Charlie Chaplin's A Burlesque on Carmen (Silent)

The legendary Charlie Chaplin stars in this spoof of the famed opera Carmen. At the time Chaplin made this film, there was something of a "Carmen mania" sweeping the country. Two separate movie adaptations hit theater screens in 1915, one starring Theda Bara (now considered lost) and the other directed by Cecil B. DeMille. The story of a weak-willed soldier seduced by an amoral gypsy woman was perfect for a send-up by Chaplin and his usual leading lady, Edna Purviance. Chaplin plotted and directed a fast-paced two-reeler no different than his other shorts for Essanay Studios, but when he moved on to rival Mutual the following year for more money, the spiteful studio altered the film to Charlie's displeasure. They beefed up the running time by adding deleted scenes and new footage with comedian Ben Turpin, making it feature-length. Chaplin sued Essanay in an attempt to block the release of this new version (now titled A Burlesque on Carmen) but to no avail. This fiasco is the main reason Charlie spoke poorly of his work at Essanay in later years. Subsequent reissues added even more extraneous material further muddling the simplicity of Chaplin's original premise. This DVD contains the 1928 Quality Amusement Corporation version, which features an opening crawl, redone intertitles and newly-shot introductory footage (which of course does not involve Chaplin) written by a "Duke Bakrak", supposedly a newspaper columnist.

PLUS: The Butcher's Nightmare (1917): Ben Turpin also stars in this rare, surreal short about a butcher who dreams about ruining the life of the girl who rejected him.