The films that Charles Chaplin made for the Essanay Film Manufacturing Company represent Chaplin's fledgling independent film work, as these 1915 films are the first that freed him from Max Sennett's Keystone comedy style films. Chaplin had become the premier film star of his day and was drawn to the Essanay Company by a $10,000 signing bonus and salary of $1,250 per week--unprecedented for the day and a huge boost from the $150 per week he was receiving from Keystone Film Company.

Don't expect the level of sophistication of City Lights or Modern Times in these early films, but the Essanay series are historically important. Chaplin begins to develop the character of the Tramp by adding traces of defiance and a great deal of pathos to his character, as his character knocks some authority figures around and consistently fails to "get the girl" for a happy ending. Unlike the earlier Keystone comedies that relied on a single plot device, Chaplin's independence allows him to expand from the strictly formula slapstick comedy of Sennett's films that required standard chase scenes.

Although Chaplin adds sophistication to the plotlines and character of the Tramp, the camerawork remains simple. Throughout each of the 1915 Essanay shorts camera movement is non-existent. Instead the camera is static and the actors move across the scene, requiring an editing cut whenever the actors move out of frame.

Additionally, most of the scenes consist of medium shots with a few long shots. Chaplin uses very few close-ups, and the handful close-ups he does use are at medium range. Thus, the later Chaplin trademark of using subtle facial expressions proves to be far less important in these early films. Instead we see many of the larger body movements and athleticism that mark The Tramp, as his timing skills for kicking people in the butt, sticking them with pitchforks, plastering their faces with paste, or taking a fall are perfectly designed for his slapstick humor.

Volume 2 of the Essanay comedies has an excellent selection of shorts, highlighted by "The Tramp," "By the Sea," and "A Woman." It also contains a short called "The Bank" that parallels City Lights since it has Charlie as janitor have his love note and flowers get rejected by the bank secretary, who is sweet on another Charlie--the cashier.

"The Tramp" contains the classic fade out of our hero trudging off into the distance. This is the first time that Chaplin used this device to denote a "sad" ending where the Tramp doesn't end up with the girl. This time the girl is the farmer's daughter that the Tramp has saved from some stealing thugs. In the course of thwarting the thieves, Chaplin engages in a great many comedic slapstick routines. He falls for the girl, but her boyfriend shows up and the Tramps hits the road.

Improvised during the course of a day around the Crystal Pier in Los Angeles, "By the Sea" contains some creative slapstick tricks that will be incorporated into future works. The same can be said of "Work," with references to Modern Times as Chaplin takes on incompetent laborers and hard-line bosses. This time he plays a paperhanger's assistant who botches the wallpapering of a home.

In a real surprise Chaplin plays a finer female impersonation in "A Woman" than Tony Curtis or Jack Lemmon do in Some Like it Hot. Chaplin is uncanny in his portrayal--so good that he could have become the finest actress of the silent screen if he had kept his sexuality a secret. In this case, he is pretending to be a woman to be close to a new sweetheart. Of course, this will never work out.

The preservation of these films is remarkably accomplished on DVD with an added musical score by Eric James, who was Chaplin's musical associate for some twenty years, collaborating with the director on The Kid and The Chaplin Revue. It's almost a miracle that some of these prints are as complete as they are, as some clips were preserved by chance because some French dairy farmer happened to have some old nitrate prints that he hadn't thrown away. While the Essanay comedies may not represent the very best of Chaplin's work, they are essential viewing for his fans and for film students.