Flip's Circus (1921)
Here's another film from Winsor McCay but sadly it too is only available in various fragments thrown today and it's not enough to fully understand the movie. Thankfully there are still over six minutes worth of fragments so we get the basic outline of the film, which has Flip, the circus owner, performing in various locations with a trained dinosaur. I'm really not sure how much of this film is actually lost and how much of it just never got completed. There are several bits of footage with a sign showing "Argument 2" or "Argument 3" where I'm guessing footage was supposed to either have been added or perhaps this is just some that is lost. Either way, one at least gets a very good idea of what the film was going for, which was just Flip doing various tricks with the dinosaur. As you'd expect, the animation was quite good throughout and I thought the character of Flip was nice and strong enough to carry you through the movie. The dinosaur was clearly modeled after Gertie and looks good as well. Fans of McCay will certainly want to check it out as well as those interested in this eras animation.
