Yukon Jake

The manic styles of Ben Turpin and Mack Sennett (not to mention director Del Lord) work pretty well in this comic Western, which parodies many of the conventions that were already commonplace even in the 1920's. While occasionally chaotic, most of it is pretty amusing, and it's an example in which Sennett's unrestrained approach comes across well.

Turpin plays a confident but somewhat disorganized sheriff who has to take on a gang led by the fancy shooting bad guy "Yukon Jake". Besides plenty of Western/outdoors action, Sennett's story even throws in a parody of his own bathing beauty features. It's all unrefined, and even some of the special visual effects seem to have been done in a deliberately haphazard fashion, for the sake of comic effect. But in any case, most of this is quite entertaining, and it's a good short feature to watch if you enjoy silent comedies.