This is quite a clever little comedy for its time. Just six years after the birth of the cinema movies had already become self-referential and were capable of a satirical mockery of its audience. A portion of this film appears to be missing (at least on the BFI DVD I watched) which is a shame. What remains shows a country bumpkin type complete with farmer's smock, hat, and rustic cheeks, dancing riotously on stage in front of the screen on which dances a ballerina. When the picture changes to that of a train racing towards the screen, the panic-stricken rube dashes from the stage in terror - a jokey reference to the myth that members of the audience ran screaming from the train pulling into a station at the first public ever screening. The bumpkin then returns to find, to his puzzlement, that it is now he who is on screen. Clever and interesting.
