A SAILOR-MADE MAN (1921)

With rare exception, Hollywood silent comedies were 2-reelers running between 20 and 26 minutes.*  Feature-length gaggers didn’t become a regular thing till Charles Chaplin, Harold Lloyd and a bit later Buster Keaton switched to long form (five or six reels).  Sure, their movies were growing up, but there was also a big financial incentive.  (How frustrating to watch your two-reeler bring in the customers while some mediocre feature piggybacking on your popularity took home the lion’s share of the gross.)  What’s more surprising is that all three got there in two-steps, at first adding a reel or two to make what were essentially expanded ‘shorts’ before adding another reel, not only for length, but for complexity, essentially finding something new: The Shape of a comedy feature film thru story development and character arc.  So Keaton moves from THE THREE AGES/’23, basically a trio of cleverly intercut  two-reelers, to OUR HOSPITALITY/’23, a comic ‘feudin’ families’ melodrama.  Chaplin from the four reel WWI parody of SHOULDER ARMS/’18 to heartfelt human comedy in his six-reel THE KID/’21*  And Lloyd from this four reel knockabout slapstick to real emotion in the five reel GRANDMA’S BOY/’22.  That’s not to say that SAILOR-MADE isn’t a superior expansion of what he’d been doing.  It’s hilarious; with rich wastrel Harold wanting to marry the even richer Mildred Davis (as they would in real life), but first needing Daddy’s approval.  Get a job young man, he tells the boy.  Luckily, a Navy recruiting poster offers the chance.  And thru a series of challenges met & adventures on sea & land, Lloyd learns to swab the deck, throw a punch, even rescue Mildred from a harem (don’t ask).  Lots of fun, and with greater things to come as Lloyd’s less eccentric persona proved an even better match for features than it was for shorts.

ATTENTION MUST BE PAID:  *While a synch-sound reel runs about ten minutes, cranking speeds varied not only by cameraman but also by projectionist.  Cheap studios getting as much product on a single reel of expensive film as possible.  Grind slow!  Greedy theater owners trying to squeeze in an extra show per day.  Grind fast!

SCREWY THOUGHT OF THE DAY:  *Chaplin’s evolution tricky to follow not only because he made two shorts between ARMS and THE KID, but because a deteriorating negative forced him to reedit ARMS down from about 45 minutes to about 35 minutes for re-release.  (A restored cut, sourced from various prints in various conditions in various archives currently being attempted.)