Shoulder Arms (1918) Charles Chapin & Edna and 50 similar items

Vintage original 11x14 in. US lobby card from the teens WWI-themed silent film comedy short, SHOULDER ARMS, released in 1918 by First National Pictures and directed by Charles Chaplin. Charlie is a boot camp private who has a dream of being a hero who goes on a daring mission behind enemy lines. The image features an exterior shot of The Kaiser (Charles Chaplin) as he leans against a German soldier while giving the once-over to The Girl (Edna Purviance), who is sitting on the running board of a1914 Locomobile Model 48 seven-passenger touring sedan as two men sit with driving goggles inside. The tag line at the bottom reads: "Speak, woman! Why be you here?" It is unrestored in fine+ condition with light signs of wear on the corners and along the bottom half of the edge of the right border. Considered the first comedy film about war and weleased two weeks and one day before the end of World War I. Many in Hollywood were nervous that one of their most famous peers was going to tackle the subject of WWI. It was released shortly before the Armistice, so it did not help boost national morale, but it did end up as one of Charles Chaplin's most popular films and it was particularly popular with returning doughboys. Originally planned at five reels; outtakes were preserved in Chaplin's private collection. True Boardman, Marion Feducha, and Frankie Lee played Chaplin's sons in cut domestic scenes intended for the beginning of the film. Peggy Prevost and Nina Trask played draft-board clerks, Alfred Reeves a draft-board sergeant, and Albert Austin a doctor in a cut scene at the draft-board office. Chaplin's fellow director, the German Ernst Lubitsch, once said that this was the best film depiction of World War I.