Pay Day

Chaplin's tramp has a job in this half hour short which comically depicts the plight of the era's laborer that has changed negligibly since. There is little plot to go around but plenty of perfected sight gags by the Silent master as he works and drinks with co-workers and fends off his shrewish rolling pin wielding wife who is intent on collecting his entire pay. The most deft comedy bits are on the job as he does amazing things with a lift as well as a scene grabbing bricks being tossed to him (albeit achieved by reversing the negative). The drinking with co-workers keeps the laughs going and continue through the final confrontation with the wife as Chaplin's uproarious balletic grace remains in fine form from start to finish.

This film is definitely worth seeing for the amazing slapstick sequences, though it doesn't have much of a storyline overall. The killer opening scenes, showing Charlie working at a construction site, had me staring open-mouthed at the screen. I also enjoyed the drunks' night out, the running-after-the-tram scenes, and the bits involving the cats (especially that sausage one).

I was less thrilled with the clichéd character of the rolling-pin-wielding wife. That role seems kind of misogynist to me, plus it opens up way too many questions that the film will never answer--you can't help but wonder how they got together in the first place, etc. And it takes a little of the innocent shine off of Charlie's sighs over Edna Purviance when you find out he's supposed to be married. The Tramp actually seems unusually louche in this picture.

According to David Robinson, this picture boasted some of the first successful night scenes that didn't have to be tinted. I loved the big searchlight that lit up the tram sequence. Sydney Chaplin also contributes some nice comedy. Edna, disappointingly, has a very small role.

This is far from my favorite Chaplin film, but I'm glad I have the DVD, because there are sequences I will enjoy watching over and over (and in slow motion).

Pay Day is definitely one of the best of all of Charlie Chaplin's early short comedies, and that's not even just because it is now placed at the end of The Gold Rush, Chaplin's own favorite of his films. Charlie plays a construction worker who shows up to work late to a job at which his boss is clearly a tyrant. The part where Charlie is in the ditch strenuously digging and only coming up with tiny bits of dirt is one of the funniest parts of the entire film. And then, of course, you have the classic brick throwing scene, which was sure to have knocked people off of their seats when they first saw it in 1922.

But Pay Day is not just another slapstick comedy, it's also got one of the better stories of Chaplin's early, short films. His misadventures at work set up the scene for his underpayment (which seemed not to be enough pay because Charlie was uneducated and added wrong – 2+2+2+2=9), and his eventual confrontations with his beast of a wife. When she takes nearly all of his paycheck, he sneaks away to a bar to get drunk, finally making it home at 5am, only to find his horrendous wife sleeping with a rolling pin. It is another classic moment when he sneaks into the bathroom (hoping to have convinced his wife that he has already left for work) and goes to jump into the bathtub full of laundry, only to find that it is also full of water.

While Pay Day does present a steady stream of slapstick comedy (which was, of course, one of Chaplin's greatest skills), it is also a fairly involved story, which few of his short films had, but which were almost always very well done. He again presents the predicament of the working man, both in his work environment as well as an amusing comment on the working man's home life. If you are interested in Chaplin's work or in slapstick comedy in general, Pay Day is a must see.

Said to be Chaplin's favorite of his short films, Pay Day is a quick, yet funny story of the Tramp and his Pay Day. Showing up to the job late, complaining about his wage, and then having to deal with his scary wife is just the first half of the movie. The night spent out on the town, drinking his problems away and then trying ever so hard to catch the train home is the second half. The physical comedy in Pay day is pure Chaplin. Catching the bricks, the escapades with the elevator and the mob to ride the train are segments that are unique and very funny. Still, Pay Day is not you average Chaplin film. There are moments in the movie that are just there to make you laugh. More of a joke filled story that an actual story with a beginning, middle and an end, Pay Day is a no holds bar comedy with the object to make the audience laugh. And it does.

Last of the Charlie Chaplin two-reelers, and also reportedly his favorite. The premise is efficient and simple - an irreverent bricklayer tries to dodge his responsibilities (and his penny-pinching wife) between daytime shifts at the construction site and inebriated nights on the town - which gives Chaplin enough structure to maintain forward momentum and enough freedom to fit in all the silly hijinx he wants. Plenty of those to go around. Between the creative cinematic tricks (reversing the film for a high-risk game of two-story brick tossing), the delightful visual gags (stealing coworkers' lunches with a crazed construction lift) and the abundant physical laughs (nobody goes head-over-heels quite like Charlie), I barely had time to catch my breath between all the good bits.

Clearly, Chaplin had transcended the format at this point, and was more than ready to move into full-length features after experimenting with longer acts in The Kid a year earlier. A tremendously entertaining, action-packed twenty-eight minutes.