Trying to Get Arrested (1909)
- Directed by
- D. W. Griffith
- Genre
- drama film, silent film
- Country
- United States
- Runtime
- 4 min
- Rating
- 3.5 of 10 from 2 voters
- Elsewhere
- IMDb
The catalogue in 3D
The film shelves have a room of their own that you can walk around in. The cat behind the counter is the AI Catbot, and they pick real films from the same catalogue when you tell them what you feel like watching. Nothing is for sale, here or in there. Go in from here and this film is already out on the counter, with more like it waiting on the shelf next to it.
How it feels
A man tries to get himself arrested so he can have a place to stay. He does various things to draw the attention of police but keeps failing.
lightheartedwhimsicalfast-pacedplayfulcomedicold-fashionedquirkyslapstick
What happens
Trying to Get Arrested is a 1909 American comedy short film directed by D. W. Griffith, produced by the Biograph Company of New York City, and starring John R. Cumpson. Filmed in two days in early 1909 at Palisades Park, New Jersey, it was released in April that year and distributed to theaters on a "split reel", which was a single film reel that included more than one motion picture. The other picture that accompanied this comedy was the Biograph "dramedy" The Road to the Heart. The screenplay or "scenario" for Trying to Get Arrested was inspired by and adapted from the short story "The Cop and the Anthem" written by American author William Sydney Porter, who is more commonly known by his pen name "O. Henry". Porter's short story was initially published in the New York World newspaper in December 1904 and republished in The Four Million, an anthology of O. Henry's works released in 1906, just three years before the production of this Biograph short. (from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA)
More like this
A New Trick (1909)
In a Hempen Bag (1909)
The Trick That Failed (1909)
The Test (1909)
Mr. Buttinsky (1909)
A Case of Spirits; or, All's Well That Ends Well (1909)
Mrs. Jones Entertains (1909)
The Friend of the Family (1909)- More like this film, on a shelf you can walk up to.It's the lit case on the top shelf.