In this short farce from France, a man pursues his wife (played by a man in drag), who he has caught trying to sneak out of the house to go shopping. The French certainly liked scenes of destruction in their films of 1911, and this one doesn't disappoint with both actors either throwing furniture at one another or crashing into various props as they fight. It no doubt raised belly laughs back in 1911, but it all looks a bit primitive today.
2 Reviews
One-Upmanship
boblipton25 July 2010
A well constructed short comedy in which Jean Durand's comedy regulars appear out of their usual characters to play a bickering couple -- she wants to go shopping alone and he doesn't want that to happen. So they fight.
The pleasure for a modern viewer is the Tex-Avery construction, in which the fight escalates and the level of violence and destruction moves up in a fairly straightforward progression. Like Avery, the length of the film determines its structure -- think of KING-SIZED CANARY and you have it. For a silent split-real, exactly the right structure and it never lets you pause to become bored.
The pleasure for a modern viewer is the Tex-Avery construction, in which the fight escalates and the level of violence and destruction moves up in a fairly straightforward progression. Like Avery, the length of the film determines its structure -- think of KING-SIZED CANARY and you have it. For a silent split-real, exactly the right structure and it never lets you pause to become bored.
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