Bonne année

Daft comedy in which a man grows increasingly irritated by the number of people wishing him happy new year in the hope of receiving a gratuity. As this is a silent movie, everyone has to carry a board with the date on it to get the message across. Strays into Melies/De Chomon territory with the beleaguered man's last minute nightmare.

This is a very pleasant split reel comedy in which the protagonist is overwhelmed by everyone insisting that he buy some New Year's kitsch -- I've been there myself on New Year's Eve, as well on Saint Patrick's Day.

For a split-reel, there's an awful lot of variety in what goes on, from the usual chase, to a plethora of special effects shots. It appears that the final gag was cut on the print I saw on Youtube, but it's not as if anything happened that I really didn't expect. Once the inevitability of the gag is set up, its anticipation before the character can see it provides its own humor.

The movie was shot a lot darker than most comedies are usually. This might have been simply a decision in printing it, of course, or it may have been a deliberate choice to add a serious undertone to the complaining tone.