Like another Chaplin film short titled "A Day's Pleasure", this one is put together as a series of vignettes with no discernible complete story line, yet will resonate with Chaplin fans who enjoy his Little Tramp character with that trademark bowleg walk used for comic effect. The title of the picture is actually it's setting in the little village of Sunnyside, opening with Charlie as a handyman on a farm who does a shift at a nearby hotel doing odd jobs. As writer and director, Chaplin throws in a head scratcher of a dream sequence in which he cavorts with nymphs on a wooden bridge, who transition into men as he comes out of his reverie. I don't know when it was first tried in a film, but Charlie's village belle (Edna Purviance) casts a quick fourth wall look at the camera that suggests disapproval with his attempt at courtship. And when a rival suitor intrudes it makes him rather despondent, though by the time the short come to a conclusion, it appears that the jaunty musical accompaniment suggests even that interlude was nothing but a dream.
Review of Sunnyside
