WTF: Cell Phone At 1928 Premiere Of Charlie Chaplin's 'The Circus?'

On the 25th anniversary of the Back to the Future story, it's fitting that we finally have visual evidence time travel will eventually be possible. Not really of course, but there's a video going around, mostly thanks to Roger Ebert, of footage from the DVD extras of Charlie Chaplin's 1928 film The Circus, which appears to show a woman walking and talking on a cell phone. Is this person, walking around Hollywood in 1928, a time traveler? Hit the jump for the video and wild discussion.

Here's the video. Once again, thanks to Roger Ebert as well as The Ron & Fez Show for the heads up.

My first question is, if that's a cell phone, who or what is she talking to? However, in theory – if it's a time traveler, maybe we eventually invent cell phones that can span time. The guy in the video, George Clarke, seems to think there is nothing else that this person (whom he even questions their gender) could be holding. It certainly looks like the woman is holding a cell phone, what with the shape of her hand and such, but maybe her ear was hurting and she was just holding onto it or something. Plus, if this woman really is a time traveler, do you think she would be stupid enough to pull out such an advanced piece of technology on the street?

I'm pretty sure this is just a bunch of crap, but it's certainly an interesting video to check out and very cool that the footage itself isn't found in the movie – where someone might have caught it in the edit – but in the DVD extras highlighting the Hollywood premiere. It's like only a movie geek could find this hidden Easter egg.

Do I really have to prompt you for discussion on this? We all know that Simon Pegg should play Clarke in the movie version.