The Kid / A Dog's Life
A Chaplin double feature starring Edna Purviance and Jackie Coogan. "The Kid" (1921, 68 min.) was director Charlie Chaplin's first full-length film and is considered one of his best. Co-starring five-year-old Coogan, whom Chaplin discovered on a Los Angeles vaudeville stage, "The Kid" is the story of a child abandoned in a limousine by his unwed mother (Purviance). When The Little Tramp finds him, he tries unsuccessfully to find a home for the boy. Obliged to keep him, The Little Tramp teaches the youngster about life on the streets and just as they have bonded and become a family, the boy's mother returns in a bittersweet finale. "A Dog's Life" (1918, 35 min.) is not only the satisfying story of canine and human underdogs succeeding in spite of the odds against them, it's also a series of side-splitting gags and slapstick routines that are as funny today as they were when the film was released and became an instant hit.