. Oh, the heavy hitters are here, but it's the inclusion of so much by the other guys that sets this set apart. If you like silent movies and are willing to sit through some strange stuff for no other reason than to see what folks were laughing at 100 years ago, this set is for you. I think it's a gold mine. A sprawling gold mine, but priceless to anyone interested in the history of filmed comedy. Each disk is divided into two sections. To give a sense of the breadth of this set, I'll briefly mention the highlights - or lowlights - of each section.

1-`Pioneers' - Section one of disk one features the pioneers of silent slapstick and contains, I believe, the earliest film in this collection, the 4-minute long `Mr. Flip' (1909), starring cross-eyed comic Ben Turpin. Mr. Griffith hadn't invented the close-up yet so we don't get a chance to see Turpin's crossed money makers. This film has Mr. Flip flirting with every woman he comes across and getting slapped with shaving cream, pies, etc., for his trouble. No plot, not even a real start or end, and really not very funny, but oddly engaging.
2- `Keystone Tonight' - Ninety odd minutes worth of early Mack Sennett/Keystone Studio one- and two-reelers. Highlight is the 16-minute `The Rounders' from 1914. Charlie Chaplin and Fatty Arbuckle star as a couple of lushes who flee from their wives so they can continue getting sloshed in the hotel bar. A lot of funny-drunk sight gags. Both had and would make more memorable films, but interesting to see how these two ad-lib off each other. This section also contains Harry Langdon's `Saturday Afternoon,' (1926, 30mins.) one of those `hen-pecked husband stepping out' movies. Some claim Langdon was the fourth great silent comedian, and his films are generally less available than Chaplin's, or Keaton's, or Lloyds's. As an innocent man-child, somewhat the waif, and a great pantomime, Langdon reminded me a lot of Stan Laurel. A somewhat creepy Laurel, to be sure. There are a couple more Langdon shorts in this set, so you can decide his claim to glory for yourself.

3- `Sennett in the `20s' - More madcap mayhem from one of the kings of silent movie producers. Because it's Sennett, coherence and continuity are going to take a back seat - or asked to take a walk - over speed and visual gags. In the 20-minute `Circus Today' (1926) Sennett favorites Bill Bevans and Andy Clyde play a couple of bumbling circus hands. Beauty Madeline Hurlock plays the circus bare-back rider. Bevans is the competent, if unmemorable, knockabout comedian with the brush moustache. Not unusual for a comedy of this era, the stars are gleefully put in harm's way every 2 minutes or so. At one point a cage full of lions escape and, naturally, chase all the main players. In one very memorable scene, the tutu-clad Ms. Hurlock is seen flat on the ground with a 400-pound male lion sitting on top of her. No process shot in this one, and I'd imagine no second take, either.
4- `Funny Girls: Genders and Their Benders.' Slapsticks starring female actresses Gale Henry, Alice Howard, et al.

5- `Keaton, Arbuckle, and St. John.' Fatty Arbuckle with Mabel Normand, a couple of Arbuckle and Keaton collaborations, one Keaton solo and one two-reeler featuring Arbuckle nephew Al St. John. Keaton's solo outing `The Boat' (1921) is the best film in the entire collection, and a textbook example of how to build and sustain a gag.
6- `Hal Roach's Acts: Star Comedians.' Five shorts from the Hal Roach studio, including a Stan Laurel solo project, a Charley Chase domestic comedy, and a Will Rogers' spoof of contemporary hit movies by Valentino and Fairbanks. Also in this section are a couple of shorts starring Harold Lloyd, including his winning 1920 horror spoof, `Haunted Spooks.'

7-`Hal Roach: The Lot of Fun.' Laurel and Hardy, Our Gang, Charley Chase, and Snub Pollard. The `Laurel & Hardy Lafftoons' was the only disappointing entry in this set. `Lafftoons' is the only instance in which compiled highlight scenes, rather than a complete film, was presented. Laurel and Hardy are a favorite of mine, but I would have preferred seeing all of `Angora Love,' rather than a short scene from it. Charley Chase is perhaps the most consistently sophisticated comic in this set. Chase uses slapstick to accent characters and situations and push the plot ahead - pretty much the diametric opposition of how it was usually done.
8- `Chaplin and the Music Hall Tradition.' Or, Chaplin and his imitators. This sections opens with 1915's `A Night in the Show,' with Charlie playing two roles - Mr. Pest and Mr. Rowdy - whose names ought to clue you in to what kind of (inebriated) theater goers they are. One is tuxedoed and sits in a box seat, one is shabbily dressed and sits way back up in the cheap seats. One of the more curious shorts in this set is 1918's `He's in Again,' with Billy West - who looks and dresses just like Chaplin - as an out-at-the-heels bar customer. West was the most successful of Chaplin imitators, and, if nothing else, this short gives you a direct example of the difference between competence and genius.

9- `The Race is On.' Four shorts here, all celebrating speed and all featuring some of the most hair-raising footage you'll ever see. The worst is Monty Bank's 1927 `Chasing Choo Choos.' It's easy to take scary stuff on film when you know there's CGI or some other film trick involved. Some of the stunts in this one defy an obvious explanation. In one scene - the one that had me on the edge of my seat - Banks has two feet in a racing race car (one that the driver had bailed out of!) and two hands on a speeding locomotive. Simply the most amazing stunt I've ever seen.
10- `Anarchic Fringe.' Well, we finally get to see a Ben Turpin close-up in `Yukon Jake' (1924). The biggest surprise, to some, will be Charley Bowers' 1926 `Now You Tell One.' Bowers, who bears more than a passing resemblance to Buster Keaton, tells his story to a gathering of the Liars' Club. Bowers included stop-action animation in his shorts, was really a pioneer in the field, and his story includes a rapidly growing eggplant that contains an egg and salt shaker, shoe strings that tie themselves, and other such fanciful nonsense.


4/5 The best introduction to silent comedies.
  by Paul J. Mular (San Carlos, CA USA)
I agree with all of the rave reviews.

But I give this set only 4 stars because of the poor presentation of Laurel & Hardy. For some reason we are given edited TV cut-downs that are not up to the current restorations on the Lost Films of Laurel & hardy DVD sets. They are cut to where there is no sence to what is happening and are a waste of time to watch.

Another small disappointement is the Charlie Chaplins, they are not the current restorations on the new Chaplin DVD sets from Warners. They look acceptable, but not up to the the New restorations.

I also wish some attempt was made to re-create original looking title cards & end titles for the shorts that were missing them. The LostFilms of Laurel & Hardy and the Kino Comedy Classic sets do this.

5/5 Sure to entertain for hours on end.
  by Prometheus (USA)
The Slapstick Encyclopedia is chock full of entertaining, rare movies from the earliest days of silent movies. Charlie Chaplin, Fatty Arbuckle, Stan Laurel without Oliver Hardy, Oliver Hardy without Stan Laurel, Bustard Keaton, Hal Roach comedies, Harold Loyd in Haunted Spooks, Harry Langdon, Will Rogers, Keystone cops...all the unforgettable greats, you may have only read about in books, and rarely seen, doing the antics that once made movies so special. Included is the rarest of rare, a 1916 film starring Great black entertainer Bert Williams doing some of the comic routines that made him famous and part of America's conscience for decades after his death. Sure to entertain for hours on end.

5/5 Back to Silents...with Raucous Laughter
  by woolrich2 (VA. United States)
There are some great and not-so-great items in this set, but all are of interest, if you like silent comedies. I recommend the 3 shorts each by Harry Langdon and Harold Lloyd (with one caveat to be discussed for "Haunted Spooks"), the rare version of Buster Keaton's "The Boat," some of the solo efforts by Stan Laurel (of later Laurel & Hardy fame), the "Hairbreadth Harry" short entitled "Danger Ahead" (based on a 1920's comic strip and one of the most ridiculously inspired things I've ever seen), the teaming of Charlie Chaplin and "Fatty" Arbuckle in "The Rounders" (where they each try to top one another on screen), and the delirious short by Charley Bowers (the only successful comedian/animator in film history--who incorporates his bizarre animation into his film shorts).

You can see so much here, as to the development of the careers of famous silent comedians. See Buster Keaton's crying and mugging hysterics while with "Fatty" Arbuckle develop into his more familiar stoic "Great Stone Face." See Stan Laurel go from frenetic nasty idiot on screen to playing the more sublime "Stanley" in the Laurel and Hardy shorts. See early Harold Lloyd shorts where his character has a bit more of an edge. Wonder why Ben Turpin had a career at all. All along marvel at the wonderful, appropriate musical accompaniment, sometimes on the odd "Fotoplayer."

The caveat? Well, nothing and I mean nothing has been censored and some very politically incorrect moments also make the cut, a few of which can make for some startling viewing for modern sensibilities. Then again, these films are 75 to 90 years old, and that should be borne in mind. In particular, I'm thinking of "The Detectress" and "Haunted Spooks" and parts of the Bert Williams short as rather blatant offenders. Also, while the prints included are some of the best surviving, a small number have some nitrate decomposition, sprocket jump, discoloration, and the like. As an example, the quality of "The Garage" with Keaton/Arbuckle's a little disappointing compared to some other prints I've watched. However, these are often very rare films, and rough prints can be better than none.

I'd recommend this set both as a tremendous resource and a great bargain for any seasoned silent movie fan as well as any novice fan who wants to learn more in a hurry.

5/5 More info about this set
  by Jmark2001 (Florida)
I previously reviewed this set but wanted to add a few comments. Included here is the incredible film "Now you tell one" by Charlie Bowers. Bowers looks like Keaton but out Keatons Keaton! After years of working in animation, Bowers took his surreal special effects into film. The result is jaw dropping! Wait until you see him 'grow" cats - and watch out for the little mouse with the revolver!
Monty Banks gives us one of the most thrilling chases ever seen in film in "chasing choo-choos". It looks like he did all of his stunts here and it is amazing that he lived to tell about it!
Definitely a great collection. Where else can you get silent films for about a dollar each? Do I like all of them? No. But with over 50 films, there is plenty here to enjoy and thrill to.