Historically noted as Chaplin's first film he directed, wrote, edited, and starred in, Chaplin plays a ineffectual husband faced with the imposing oaf: Mack Swain. Swain is trying to make time with Charlie's wife, played by Mabel Normand (who co-wrote the film). The setting is in a park and soon it's apparent Swain is married also and the yolk is on him as they say. Chaplin goes through his drunk routine in a bar while Mabel receives a special delivery of what looks like a mannequin version of Mack Swain in the park. Chaplin arrives home and, being drunk of course, thinks the mannequin is real. It's here where the highlight of the film comes. Nineteen year old Mabel Normand must have been a sensation in those pajamas back in 1914. The film appears to follow a more logical progression than most Keystone Chaplin efforts. It's one of the earliest films of Chaplin with extensive footage of him engaging in physical comedy with prop(s). ** of 4 stars.

In one of the most effective and thorough characterizations in any of Chaplin's films up until that time, in Mabel's Married Life Charlie plays Mabel's husband, an feeble drunk incapable of deflecting the oafish advances of a huge man in the park, who hits on Charlie's wife right in front of him. Starting these films in the park was one of Chaplin's favorite things to do back in the earliest days of his career, but here he starts his film there and then takes us into the mind of one of the characters, rather than just having some on screen slapstick goofiness.Soon after the park incident, Charlie goes to a bar and is teased by the other patrons as he slowly gets drunk. His wife, meanwhile, is at home fashioning a blow-up doll to resemble the man in the park, thus providing a scenario from which her drunken husband can emerge her hero.There have been some criticisms that the scene involving the dummy wasn't fleshed out and made into the effective scene that it could have been, but I have to disagree. It is very stereotypical Chaplin comedy that comes out of the scene, but I can't think of any reason to expect anything different. What we do get is a brief but effective look at the desperation of a woman who is married to someone who wants to but is unable to protect her from undesirables, and her efforts to improve her husband's confidence. It doesn't seem to work too well, but I have a feeling that the film's original audiences were more than pleased.This film, by the way, is notable as being the first that Chaplin was allowed to write and direct on his own, and as compared to the rest of his films from this time, it is clear that he immediately began to prove his talent. Oh, and one more thing - you may notice that the film has French intertitles. I'm not sure why this is, but those of you lucky (and smart) enough to own a Mac, you can just type them into the translator on your Dashboard and have it translated into your language of choice...

Once you've seen a few Keystone comedies made before Charlie Chaplin arrived on the scene you get a sense of the impact he had on contemporary viewers. Sure, the best of the 1912-13 Keystones have a gritty vitality, but they take a little getting used to. They're sometimes haphazardly constructed, and often quite violent. This is not to say that Chaplin's arrival brought about an instant change in approach, for his earliest directorial efforts such as A Busy Day or The Property Man are easily as rough as the studio's typical output, but in his best Keystones we can see Chaplin begin to find his style. As a director he smoothed out the stories and slowed down the pace, while as an actor he showed more finesse than most of his colleagues, and also influenced them to temper their mugging and gesticulating. Mabel's Married Life is one of the Keystones I enjoy. It tells a coherent if simple story, violence is kept to a minimum, and it builds not to a wild chase but to a genuinely amusing, leisurely paced routine: Charlie's drunken encounter with a boxer's dummy. Compared to Chaplin's own later work this short is still a bit ragged; the routine with the dummy isn't as fully developed as it might have been, and the character Charlie plays is far from admirable, but there are laughs along the way and the tone is agreeably lighthearted, despite the saloon sequences and Charlie's heavy drinking.Like so many Keystone comedies this one begins in a park. Charlie and wife Mabel Normand sit together on a bench, but Charlie is miserly and only grudgingly shares some of the banana he's eating. When he goes off to drink in a nearby saloon a burly gent played by Mack Swain attempts to make time with Mabel, who is decidedly uninterested. (Swain is clean-shaven here, and rather less cartoon-y than usual.) Charlie returns but finds it difficult to assert himself against the big guy, who treats him as an ineffectual pest. Eventually Swain's wife must intervene and call him off. When Charlie returns to the saloon Mabel, exasperated, purchases a boxing dummy so that her husband can learn self defense. That night when Charlie returns home tipsy he believes the dummy is Swain, and has a hard time ejecting him while Mabel watches in amusement.Charlie's encounter with the dummy is the comic highlight, but Mabel has some nice moments, too. Whenever I see this film I always enjoy her disgusted impersonation of her husband's waddling walk, and she has her own lively confrontation with the dummy before Charlie returns home. When we watch Chaplin's early films we tend to compare them to his mature work, so of course they tend to come up short, but Mabel's Married Life stands as one of the better comedies he made for Mack Sennett during his apprenticeship.P.S. I was lucky enough to acquire a Super-8 print of this comedy from Blackhawk Films in the '70s, and when I screened it again recently I appreciated the quality of the musical score they provided, a series of peppy themes played on a Wurlitzer organ. Sometimes I find organ music inappropriate for comedies, but this score really works, and definitely enhances the impact of the film. Many thanks, Blackhawk!

I've seen quite a few Chaplin shorts from early in his career and I've noticed that his early stuff (done for Keystone Studios) is pretty dreadful stuff. Unlike his wonderful full-length films from the 20s and 30s, the films from 1914-1915 are incredibly poorly made--having no script but only vague instructions from the director. In most cases, the films had almost no plot and degenerated to people punching and kicking each other.Well, this film isn't really any better than the rest. Charlie and Mabel Normand spend much of the film slapping or being slapped. Charlie is powerless to stop a tough jerk from making unwanted advances on his wife. So, Mabel buys a punching doll and a drunk Charlie thinks it's real. That's it. No real laughs and no real plot.FYI--this short was from THE ESSENTIAL CHARLIE CHAPLIN COLLECTION from Delta Entertainment. Like a few of these early shorts, the captions are all in French! Well, lucky for me I have a pretty good understanding of the language. Others might be frustrated at this, but there are only a few captions.