A narrator relates a variety of peculiar stories involving characters with the initials HC and their dealings with telephones. These are interspersed with artistic shots of telephone boxes in a variety of locations.
Peter Greenaway
as Narrator
An animated musical love story about a young man who lives inside a billboard and is charged with updating the advertisements. When he falls in love with a beautiful lady living across the highway, he has to use the only method he knows to get his message across - advertising
A deer, disillusioned by the consumerism that defines his life. A lizard, ostracized from society, forever wandering. A chance meeting in the middle of a field. Who will survive? And who will transcend existence? Preserved by the Academy Film Archive in 2009.
A man grows insane when he hears the beeping of a Monarch telephone, and he seeks help of a psychiatrist.
The hilarious story of a restless young farm-thumb, Loke Groundrunner, and his tasty companion, Princess Bunhead, who go on an quest to combat Black Helmet Man and the Evil Thumbpire. This is the first film of the hilarious 'Thumbs!' franchise.
A touching story of an Italian book seller of Jewish ancestry who lives in his own little fairy tale. His creative and happy life would come to an abrupt halt when his entire family is deported to a concentration camp during World War II. While locked up he tries to convince his son that the whole thing is just a game.
Newlyweds receive a build-it-yourself house as a wedding giftβand the house can, supposedly, be built in "one week". A rejected suitor secretly re-numbers packing crates, and the husband struggles to assemble the house according to this new 'arrangement' of its parts.
This early Chaplin film has him playing a character quite different from the Tramp for which he would become famous. He is a rich, upper-class gentleman whose romance is endangered when his girlfriend oversees him being embraced by a maid. Chaplin's romantic interest in this film, Minta Durfee, was the wife of fellow Keystone actor, Roscoe "Fatty" Arbuckle.
Pierre and Jacques are working as waiters at a restaurant where the cooks go on strike. When the two are forced to work as bakers, the striking cooks put dynamite in the dough, with explosive results.
The Tramp interferes with the celebration of several kid auto races in Venice, California (Junior Vanderbilt Cup Race, January 10 and 11, 1914), standing himself in the way of the cameraman who is filming the event.
Although only a dental assistant, Charlie pretends to be the dentist. After receiving too much anesthesia, a patient can't stop laughing, so Charlie knocks him out with a club.
A tramp gets drunk in a hotel lobby and, upstairs, causes some misunderstandings between Mabel, two hotel guests across the hall from her room, and Mabel's visiting sweetheart.
Three men compete for the attentions of a pretty girl. One of them, a little tramp, plays dirty.
Charlie plays an actor who bungles several scenes and is kicked out. He returns convincingly dressed as a lady and charms the director, but Charlie never makes it into the film.
The hero, a janitor played by Chaplin, is fired from work for accidentally knocking his bucket of water out the window and onto his boss the chief banker (Tandy). Meanwhile, one of the junior managers (Dillon) is being threatened with exposure by his bookie for gambling debts unpaid. Thus the manager decides to steal from the company.
The Stooges are key witnesses at a murder trial. Their friend Gail Tempest, who dances at the Black Bottom cafe where the Stooges are musicians, is accused of killing Kirk Robin.
Mr. Snookie steals an umbrella and then, while trying to help a woman to cross a puddle, the Tramp appears and intervenes.
Mabel tries to sell hot dogs at a car race, but isn't doing a very good job at it. She sets down the box of hot dogs and leaves them for a moment. Charlie finds them and gives them away to the hungry spectators at the track as Mabel frantically tries to find her lost box of hot dogs. Mabel finds out that Charlie has stolen them and sends the police after him. Chaos ensues.
Overwhelmed by grief following the death of his wife, Donnelly shares a train carriage home with a troubled young man identified only as the 'Kid'. As the Kid becomes more agitated and foul-mouthed, the journey takes on a violent and dangerous hue β for the bereaved Donnelly and for other hapless passengers on the train. Academy Award Winner: Best Live Action Short Film β 2005
It's a classic boy-meets-girl story, boy-loses-girl, boy gets mistaken for an escaped convict and ruthlessly chased by armies of cops across the countryside in a thrill-packed stunt-addled climax.