Too much of everything

Good movie but grossly overrated

Absolutely the worst movie.

The movie's not perfect, but it sticks the landing of its message. It was engaging - thrilling at times - and I personally thought it was a great time.

Am a big fan of Charlie Chaplin, have been for over a decade now. Many films and shorts of his are very good to masterpiece, and like many others consider him a comedy genius and one of film's most important and influential directors. He did do better than 'The New Janitor', still made relatively early on in his career, generally a period where he was still finding his feet and not fully formed what he became famous for (though he is definitely more settled feeling here). Can understand why the Keystone period suffered from not being as best remembered or highly remembered than his later efforts, but they are mainly decent and important in their own right. 'The New Janitor' has a lot of nice things about it and is to me one of the best efforts in the 1914 Keystone batch. 'The New Janitor' is one of his funniest and most charming efforts from this period. Sure the production values not as audacious. Appreciated the busier and more complex story than before, though occasionally it was a bit hard to follow. 'The New Janitor' for early Chaplin is very good and it showed that Chaplin was starting to settle.While not audacious, the film hardly looks ugly, is more than competently directed and is appealingly played. Chaplin looks comfortable, with more shades than before of his distinctive style here, and shows his stage expertise while opening it up that it doesn't become stagy or repetitive shtick. There is more sympathy and emotion than before.Although the humour, charm and emotion was done even better and became more refined later, 'The New Janitor' is still very funny, cute and hard to dislike. It moves quickly and doesn't feel too long or short.In conclusion, very good for early Chaplin. 8/10 Bethany Cox

This film is interesting more in the light of Chaplin-as-director than of Chaplin-as-comedian; in the middle it takes a prolonged detour into what appears to be a serious dramatic plot, played perfectly straight and with some depth of character (Gene Marsh, as the bright young female secretary, is perhaps the most memorable performer in the film, along with a stand-out cameo from Al St.John). The trouble is that I actually found this strand more interesting than the not-especially-funny comedy section featuring Chaplin turning out a waste-paper basket, dusting a lady's derrière (all right, thanks to the timing of both Chaplin and Miss Marsh, that *was* quite funny...) and predictably failing to topple out of a skyscraper window while soaking the boss below. And I'm afraid I completely failed to see the pathos that I'm told Chaplin originated in this film in the role of the downtrodden caretaker.The pay-off when the two strands finally combine is largely worth the wait. I can't help wondering what fans promised "Charlie's latest side-splitter" made of this picture in 1914, though...

As Chaplin's earliest films continue to evolve you can see more and more of the sight gags that would become very common in his later films, such as kicking his cigarette when he throws it away, various kicking and falling routines, and one which would be used again in The Immigrant a few years later, holding a man up with a gun held between his legs from behind.This film has a more complex plot that the majority of Chaplin's short comedies that came before it, although I might have to admit that at times I found it to be a little bit hard to follow, maybe because the comedy was not quite enough to pull along the rest of the story, which itself is not quite strong enough to stand on its own.Charlie plays a janitor who, as is to be expected, gets himself fired in some hilarious way, and then later comes to the rescue when an employee with a gambling debt attacks a woman who catches him trying to steal from the safe to cover his debt. The story is not complex or even very interesting, but it's there, and it shows that Chaplin sees the lack of story in his films so far as is trying to improve that.

I've seen quite a few Chaplin shorts from early in his career and I've noticed that his early stuff (done for Keystone Studios) is pretty dreadful stuff. Unlike his wonderful full-length films from the 20s and 30s, the films from 1914-1915 are incredibly poorly made--having no script but only vague instructions from the director. In most cases, the films had almost no plot and degenerated to people punching and kicking each other.However, unlike MOST Keystone comedies, this short actually has a pretty well-defined plot. Charlie is a janitor and gets fired when he accidentally dumps a pail of water on the boss' head. Later, an employee with gambling debts tries to steal from the company safe but is caught by a female employee. The cad attacks the lady and Charlie springs to the rescue.Unfortunately, despite having more plot, this film isn't all that funny. Still, compared with MOST early Chaplin films, this is worth watching.By the way, the bellboy appears to be Al St. John--a perennial extra in silent comedies and Fatty Arbuckle's nephew.