The Fraidy Cat

Fraidy Cat, The (1924)

*** 1/2 (out of 4)

Jimmy Jump (Charley Chase) is the biggest coward in town as everyone picks on him. This includes the Our Gang group who shoot water on him and make is life on scare after another. Jimmy then learns he's going to die in a week so he decides to go out like a man. This is without question one of the best of the early Chase movies as he's just so good in the role of the coward that you can't help but love him but also love to see him get tormented. The Our Gang group made their debut here and their childish charm is easy to spot and it's easy to see why they would get their own series. Chase handles the material very easily and makes for a great number of laughs but one of my favorites has to be the scenes in his bedroom where he has a dummy that he picks on to try and build up courage. There's a lot more slapstick here than in your typical Jimmy Jump film but that's okay because Chase does this perfectly well.

This appears to be one of the better-known of Charley Chase's early "Jimmy Jump" one-reelers because it also happens to feature the debut of Hal Roach's "Our Gang" kids. Here they are funny only as a foil to Chase -- a group of local kids who torment the super-cowardly Charley, and upon whom he gets his comeuppance after getting a burst of courage later. Fortunately, that humor reflecting off of Charley is very funny, as is the rest of the film.

One thing that Chase did really well was to take his basic character, put a simple but often outlandish twist on it, and draw great comedy out of the complications that naturally arise. He might be the world's most forgetful man (as in the much later "The Mind Needer") or even be afflicted by a strange condition that causes time to freeze every once in a while just for him (as in "Life Hesitates at 40"). Here, developing this trick, his problem is that he is extremely cowardly; when he overhears "diet a week" and thinks this means he will die in a week (though why he thinks his girlfriend's father is to be trusted with such a prognosis we don't know), his character reverses with very amusing results.

It's well-structured as always with Charley, but more slapsticky than usual, and happily the slapstick works well. The funniest sequence, though, is a wonderful gag that involves Charley not having to speak the romantic lines he wishes he could because the man across the hedge is doing it for him.

Watch for a shot where you can lip-read Charley speaking an expletive beginning with F that wouldn't be aloud in his later sound films.

This is an extremely funny little film with a satisfying story and good structure packed only into ten minutes -- Charley Chase represents himself well his fans (such as me) and for people who come to this short just for the Little Rascals.

James Parrott, Charley Chase's younger brother, directed this short about the cowardly Jimmy. As one of the title cards says "Even the 'gang' has got Jimmy's goat - they've threatened to sic their pet rabbits on him." The gang members are the "Our Gang" kids but not the first of their film appearances, which was in 1922. Everyone bullies Jimmy, especially Lem Tucker who is chasing after Jimmy's true love, the doctor's daughter. When the doctor tells Jimmy that he needs to diet a week, Jimmy hears it as he will die in a week. Determined to 'go out like a man,' Jimmy gets tough with the kids and with Lem. There are a lot of funny bits in this one including one where Jimmy rides a bull to save the doctor's daughter from Lem. A highly entertaining Chase short.

Charley Chase returned to regular comedy performing with his 'Jimmy Jump' series of one-reelers for Roach in 1924. This is the eighth or ninth of the series. In it, he is a coward in love with Beth Darlington, but scared of everyone, including Earl Mohan, who also wishes to woo Miss Darlington, and the members of Our Gang. When he mishears the doctor and thinks he has one week to live, he finds his courage..... and some very funny gags.

Chase would continue with the one-reel comedies for another year, here under the direction of his brother, James Parrott, and later under Leo McCarey, before expanding his output to two-reels at a time, and begin a series of classic short comedies.

This was a very short Charlie Chase comedy starring as the character "Jimmy Jump". Jimmy is a total wimp--so much so that even the neighborhood children pick on this man! Plus, his rival in love makes his life miserable by picking on him as well. Jimmy is so timid though, he never fights back--choosing in one case to sick him mom on the bullies! Later, Jimmy mistakenly thinks he's dying. So, with nothing to lose, he decides to give all the bullies their "comeuppance"--and it's great fun to watch him in action! While this is obviously NOT a deep film, it is short and well-paced and above all, entertaining. At only about 10 minutes, its well worth seeing and proves that Keaton, Lloyd and Chaplin were not the only funny men of the era.