Person
Max Linder
Cavernes, Saint-Loubès, Gironde, France
Although all too frequently neglected by fans of silent comedy, Max Linder is in many ways as important a figure as Charles Chaplin, Buster Keaton, or Harold Lloyd, not least beca…
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Although all too frequently neglected by fans of silent comedy, Max Linder is in many ways as important a figure as Charles Chaplin, Buster Keaton, or Harold Lloyd, not least because he predated (and influenced) them all by several years, and was largely responsible for the creation of the classic style of silent slapstick comedy. He started out as an actor in the French theatre, but after making his screen debut in 1905 he quickly became an enormously famous and successful film comedian on both sides of the Atlantic, thanks to his character "Max", a top-hatted dandy. By 1912, he was the highest-paid film star in the world, with an unprecedented salary of one million francs. He began to direct films in 1911 and showed equal facility behind the camera, but his career suffered an almost terminal blow when he was called up to fight in World War I. He was gassed, and the illness that resulted would blight his career. Although offered a contract in America, recurring ill-health meant that his US films had little of the sparkle of his early French work, and a brief attempt to revive his career by making films for the recently-formed United Artists (one of whose founders, of course, was Chaplin) in the early 1920s came to little, although these later films are now regarded as classics. He returned to France and killed himself in a suicide pact with his wife in 1925.
Filmography
Movies and shows, newest first
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2024
Life and Deaths of Max Linder
Movie Self (archive footage)
-
2020
Charlie Chaplin, The Genius of Liberty
Movie archive footage
- 2014
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2013
Tout sur mon père Max Linder
Movie Self (archive footage)
-
2013
Birth of the Tramp
Movie Self (archive footage)
-
1983
The Man in the Silk Hat
Movie Self (archive footage)
-
1978
Encyclopédie audiovisuelle du cinéma
TV show Self (archive footage)
-
1963
Laugh with Max Linder
Movie Self (archive footage)
-
1955
All in Good Fun
Movie Archive Footage
-
1948
Easter Parade
Movie Audience Member (uncredited)
-
1947
The Way of the World
Movie (Archive Footage)
-
1946
Those Were The Days
Movie (self)
-
1939
Charlie the Innkeeper
Movie
-
1931
The Theft of the Mona Lisa
Movie (archive footage)
-
1927
Maxim's Porter
Movie Writer
-
1924
Au secours !
Movie Max
More credits
-
1924
King of the Circus
Movie Max Graf von Pompadour
-
1924
The World of Yesteryear – Max Linder
Movie Self
-
1923
Par habitude
Movie Story
-
1922
The Three Must-Get-Theres
Movie Dart-In-Again
-
1921
Be My Wife
Movie Max, the Fiancé
-
1921
Seven Years Bad Luck
Movie Max
-
1919
Le Petit Café
Movie
-
1917
Max, médecin malgré lui
Movie Max
-
1917
Max the Heartbreaker
Movie
-
1917
Max in a Taxi
Movie Himself
-
1917
Max Wants a Divorce
Movie Max
-
1917
Max Comes Across
Movie Max
-
1917
Max and the Purse
Movie
-
1917
Max devrait porter des bretelles
Movie Max
-
1917
Max Linder Visits Charlie Chaplin
Movie Self
-
1915
Chance and Love
Movie Max
-
1915
Hairdresser of Love
Movie
-
1915
Max in Monaco
Movie
-
1914
The False Max Linder
Movie Max
-
1914
Max asthmatique
Movie Max
-
1914
Max in the Convent
Movie
-
1914
The Forced Marriage
Movie
-
1914
Max Plays at Drama
Movie
-
1914
Max and the Lady Doctor
Movie Max
