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OPEN CLASSIC CINEMA · 901

The Face on the Bar Room Floor

191414 minUnited States

Video edition: Wikimedia Commons
Original language: No spoken dialogue. Intertitles: English.
This copy runs: 11:36
Subtitles: No subtitle track in this language

Languages and subtitles

No subtitle track in this language

Wikimedia Commons · Charlie Chaplin · Public domain

This copy runs shorter than the reference runtime. Editing and playback speed can differ between editions.

Synopsis

A distressed drinker tells a barroom crowd how he loved a woman who left him for another man. Trying to preserve her image in chalk on the floor repeatedly brings him into conflict with the people around him. His account of romantic ruin keeps colliding with the physical disorder of the room in which he tells it.

Cast

Charles Chaplin

Cecile Arnold

Fritz Schade

Vivian Edwards

Chester Conklin

Harry McCoy

DirectorsCharles Chaplin

Inspirations

Chaplin turns Hugh Antoine d'Arcy's sentimental poem toward Keystone comedy. The telling retains the abandoned lover and the chalk portrait while redirecting the solemn conclusion into drunken physical collapse.

Sources and availability

General references identify the work and its copy. A reference beside an editorial section is linked to the claims checked in that section.

Wikipedia — film reference Wikidata — film identity and credits

Work catalogued as public domain in the United States.

The public-domain references concern the original films in the United States. Rights can differ for other countries, editions, restorations, music or translations. Sources are listed on each film page.

Availability checked on September 12, 2026.

Photograph credit

Photographs cropped, resized and optimized as WebP, displayed in monochrome.

Charles Chaplin — Strauss-Peyton Studio, 1921; published in Photoplay no. 3 (1922); National Portrait Gallery / Wikimedia Commons. · Public domain in the United States (PD-US-expired)
Cecile Arnold — Los Angeles Times; https://digital.library.ucla.edu/catalog/ark:/21198/zz0002nd52 · CC BY 4.0
Fritz Schade — Albert Witzel; picclick.com · Public domain
Chester Conklin — Hartsook Photo; J. Willis Sayre Collection of Theatrical Photographs · Public domain
Harry McCoy — Hartsook; J. Willis Sayre Collection of Theatrical Photographs · Public domain

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