Shoulder Arms

Shoulder Arms (1918) is Charlie Chaplin's wartime comedy you can watch online on iFILM. Chaplin wrote, directed and played the lead: a hopelessly clumsy American rookie sent to France, the last man on the roster anyone would trust behind enemy lines.

Released in October 1918 with the Great War still going, the film turned trench life into slapstick at a moment that left little room for jokes. Chaplin's brother Syd is his unlikely comrade; Edna Purviance rounds out the small cast. Thirty-six minutes of the most precise comic economy Chaplin ever packed into a short. Watch Shoulder Arms (1918) online on iFILM.