This is part of a series of articles reviewing the American Film Institute's Top 100 Films, as unveiled in 2007. Why am I doing this? Because the damned cinemas are closed and I have to review something.
(G) ★★★★★
Director: Charlie Chaplin
Cast: Charlie Chaplin, Virginia Cherrill, Harry Myers, Al Ernest Garcia, Florence Lee, Hank Mann, Robert Parrish, Henry Bergman.
 |
| Luckily for Charlie and his mate, they were both white. |
Picking the best film of Charlie Chaplin's career is tough. The American Film Institute would have us believe it's City Lights, his sweetest, gentlest comedy, and they're probably right. When you line it up with the other contenders for Chaplin's Champion - The Kid, The Gold Rush, Modern Times, The Great Dictator - City Lights sits right in the middle in terms of release, but pokes its nose above the rest like a molehill on a plateau of greatness.
"The most recently seen ... is always the favourite," wrote William Bayer, in his book The Great Movies on the "impossible (task of naming) the Chaplin masterpiece".
"The problem is always complicated by the fact that (his typical main character) The Tramp is always different," Bayer wrote. "Sometimes more jaunty and resilient, at other times more depressed, more crushed. And, too, there is the element of social comment. It is always there, but depending on one's taste in Chaplin, one will prefer the film that contains the desired quotient."
Bayer nails it here, and perhaps inadvertently highlights why City Lights "stands as one of Chaplin's most universally loved films", as The Wordsworth Book Of Movie Classics puts it. Less overtly political than Modern Times and The Great Dictator, City Lights bears his trademark themes of class disparity, but what he has to say is cleverly buried inside "a comedy romance in pantomime". If you don't care for the social commentary, this is just a beautifully executed love story with one of the all-time-great endings and some of the best skits in the history of cinema. But if you want the bigger ideas, scratch the surface and sniff out what he's saying about the haves and the have-nots.
Where City Lights has the edge on The Kid and The Gold Rush, and indeed many comedies, is its story flows simply and beautifully; its jokey sequences never deviate too far from that storyline at the film's heart but are sidesplitters.
The truly remarkable thing about City Lights is that it's defiantly silent, not counting the hilarious whistle sequence. While working on the film in 1928, Chaplin was acutely aware that "talking pictures" were on the rise. He reportedly agonised in pre-production about whether to make the film a talkie. But Chaplin rolled on with what he knew, and was dismissive in the press about the new moviemaking trend: "I give the talkies three years, that's all," he said. But by the time City Lights' premiere rolled around in January 1931, it was obvious talking pictures weren't merely a fad.
But Chaplin couldn't fathom his Tramp, nor his style of movie-making, in a verbal world. He even opened City Lights with a scene that mocks talking, with Chaplin replacing the words of several speechmakers with unintelligible sounds. It's the perfect middle finger to the talkies, signifying Chaplin's determination to do his own thing.
And Chaplin had carte blanche to do his own thing. He was part-owner/co-founder of United Artists with D. W. Griffith, Mary Pickford, and Douglas Fairbanks, and on his films he wore many hats - for City Lights he was director, actor, write and composer. With no one to say 'no', he pressed ahead with his unfashionable silent endeavour, and though it was snubbed by the Oscars (not a single nomination), it was adored by audiences and was #1 at the US box office in 1931. He was vindicated then, just as he is vindicated now - City Lights is probably his best loved film.
Ninety-plus years on, the movie is just as funny and endearing as it was in 1931. The universality of the Tramp shines through - he's the ultimate underdog, which allows the pathos and humour to work together in magical ways. The boxing match is not just a work of pinpoint perfect comedy genius (that apparently took four days of rehearsal to choreograph), it's underscored by the desperation of the Tramp's situation - it's hilarious but also gripping. This balance between story, laughs, and heart is part of the key to City Lights enduring adoration, almost a century on.
The social themes also remain poignant, though they're understated and simple. The Tramp is down on his luck, the Blind Girl (Cherrill) has it worse, yet it's the Eccentric Millionaire (Myers) who feels he has it so bad that he's suicidal. The Millionaire is also the one who has no regard for the value of money, and no inkling that the cash and the cars he's so willing to throw away have the capacity to improve the lives of others. It's only when he's in an altered state - ie. shitfaced - that he has compassion for his fellow man.
It all culminates in a scene that is still stirring today. Edward F Dolan Jr, in his book History Of The Movies, says the finale of City Lights "may be the single finest scene that Chaplin ever put on film". "A superb exercise in facial pantomime, the scene is deservedly one of the most famous in screen history," he wrote. And back in 1949, critic/screenwriter James Agee was even more gushing in his essay Comedy's Greatest Era saying, "It is enough to shrivel the heart to see, and it is the greatest piece of acting and the highest moment in movies".
Even if its ending doesn't shrivel your heart, you'd have to be heartless to not find yourself enjoying City Lights, which Chaplin said was his favourite of his films. His ability to turn the mundane into unexpected hilarity, while keeping a head and a heart in the story, is at its zenith in this endlessly charming film.
You've read the review, now watch the movie:
No comments:
Post a Comment