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

The Rink (1916)

Charles Chaplin’s famous rollerskating comedy pits an errant waiter, posing as a society gentleman, against big Mr. Stout (Eric Campbell) for the attentions of Edna Purviance, with most of the rivalry played out on a roller-rink floor. A lively and funny comedy, but what is going on with Edna’s hairstyle in this film?

The film is presented with a music score composed and performed on piano and synthesizer by Antonio Coppola. An optional improvisational piano score performed by Maud Nelissen 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 high-definition scan of a good to very-good 35mm diacetate fine-grain print held by the Library of Congress, with additional footage conflated from a 35mm safety duplicate print and an incomplete 35mm nitrate print held by the British Film Institute, and a 35mm nitrate print held by the Centre National du Cinéma et de l’image animée [CNC]. 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 from intertitle list documents held by the Library of Congress. 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 Lobster Films, Paris, in 2014, which includes clean-up of print flaws and image stabilization.

The film is presented with a music score composed and performed on piano and synthesizer by Antonio Coppola. An optional improvisational piano score performed by Maud Nelissen 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 is available directly from . . .

Supplementary material includes 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.

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

This DVD edition has been mastered from an excellent 35mm print from the same video transfer as the 1997 Mutual DVD series noted above.

The film is accompanied by a music score composed and performed on synthesizer by Michael Mortilla.

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

The film is accompanied by a music score composed and performed on synthesizer by Michael Mortilla.

We caution that disc mastering makes a huge difference in the visual quality of DVDs. Since the content has been manufactured onto five double-sided discs, and if proper care has been taken to master the DVDs, the visual quality is comparable to the 2002 Image edition noted above.

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

For this low-budget DVD edition, the film has been transferred from a very-good 16mm reduction print prepared by Blackhawk Films. The quality of the video transfer is coarser the original 1980s laserdisc releases of these films. The picture image retains most of the film’s original greyscale tones, but is slightly greyed in its shadows and picture detail is lacking due to the low video bit rate and overcompression of the video information. The image looks particularly rough on an HD monitor. The transfer cropping is tight but is different from the 1980s laserdiscs, indicating new transfers from the same source materials. Because each source print was from the Blackhawk sound versions (all produced at the sound film speed of 24 FPS), each of the Mutual films on this disc run noticeably faster than the original camera speed of approximately 18-20 FPS.

We don’t recommend this edition but, despite the faster running speed, we sometimes like to return to these older Blackhawk prints, which feature Winston Sharples music, to enjoy the silly sound effects that accompany the slapstick action.

LASERLIGHT DIGITAL has discontinued business and this Region 0 NTSC DVD edition is . . .

This low-budget DVD edition is nothing more than a 2002 Delta Entertainment repackaging of the remaining, unsold stock of the 1999 Laserlight edition. Since the only thing new about this Delta edition is its cardboard slipcover, its content is the exactly same as the Laserlight edition reviewed above.

This one isn’t recommended either.

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

This DVD edition was mastered from a dark analog video transfer from a 16mm or 8mm reduction print (the resulting quality is so bad, it’s hard to tell).

While the temptation is to get three discs for a low price, the quality of prints used for the video transfers are commensurately low.

The Rink is available in higher-quality home video editions elsewhere. Not recommended and it’s out-of-print now, anyway. No loss.

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

The films may be accompanied by soundtracks compiled from preexisting recordings.

This Region 0 NTSC DVD-R edition is available from ALPHA VIDEO through . . .

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