Film's First Robot Flicks the Bird

 Mack Sennett's more famous for being an early filmmaker than a good one, but if the comedies he produced rollercoaster in quality, that does at least mean there'll be highs. Here's Ben Turpin in A Clever Dummy, playing possibly cinema's first Robot, three years before Karel Čapeck invented the word. Clockwork dolls were clearly already a thing though, as attested to by Turpin's brilliant impersonation of one, two minutes in. That's one high. 

 

Another is the repeated and unambiguous raising of his middle digit, as seen at the top of this post, when eight and a half minutes in, the "lovesick janitor" played by Turpin – upon whom the automaton is modelled – takes its place to perform a series of sinuous physical jerks for a couple of talent scouts. It's pleasingly reminiscent of Brigitte Helm's robot dance in Metropolis made a decade later, and these talent scouts are won over, although not as won over as Metropolis' panting swells. Director Herman C. Raymaker is not as silly as Fritz Lang. 

 A third highlight is this intertitle:

 And a fourth is the last seventy seconds, into which Sennett suddenly seems to have decided to see if he can cram the entirety of Con Air. He doesn't do badly either. I like Mack Sennett. Enjoy!