Although not the first feature-length animated film, as is sometimes thought, it was the first cartoon to feature a character with an appealing personality. The appearance of a true character distinguished it from earlier animated "trick films", such as those of Blackton and Cohl, and makes it the predecessor to later popular cartoons such as those by Walt Disney. The film was also the first to be created using keyframe animation.
Mr. Snookie steals an umbrella and then, while trying to help a woman to cross a puddle, the Tramp appears and intervenes.
A wicked king has taken over the Emerald City, and wants his daughter, Princess Gloria to marry the horrid courtier Googly-Goo, though she loves Pon, the Gardener's Boy. The camera follows two farmers placing a Scarecrow upon a pole in a cornfield. Pon rescues a Kansas girl named Dorothy from the evil witch Mombi, whom Princess Gloria has been taken to by King Krewl to freeze her heart so she will no longer love Pon. An Indian princess has a ceremony to bring the Scarecrow to life. Pon rescues the cold-hearted princess and they flee for help, discovering the Scarecrow, who promptly falls in love with the princess, and Button-Bright, a lost boy from America. They come to the castle of the Tin Emperor, Nick Chopper, and after oiling him, he falls in love with Gloria. After a bit of a chase aided by the Sawhorse and the Wizard, Mombi turns Pon into a Kangaroo, and a slough of Fred Woodward's animals battle it out.
Charlie is a clumsy waiter in a cheap cabaret, suffering the strict orders from his boss. He meets a pretty girl in the park and tries to impress her by pretending to be an ambassador. Unfortunately she has a jealous fiancé.
Young Cabiria is kidnapped by pirates and sold as a slave in Carthage. Just as she's to be sacrificed to Moloch, Cabiria is rescued by Fulvius Axilla, a good-hearted Roman spy, and his powerful slave, Maciste. The trio are broken up as Cabiria is entrusted to a woman of noble birth. With Cabiria's fate unknown, Maciste punished for his heroism, and Fulvius sent away to fight for Rome, is there any hope of our heroes reuniting?
A swindler scams a newspaper reporter-photographer and then, not realizing where the man is employed, applies for a job at his newspaper.
A tramp gets drunk in a hotel lobby and, upstairs, causes some misunderstandings between Mabel, two hotel guests across the hall from her room, and Mabel's visiting sweetheart.
Set mostly in the Stone Age, a prehistoric king, with a harem of wives, rules a beach. Charlie arrives and falls for the king's favorite wife. In the end, it turns out to have been a dream; Charlie was asleep in the park.
The Tramp interferes with the celebration of several kid auto races in Venice, California (Junior Vanderbilt Cup Race, January 10 and 11, 1914), standing himself in the way of the cameraman who is filming the event.
Thwarted by his despotic uncle from continuing his love affair, a young man's thoughts turn dark as he dwells on ways to deal with his uncle. Becoming convinced that murder is merely a natural part of life, he kills his uncle and hides the body. However, the man's conscience awakens; paranoia sets in and nightmarish visions begin to haunt him.
Mrs. Clymer has great social aspirations, and every time she gave a party her husband was in the habit of going to the Hash House for his sinkers and coffee. One night she panned him to a whisper for not showing up at one of her shindigs, so he promised to be on hand for the next one. Sometime later Mrs. Clymer railed the hens one afternoon for a musical. Hubby happened home early, so nothing would do but he must get gussied up and entertain the ladies. There was one young grass widow present who looked mighty good to hubby. His wife had told him to pay some attention to her lady friends, so he extended himself. Before sending the widow home he got her address and told her he kind of wished he was single. Mrs. Clymer got his number and forbade him to ever show up at another one of her parties.
Griffith adapts the story of the Apocryphal Book of Judith to the screen. During the siege of the Jewish city of Bethulia by the Assyrian tyrant Holofernes, a widow named Judith forms a plan to stop the war as her people suffer in starvation, nearly ready to surrender.
Once a lot of grown-up girls organized a club for the discussion of current evils. The principal current evil they discussed was man. The object was to find some way to keep them home at nights. One dame thought every wife ought to provide her companion with an intellectual atmosphere so he wouldn't sneak out at night to the thirst parlor.
Two drunks fight with their wives and then go out and get even drunker.
In a dance hall, two members of the orchestra and a tipsy dancer fight over the hat check girl.
Charlie is hanging around in the park, finding problems with a jealous suitor, a man who thinks that Charlie has robbed him a watch, a policeman and even a little boy, all because our friend can't stop snooping.
Pierre and Jacques are working as waiters at a restaurant where the cooks go on strike. When the two are forced to work as bakers, the striking cooks put dynamite in the dough, with explosive results.
When a burglar dressed as Santa Claus steals a family's Christmas presents, amateur detective Octavius sets out to recover the loot.
A womanizing city man meets Tillie in the country. When he sees that her father has a very large bankroll for his workers, he persuades her to elope with him.
Mabel goes home after being humiliated by a masher whom her husband won't fight. The husband goes off to a bar and gets drunk.
