Probably no silent movies have worse reputations than Harry Langdon's self directed films. The common belief among silent film fans is that Harry Langdon was a very talented comedian making excellent films but when he got power hungry and decided to direct the films himself the quality quickly fell and the films just became weird. However I would argue that the two self directed movies that can be seen today (Heart Trouble is currently a lost film) are actually excellent films. While Three's a Crowd (1927) is my favorite of the two, I do have a strong fondness for The Chaser as well.
The Chaser was quite a change of pace after Three's a Crowd. Three's a Crowd had more pathos than any Charlie Chaplin movie. Three's a Crowd is while a comedy a profoundly sad one. The Chaser however eschews such sadness for more pure comedy. True this comedy is very dark but so had been the comedy for many of Harry's most popular films. So one could easily argue that this movie was a return to that.
The film's storyline is very simple. Harry (Harry Langdon) spends much of his time away from home much to the annoyance of his wife (Gladys McConnell). His wife decides to sue him for divorce. However a judge (Charles Thurston) with a twisted sense of humor decides to instead have the two switch places. The wife will go to work, while the husband stays at home and takes care of all of the chores there, as well as wearing a dress of course.
Unlike Three's a Crowd with its more dramatic storyline, a film like The Chaser is a film that depends heavily on the humor. Luckily for us this movie is really funny. The scene where Harry tries to get a chicken to lay an egg shows Harry doing what he does best and getting plenty of laughs doing it. I also love the absurdity of everyone thinking Harry is a woman simply because of the dress, despite there being nothing else feminine about his appearance or actions. Any other silent film comedian would have made the character act more traditionally feminine (think of Fatty Arbuckle's many drag scenes), but Harry being a subversive comic and playing a character who would never do this, Harry gets just as many laughs by not doing the usual gag, but by instead turning it on its head. The suicide note contains some absolutely brilliant dark humor. To be fair the scene involving Harry's ability to kiss women and make them faint goes on a bit too long and the idea was funnier when done in the Harry Langdon short, Soldier Man (1926). Still the majority of the humor is really funny and the film is a delight.
As mentioned in the previous paragraph this movie borrowed a gag from Solider Man. This was not the only one of Langdon's classic shorts borrowed from here. Also borrowed from is one of Harry's most famous short films, Saturday Afternoon (1926). In that short, Harry is a henpecked husband whose "friend" (Vernon Dent) convinces Harry to go along on a night out on a double date behind his wife's (Alice Ward) back. The same basic storyline becomes the third act of The Chaser. In The Chaser the friend was played by Bud Jamison. Interestingly in the talkie era Vernon Dent and Bud Jamison would be The Three Stooges' most common costars both playing similar roles where they would get the worst consequences from the Stooges' actions. Dent was Harry's most common costar appearing in many many Harry Langdon shorts and features. Bud Jamison appeared in less Harry Langdon films than Dent, but he had previously been in Harry's feature film His First Flame (1927) and would later be in the lost Harry feature Heart Trouble (1928).
An advertisement for the film in Variety.
You can see two great ways showings of this movie was advertised in the below page of First National News.
The Chaser may not be my favorite Harry Langdon feature, but I still think it is much better than its reputation and certainly deserves more positive attention. This is a fun and often hilarious comedy that I really enjoy and I hope you might like it as well.
This movie is on YouTube so you can watch it below. Enjoy.
-Michael J. Ruhland
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