His Private Life

This short opens with a patriotic military parade and a title card informs us that "In the spring of 1917 when we had to go over and clean up the war." I found this boastful assertion to be somewhat off putting but no doubt representative of the attitude of many at the time. That aside, it is a very funny short. Reggie Hemingway is a wealthy and lazy young man "Who inherited his father's millions, power and position - and his fiancé." When Reggy's fiancé tells him what a beautiful general he will make, Reggie enlists in the army. Private Hemingway reports to boot camp donning a top hat and monocle. One of the first to greet him is a hard boiled Sergeant - who just happens to be Reggy's former secretary Oscar - a man who the arrogant Reggy had treated very nastily. One of the funniest bits is when Reggy does battle with a "runaway" fire hose and in the process drenches the camp commander, an action that gets him 30 days on Kitchen Police duty. After doing the mandatory potato peeling duty, Reggy does battle once again - this time with a huge pile of dough. A pie fight ensues between Reggy and the cook and the hapless Reggy has the misfortune to nail the camp commander with a pie and it's off to the guardhouse for Reggy. A title card then informs us "Eighteen months later. Victory! Peace! Prohibition! The world saved for Democrats!" And we are told, with the Armistice came the release of many prisoners - and out of the guardhouse walks Reggy. The diminutive Lupino Lane was an amazingly athletic comedian and while this short is not the best example of his acrobatic skills, it is still very funny and a joy to watch. As was the case in Fatty Arbuckle's post scandal career, the short credits William Goodrich as the director.

Lupino Lane (born Henry Lupino) was a prominent member of the distinguished Lupino family of clowns and actors who have performed on London's stages for more than three centuries. (Yes, Ida Lupino was a member of that family too ... and I'm pleased to report that the family are still performing.) In addition to being a gifted comedian, Lupino Lane was a skilled acrobat, and he used his acrobatic talents brilliantly in the service of slapstick comedy. Lane easily takes his rightful place alongside fellow silent-film comedians Buster Keaton and Clyde Cook: they are the three greatest acrobats of slapstick. (I would put Al St John a notch lower: unlike Keaton, Cook and Lane, Al St John never mastered any of the more advanced acrobatic manoeuvres such as a tinsika or a shoulder kip. Even Gene Kelly could do a shoulder kip!) Among his many, many acrobatic tricks, Lane was able to spin round on the top of his head like a break dancer!

Lupino Lane's career peaked on stage, in the West End musical 'Me and My Girl'. Earlier, however, he starred in some low-budget American silent comedy shorts. Lane had the great asset of Roscoe Arbuckle (post-scandal) pseudonymously scripting and directing Lane's films.

In his short films, Lane often played a fop with a monocle and a prominent spit curl. I detest this character's appearance on sight, and I suspect that this was Lane's intention. Whereas Chaplin's Little Tramp was calculated to steal the audience's sympathy, Lane and Keaton often played wealthy idiots who had to EARN the audience's sympathy.

Lane's starring short 'His Private Life' is one of his funniest films. (By coincidence, he later played a supporting role in a feature with the same title.) Here, Lane is the gormless scion of a wealthy family, who rejoices in the name Reggie Hemingway. Did scriptwriter Roscoe Arbuckle think there was something funny about the name Hemingway? His hilarious film 'Curses!', also made about this time, features a hero named Rodney Hemingway.

Reggie makes a right berk of himself in the business world, alienating his father's secretary Oscar (George Davis, a near-lookalike to Fernandel) and getting the man sacked. A pretty girl demonstrates her penchant for men in uniforms. To impress her, Reggie enlists. In one of those convenient silent-film coincidences, Private Hemingway (as Reggie now is) discovers that his new drill sergeant is Oscar, ready and eager to make Reggie's life sheer hell.

Every frame of this movie is hilarious. My only regret is that the hosepipe sequence resorts to special effects to enable Lane to perform some 'impossible' gags which any fourth-rate comedian such as Billy Franey could have done just as effectively. Lane's brilliant acrobatic skills enabled him to achieve (with NO fakery) slapstick gags that no other comedian could have performed: not even the great Buster Keaton. and Lane should have concentrated on his own considerable strengths instead of cheap sight gags.

I agree with the point previously made by IMDb reviewer Bob Lipton, who noted that this film benefits from its excellent photography and wide-open exteriors. Arbuckle was a courageous and innovative director who avoided the usual 'formulas' of comedy direction, and this movie benefits strongly from his talents. I'll rate the very funny 'His Private Life' 9 out of 10.

A lovely little service comedy for Lupino Lane. He was one of the great acrobatic comics of the silent era, ranking with Keaton and Al St. John for the amazing complexity of his falls, and here, under the direction of Roscoe Arbuckle, he pulls some wonderful stunts. The drill scenes, where he is constantly out of step are not only funny, they are beautifully shot by cinematographer Byron Houck to bring out the size of the field: Arbuckle, unlike most comedy directors, did not insist on shooting in flat bright light.

Besides his physical dexterity, Lane also had a great talent for fighting with inanimate objects in a way that makes them seem alive and malevolent; if you've seen him work with his cape in the musical ME AND MY GIRL, you have an idea of his abilities in this arena. Here he gets to fight with a firehose, a stack of plates, and a huge and ill-tempered mass of dough.

Highly recommended.