Reviews of silent film releases on home video. Copyright © 1999-2026 by Carl Bennett and the Silent Era Company. All Rights Reserved.

The Count (1916)

Charles Chaplin was delighted when he began fulfilling his 1916 contract with the Mutual Film Company, a distribution outfit that handled the films of many of the top film producers of the time. The contract was the first made with Chaplin’s own production company, which meant that he could produce his comedies with total creative control.

The Mutual comedies show signs of Chaplin maturing as a cinema artist. His Mutual stories became more carefully constructed and less reliant on senseless bash-and-bop slapstick. The gags show flashes of comic brilliance.

— Carl Bennett

The film is presented with an ensemble music score performed by Donald Sosin, Peter Breiner and Richard A. Whiting. An optional improvisational piano score performed by Neil Brand is also available.

Supplemental material includes the documentary The Birth of the Tramp (2013); the documentary Chaplin’s Goliath (1996) on Chaplin star heavy Eric Campbell; and an insert booklet with notes on the films by Jeffrey Vance.

For information about other films in this collection, see our Chaplin’s Mutual Comedies 1916-1917 on home video page.

This is our enthusiastically recommended home video edition of this film.

This Region A Blu-ray Disc edition is available directly from . . .

This dual-format Blu-ray Disc / DVD edition has been mastered from a good to very-good 35mm nitrate print held by Lobster Films, Paris, with additional footage conflated from a 35mm nitrate duplicate negative held by the Cinémathèque Royale de Belgique, a 35mm safety fine-grain print held by La Cinémathèque française, and a 35mm nitrate duplicate negative from the Blackhawk Film collection held by the Academy Film Archive. Most of the footage was sourced from the American release version with missing footage supplied from the European export version of the film. New intertitles were reconstructed by Film Preservation Associates from 1920s rerelease prints in their collection. This edition was a cooperative project of Cineteca de Bologna, Film Preservation Associates and Lobster Films, Paris, in cooperation with Association Chaplin. Digital restoration work was performed by L’Immagine Ritrovata in 2013, which includes clean-up of print flaws and image stabilization.

The film is presented with an ensemble music score performed by Donald Sosin, Peter Breiner and Richard A. Whiting. An optional improvisational piano score performed by Neil Brand is also available.

Supplemental material includes the documentary The Birth of the Tramp (2013); the documentary Chaplin’s Goliath (1996) on Chaplin star heavy Eric Campbell; and a 28-page insert booklet with notes on the films by Jeffrey Vance.

For information about other films in this collection, see our Chaplin’s Mutual Comedies 1916-1917 on home video page.

The collection is issued in limited-edition steelbook packaging, which we feel must be handled gingerly to avoid damaging its discs and the case itself.

This review was updated in 2026.

This Region A Blu-ray Disc / Region 1 NTSC DVD edition has been discontinued and is . . .

Some of the video transfers are the same as for the VHS and 1995 laserdisc editions.

The special features include the documentary The Gentleman Tramp (1975), narrated by Walter Matthau, with excerpts from My Autobiography read by Laurence Olivier; Chaplin family home movies, including scenes of Chaplin at home near Vevey, Switzerland; the documentary Chaplin’s Goliath (1996) on Chaplin star heavy Eric Campbell; “The Mutual-Chaplin Specials,” an appreciation by Jeffrey Vance, author of Chaplin: Genius of the Cinema; “Making The Gentleman Tramp,” a reminisence by Richard Patterson; and a stills gallery containing more than 90 images from the collection of Jeffrey Vance, many never before published.

This Region 0 NTSC DVD edition has been discontinued and is . . .

That being said, readers have noted that there is surviving footage from these films that does not appear in this home video edition. Our understanding is that most (if not all) of these films have originated from the Van Beuren Company 35mm negatives that were prepared in the 1950s. Those prints featured music by Winston Sharples and synchronized sound effects, and they can be viewed in their 1950s form (transfered at sound speed) on early laserdisc and VHS collections from Image and Republic. While these 35mm negatives feature superior visual quality, portions of the original footage and intertitles were removed in the 1950s. Some early 16mm reduction prints from Blackhawk Films and others, which originated from other surviving positive prints, feature footage that doesn’t appear in this DVD edition. Logic would lead some to assume that this extra footage survives in 35mm prints held by the world’s film archives and by private collectors.

Previously we recommended the now out-of-print The Chaplin Mutuals DVD series with the caveat noted that there was missing footage. David Shepard has now released a new edition of the Chaplin Mutual comedies that are more complete and feature some improvement in visual quality.

This Region 0 NTSC DVD edition has been discontinued and is . . .

Don’t consider buying this collection for the Chaplin Mutual films. The Mutual films have all been released on DVD home video in far superior editions transferred from 35mm prints. Cobra Entertainment (successor to Delta) rereleased remaining stock of this disc onto the market in 2010.

DELTA ENTERTAINMENT has discontinued business and this Region 0 NTSC DVD edition is . . .

Other SHORT COMEDY FILMS of the silent era available on home video.