Not Wanted

After five years as the best of the Chaplin imitators, Billy West struck out with his own comedy character, a middle-class man in a nice suit and a fedora -- but with the mustache. These movies involved him in cartoonish situations in which he executed some extended gags very nicely -- in this one he does the one in which the water pump only works when he's not ready for it and another in which he can't catch a fish with some expensive gear, while the boy next to him catches whoppers with a stick and a bent pin -- and gradually moved behind the camera.

In this one, he's on his way to do some fishing and gets involved with a girl whose father wants her to marry someone and a baby. Only the first reel of this two-reel comedy is still around. Ben Model has graciously posted it to Youtube along with one of his typically witty scores. It's not an amazingly good comedy, but it does have well-performed gags and some very funny title cards and is well worth the time of anyone who enjoys silent comedies.