Stealing Chaplin

Holding the body of Charlie Chaplin ransom, two brothers in over their heads are the core focus of this feature from Paul Tanter. Stealing Chaplin sets out to display two brothers, Cal (Simon Phillips) and Terry (Doug Phillips), who do just that. They steal the body of Charlie Chaplin. Rather straightforward, but in practice, it proves rather difficult, not just for the brothers but for the director as well. How can an audience be expected to care for characters who are seen as uncharismatic conmen at the best of times, and layabout losers with money troubles and gangster woes at worst? Likeability is the key, but Tanter just doesn't have that for this duo.

Cal (Simon Phillips) and Terry (Doug Phillips) are British brothers and hopeless con-men in Las Vegas. They owe $30k to a mob boss. Their last con is a ridiculous scam and the cops are after them. Terry has another drunk idea. Steal Charlie Chaplin's corpse.

This real life premise is ridiculous enough to turn into a fun fictional screwball crime comedy. This is a low budget indie. These guys may even be brothers. I don't know. They are mildly funny. The accent probably kept me from really getting them. They could be fun side characters. This is mostly a borderline indie production. Some parts are better than others.

I'm shocked that this movie has only 4 reviews at the time of me writing this...

The real Chaplin had his body stolen from his grave in 1978 by two poor farmers wanting at first 1 million dollars. Eventually they were caught because they were impatient and decided to actually threaten the family as they weren't getting the results they wanted leading to more intense police work. They ended up doing 4 years prison. The wife of Charlie insisted that the law take it easy on the two because that's the kinda ppl the Chaplins were.

This movie is basically a spoof of that incident. Without giving away too much, the movie has the feel of Simon Pegg and David Schwimmers "the big nothing". The jokes and editing are fast paced. The story keeps you invested. The two main characters are a perfect comedy duo similar to a modern day Abbot and Costello or Simon Pegg and Nick Frost (Cornetto trilogy era). It's very well paced and written. You could tell from the first 5 mins that this was going to be good. It's a comedy of errors type movie. The supporting cast is good. I saw this on Tubi. If you like late 90s/00 comedy, have seen a few Chaplin movies and have a few hours. Check this out. I was pleasantly surprised how good it was. Shout out to everyone involved in this.

I wrote something very long about this movie that was really proud of and Letterboxd just erased it for no reason in the middle of me typing. I'm pissed so to keep it short, look up what this movie is and how limited the release of this movie is and how shockingly small its box office return is. I'm shocked this even came anywhere remotely near me. It's a cheap pile of garbage with bad acting and cinematography. If this felt more like a British comedy then it'd be way funnier. Started to get bored halfway through and tired of it. Ending is abrupt as hell. That's it I think, I don't know. Good movie.