Tag Silent Fim

City Lights

Anthony Panariello Leave a comment

Category: Silent Film, Comedy

Starring: Charlie Chaplin

Another Chaplin movie (a lot of his seem to make most ‘best movie’ lists and I can start to see why.  In this particular one he reprise the role of the tramp and the movie opens with him taking a nap under a tarp that is later revealed to be a statue that is having a big unveiling.  The usual slapstick shenanigans happen and he eventually escapes the authorities. He then meets a flower girl who is selling flowers and is instantly smitten.

As he’s leaving the flower girl hears a fancy car with a chauffeur and thinks it’s the tramp. Later that night the tramp is down by the water and he sees someone trying to kill themselves. He saves them from the attempt and it turns out the guy’s a millionaire and he takes the tramp back to his house to keep the party going. The guy’s a complete lush and when the tramp asks him for money to buy more flowers from the flower girl he peels off a few from a fat stack and sends him on the way telling him to take his car – a very nice Rolls Royce.

The thing is – the millionaire only really remembers the tramp when he’s hammered – once he’s sober he is a cruel and abrupt stereotype of a 1920’s tycoon.  It’s something that is repeated a few times with the millionaire who always seems to find the tramp when he’s sauced out of his mind.

Meanwhile the tramp keeps visiting his blind girl and one day she isn’t at her usual street corner. He eventually tracks her down and finds out that she is ill, so he keeps her company by reading her a newspaper. One of the articles is about a doctor who has a procedure to restore sight – the girl smiles and said it’d be wonderful because then she can see him. The tramp knowing he’s pretending to be rich and is aware of his looks isn’t enthused with this idea. However, as he’s leaving he finds an eviction notice and realizes her family is getting kicked out of the apartment.   Determined to help her he decides to get the money to pay her back rent.

The problem is he’s visited the blind girl too many times and the foreman fires him. One of his buddies ropes him into a fixed fight to make some cash but the crooked boxer takes off because the police are coming the his replacement is a giant of a man with murder in his eyes.  A comical drawn out boxing match happens which includes the tramp hitting the boxer with a shovel, the boxer punching the police, and general mayhem. However, the boxer eventually beats the tramp and he goes away without the money needed for the girl.

It’s at this time that the millionaire rolls up on the tramp, three sheets to the wind, and invites him to party (again). They have a good time and the tramp asks if he can give him the money for the girl. The rich guy says sure – and all seems to be solved, except that at that moment burglars break into the house and rob it – with the tramp making his getaway by running from the police (something he does quite frequently, to be honest)

Knowing that it’s a matter of time he runs to the girl and gives her the money – telling her that he’ll see her “in a while” shortly after the police find and arrest him. A while later he gets out of prison and goes to her street corner, only to find her gone.  One day as he’s walking down the street he looks in a store window and there she is! She runs a florist shop now and her sight has been restored! He nervously starts to approach but some newsboys who have taken a dislike to him start harassing him and she sees it through the window. She offers him a coin and a flower and when she touches his hand she realizes who he is and they share a smile.

4/5 – At this point the whole tramp gets the girl thing seems to have been done this is just another angle on it. The deranged millionaire was pretty funny and the slapstick bits are pretty consistent and humorous. Chaplin’s ability to express emotion without words is without peer and I can see why he dominated the silent film industry and his fame endures to this day.

The Kid – 1921

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Charlie Chaplin

Silent Movie / Comedy – 1921

3/5 stars

This one starts with an ingénue who has a baby but the father isn’t interested (doesn’t believe it’s his? Who knows with silent movies) so she is desperate to keep her career so she does the unthinkable and abandons the baby in a rich person’s car hoping he can have a better life (leaving a note asking for someone to care for this orphan child).However – the car is promptly stolen by two thugs who race off in the car only to pull over when the baby starts crying – one thug waves the gun at the baby and suggests (via body language) maybe we should you know.. Shoot it? The other thug who isn’t a complete sociopath decides to leave the baby in an alley (arguably an equally poor solution) where Chaplin’s tramp happens to live.

Chaplin stumbles across the baby and tries to leave it but his conscious won’t let him neither will the police officer who patrols the slums. He tries to put the baby in passing mother’s carriage but that backfires as she catches him in the act and Chaplin goes back into his hovel unsure what to do.

5 years pass and they’ve fallen into a  poverty riddled routine where the kids breaks a window with a rock and Chaplin walks around as a window repairman  and they scrape together enough to maybe buy some food (although seeing a coin operated gas meter was illuminating) – all during this time the mother becomes a famous wealthy actress who tries to atone for her guilt by running a charity for children where she unwittingly interacts with her own child – and she gives him a small toy to cheer him up.

The trouble began when a local bully stole the toy and the kid wasn’t taking that shit and threw down like a champion. They got into a proper brawl and the whole hood showed up for the show (not much else going on tbh) – the kid is whopping the bully’s ass but then the bully’s gigantic dad shows up and tells Chaplin if he kid loses he’s going to curb stomp him so Chaplin tries to throw the fight and pronounce the bully the winner but the kid has the heart of a lion and drops the bully with a tyson-esque combo (in reality he looked like Yoda fighting during the clone was) then Gigantor comes for Chaplin but he manages to avoid his punches for a while until he grabs a brick and starts going full mason on the bully’s dad’s forehead.. Eventually goliath falls and they escape back to their hovel.

Shortly afterward the kid gets sick and his mother (still unknowingly) arranges for a doctor to visit – where Chaplin explains that the kid isn’t his and shows the doctor the note. The doctor arranges for an orphanage to kidnap the kid forcefully which honestly is a traumatic scene to watch as a father which sets off a wacky rooftop chase scene where Chaplin rescues the kid and they hide out in a flophouse to figure out what to do. However, during this the mom met with the Dr. who showed her the note Chaplin had and she realizes that the kid is hers! What are the odds! She puts out a 1,000 dollar reward for his return

The owner of the flophouse sees the reward in the paper and grabs the kid to turn him in for the money and when Chaplin wakes up the kid is gone (again, nightmare fuel for dads) and he frantically searches for him before giving up and falling asleep at the door of his hovel which kicks off an LSD fueled fever dream where the people in his neighborhood are devils and angels and he’s flying around doing.. uhh.. I’m not sure. He’s awaken by the police and he thinks he’s going to jail but he’s actually brought to the mansion of the mother who then lets him in (presumably to reunite with the kid)

Fun fact: The actor who played the kid was uncle Fester in the Addams Family TV series!

Not Fun fact: This movie was written shortly after lost a son in childbirth – making is especially poignant.

Really not fun fact: The kid was conceived on a very young actress and Chaplin married her to avoid the scandal and was divorced shortly after – then he did it AGAIN with the girl who played the angel in THIS movie knocking her up at 16. Yikes.

Modern Times – 1936

Anthony Panariello Leave a comment

Silent Film – 1936
Charlie Chaplin

Another visit to Chaplin’s tramp character. This time he’s working in a factory where everything is regimented and watched over (very big brother like) by the boss via television screens. Chaplin’s character is starting to show stress from the repetitive nature of the work and then goes off the rails in a madcap dash around the factory -eventually getting stuck in the gears in a pretty famous scene

He’s committed to a hospital and when he gets out accidentally gets involved in an anti govt protest and ends up in jail. At some point in prison he ingests a bag of cocaine and goes full Tony Montana (only without the guns) and in his rush around the station he stops a breakout attempt without even realizing what he’s doing.  The cops are so thankful they give him a cushy cell with lots of amenities which the tramp seems to really enjoy. However – his time in prison is soon to be over and he unsuccessfully tries to convince the police that he belongs back in prison since he gets three meals a day and a comfortable place to sleep.

One released he struggles to find a job – eventually finding work using a letter of recommendation from the police captain at a shipyard where he’s given a simple job of hammering some piles in – however he didn’t understand the instructions (in true tramp style) and ends up launching a ship that… wasn’t quite ready to be launched. Dejected from his inability to find work he’s walking down the street when he sees a young girl stealing bread and when the cops ask him what happened he said he stole the bread trying to get back to his cushy prison cell.  Witnesses tell the police that he didn’t really do it and he’s freed back onto the streets.

Really determined to go back to jail – he goes to a restaurant and eats a ton of food and then doesn’t pay – tracking down a cop to come arrest him for it.  He’s locked up in a paddy wagon – and lo and behold, the girl from earlier is in the wagon with him! He tries his charm on her and she seems to vibe with him.. When suddenly the paddy wagon crashes and they escape in the chaos.

He tries to go straight for the girl and takes a job as a night watchman at a department store  – he has a great time roller skating around and sharing what the store has to offer with her but then three goons break in and try to rob the place – the tramp realizes they’re fellow factory workers who are just hungry and desperate. He decides not to call the police and falls asleep in a very unfortunate location where he is discovered the next day and promptly fired.

The girl gets a job dancing in a nightclub and convinces the owner that the Tramp is a singer and waiter but he’s terrible at the waiting part and his last chance is the singing performance. He’s really nervous but the girl helps him write the words on his cuffs so he won’t forget them – but he loses the cuffs during the dancing part! What’s he to do? That’s right.. He channels his inner Eminem and goes full five mile on them: Chaplin Modern Times ‘non-sense song’

Things are seeming up for these two lovebirds, but then the police track the girl down from her previous escape and her and the Tramp are forced to flee once again.  The stop at the site of the road and the girl desparis at they have nothing left but the tramp reassures her and they set off down the road into whatever awaits them.

4/5 – Great move and one of Chaplin’s finest performances

I think this is the first time you hear Chaplin’s voice in one of this films and he uses it to sing a nonsense song that somehow conveys an idea without using an actual language (he made it all up). The slapstick comedy was tight and funny and the camera work and direction was engaging.  Some of the ‘special effects’ were really well done practical effects that he sold with his conviction and body control.  Reading into it somewhat it was a commentary on industrialization and the political climate of the time and has eerie echoes into the current day with AI threatening to displace a lot of people’s jobs. It was one of the last silent films of the era and Chaplin’s last performance as the tramp and I’m glad he got to set off into whatever future awaited him with someone by his side.

The Thief of Baghdad [1924]

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Silent movie

Swashbuckling / Adventure

Starring: Douglas Fairbanks

The entire length of this movie I was thinking to myself – oh, wait this is what Disney’s Aladdin as loosely based on (silly sidekick, princess who needs to be married off, a flying carpet and a dude who falls in love with a woman he’s met for 10 minutes)

Movie starts out with Fairbank’s character being an unrepentant thief (literally he goes into a mosque and tells everyone exactly this) who steals things in the marketplace via his athletic sneakiness and overall charm – ending with him stealing a magic rope that goes in the air by itself (we’ve seen that used frequently in media over the years) – he goes back to his 1 BR studio  condo located in a well behind the market and meets up with his partner – showing him the rope and plotting how they can use it .

The announcement comes out that the princess is to be married off and princely suitors should come to Agraba.. Oh wait.. Baghdad and then Alladd.. Oh wait.. ‘the thief’ thinks the Palace! Ah ha! With the rope we can rob that place blind! So they scout out a good location and then use the rope at night to sneak into the castle where the thief steals some jewels via a slapstick comedy involved sleepy fat eunuchs but during his escape he sees the princess and.. BLAM INSTANT DEEP LOVE FOR BOTH OF THEM.

Anyways.. Someone hears the noise and he has to hide under a rug but as he’s trying to leave one of the princess’ handmaidens sees him and chases him off and he goes back to his pal who asks where the treasure is and he says the corniest line in movie history at the time (while holding up the princesses slipper) this is the real treasure. Her slipper –  which I’m sure is delightful after sweating all day in the Agrabah.. Shit.. Baghdad sun.

So anyway – the thief is besotted but he isn’t a prince – so he watches the real princes walk in – and there are three of them.. The prince of Persia (not who you think) who is a comically obese sleepy prince, the prince of the indies who is an arrogant jerk and the prince of the Mongols who is dripping with stereotypes.  The princess thinks none of them have drip like Alladd.. Dammit.. The thief and  despairs before her man rides on  a stolen horse wearing stolen clothes pretending to be a prince. He was actually there to kidnap his  true love who he met one day ago (Queen Elsa disapproves) but through the Mongol spy in the palace he is revealed to be a common thief!

So the Caliph DQs him and the princess is distraught – so she comes up with a plan to delay them saying give them seven moons to find a gift worthy of her and she will choose – so they go off on an adventure to find these rare treasures. The thief meets up with the priest who he mocked in the beginning asking for help and he showed him a dangerous path to find a great treasure that will surely win this contest but warning him it is a perilous journey.

Prince of Persia takes a nap while his retainers find a magic carpet thanks to a crafty beggar who knew a secret (I see you Walt) and the prince of the Indies finds a lost idol with magic crystal eyes (imagery that is repeated through the years in fantasy elements – and I think it was on the cover of the original D&D players guide) and the Mongol leader finds a hidden magic apple that will heal any injury even dead (which tests on a random fisher man just minding his business)

While this is going on the thief is going through his peril – caves full of flames, giant furry bat attacks, underwater temptations, giant fish/squid monsters,  proto-ents,  flying horses and general peril – and he eventually finds a magic box that will create whatever the user wants (thanks to the advice of a hermit who lived in the caves)  he triumphantly returns to the hermit and.. Promptly rides off on a summoned horse.. Man didn’t even summon up some chicken wings or a lady friend for this lonely hermit. Bruh – not cool.

Anyways, the Mongol’s great idea to win the princess’ favor is to.. Poison her? Presumable to use the apple to heal her.. But its apparent the poison is fact acting and he can’t get there in time (thanks to the crystal ball) so they hitch a ride on the magic carpet and zoom off to save the princess who realizes they all came back with awesome treasures but her true love is still missing..

The Mongol decides he’s tired of her shit and just sneaks in a bunch of warriors to storm the castle, take over the city and imprison the Caliph and the princes. He’s got it made in the shade.. He’s going to marry the princess and rule all of Baghdad.. But wait.. THAT’S THE THIEFS MUSIC!!

He rides in and starts throwing magic dust like a deranged tinker bell summoning up an army 10,000 strong.. The Mongols flee and the prince is about to have his bro execute him when the slave/spy says why not grab the magic carpet and steal the princess? So that’s what he does but the Thief arrives under the cover of his invisibility cloak and rescues her at the last minute!

Gold Rush [1925]

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Charlie Chaplin

Silent Movie / Comedy

In a reprisal of Chaplin’s ‘tramp’ persona he heads off to the Alaskan territory with just his cane (and woefully underdressed) looking to capitalize on the gold rush.  He runs into a storm and takes shelter in what seems to be an abandoned cabin – but its currently being used by an escaped criminal who isn’t too happy with the new company. He chases Chaplin off in a comical wind/storm scene but then a prospector (Big Jim) who found gold seeks shelter from the storm in the cabin and overpowers the criminal. There’s an uneasy standoff where the three men begin to starve and they draw straws to see who goes out into the storm to get food. The criminal is sent off and promptly finds bounty hunters looking for him who have a nice sled full of supplies. He shoots them and steals their supplies and promptly vanishes from the movie (I’m not really sure why he even was in the plot except maybe as an antagonist for the staged cabin scenes)

Cut back to the cabin and there’s the famous scene of Chaplin boiling his shoe to have something to eat (imagery featured frequently in images of hobos) and then Big Jim being delirious due to hunger and imagining Chaplin as a giant delicious chicken they have a quick chase and then big Jim comes to his senses and leaves to find his gold only to be assaulted by that criminal guy and left unconscious in the snow!

Cut to a different movie altogether for a while for a weird romance subplot where Chaplin meets a dancer who flirts with him to anger another guy and then agrees to go to dinner with Chaplin on NYE. On NYE Chaplin sets up his cabin all nice and then does the famous dancing roll bit (Oceana roll) then falls asleep waiting for her to arrive. She never does (quite a sad bit where he looks in the window and see her dancing with that handsome fella. He wanders off and then Georgia and her friends go to cause trouble for ‘the tramp’ but then see all the effort he want to for the party and she clearly feels guilty at her behavior. Later Chaplin goes into the party to confront them when big Jim rolls in (having lost his memory after the assault) and grabs Chaplin and says ‘we need to find the cabin! Then we can find my gold and I’ll share it with you!’ — so they head back to the cabin and get some rest before they head out but then a crazy storm blows in and blows the entire cabin to a cliff edge!

They wake up and a funny bit ensues where they walk back and forth and the cabin teeters on the edge but they think it might be a hangover but then when Chaplin opens the door he sees he’s dangling off a cliff and then they spend a few minutes figuring out how to escape but fate has smiled on them – the storm blew them right to big Jim’s mine! They’re rich!

Cut to them dressed fancily in furs and smoking cigars walking on a ship to sail back to America as millionaires – we see Chaplin’s girl also sailing out as it seems things didn’t work out with handsome man (she never really seemed that into him to begin with). Some various hijinks ensue where she shows she’s a somewhat good and remorseful person (offering to pay for his ticket when the crew thinks he’s a stowaway) and Chaplin goes in for the kiss and roll credits.

4/5 stars – The movie is iconic for a reason – so many tropes were born from this movie as well as call backs in many modern movies (the bread roll dance in Benny and Joon, countless eating your boots scenes.. Etc.) and for a silent movie it conveyed both comedy and pathos very effectively you forget it’s a silent movie and are drawn into the narrative completely.

(side note: apparently there’s a 1941 version re-cut by Chaplin that includes his own score and narrated interstitial panels. .might watch that if I have the time)

The General [1926]

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Type: Silent Movie, Comedy

Starring: Buster Keaton

The origin of slapstick comedy in movies? This movie is 100 years old but the laughs are pretty timeless.  Keaton plays a train engineer who loves his train and Annabelle, a woman in his town. The movie is set at the outbreak of the civil war and when a general muster is called for the town Keaton tries to enlist (to impress his lady mostly) and he is deemed to important as a train engineer to fight on the front lines.

He tries several times to enlist but is rebuffed before he leaves rejected (the famous shot of Keaton sitting glumly on the train wheels as the train starts to move).  The union general sends some troops undercover to steal a train at the end of the line and then take it along the line destroying infrastructure on the way. They decide to steal Keaton’s train – and by happenstance his woman is on the train looking for something from her trunk.  He proceeds to chase the train using a variety of methods before commandeering a confederate train to chase them. He finally catches up with them and is hiding under a table when he hears plans for a union surprise raid and he sees that Anabelle is there! She’s been captured by the union and is held hostage.

He rescues her and they escape into the night.. When day breaks they see they are near a union train depot and lo and behold his train ‘The General’ is there! They sneak aboard and steal the train heading back to confederate lines being chased all the way. 

After setting a fire on a critical bridge they alert the confederate army who mount a counterattack on the union and drive them off and the Keaton gets the girl and a promotion to lieutenant

3/5

I really enjoyed the comedy elements of this movie – and Keaton did all of his own stunts, some of which were really straight dangerous! The plot existed to serve the comedy but was passable but the treatment of the actress was pretty poor (She was the inept comic relief who was dumb as a box of rocks) — yeah yeah I get it was the 1920s but it was still jarring to see.

Metropolis [1927]

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Name: Metropolis

Type: Silent Movie / dystopian sci-fi

Interesting take on a dystopian society where the elites live above in the sky in a city that is powered by the ‘workers’ that toil in the city below.  The son of the rich people’s leader sees a woman trying to organize the workers for better lives and falls instantly in love (as you do). His dad has a best bud ‘ Rotwang ‘(the prototypical evil mad scientist) who has made a robot that can assume human form. The dad asks Rotty to make the robot in the form of the woman trying to organize the workers to incite a rebellion he can then quash them entirely. Little does dad know that Rotwang secretly has beef with him because his one love Hela chose him over Rotwang so he wants revenge! He knows the woman is in love with his rival’s son and plots to destroy them both with his robot girl!

So he make the robot girl into the whore of Babylon.. Who dances (quite lasciviously for the 1920’s) and drives all the rich boys crazy (some 7 deadly sins allegories sprinkled in here) and then incites the workers to open rebellion. The revolting workers break ‘the heart’ machine which for some reason causes unchecked flooding? Anyways the real Maria arrives to rescue the kids from the flood while their parents are on a riot rampage (hey, did we forget to hire a babysitter?).

The workers are angry all their kids are done for, so they blame Maria and burn her at the stake.. But NOT it’s not Maria! It’s the robot lady! But where’s Maria? Oh she’s being clumsily chased by a cartoonishly evil Rotwang who really needs to work on his cardio. Then there’s a roof fight and some hero falling and getting back up  tropes (wait, if it is the original movie to do it, is it a trope?) they fight on the rooftop and Rotwang falls to his doom.

Boy get girl – father learns lessons and.. Cut to the fin title card.

3/5 – The special effects for it being 1927 were pretty amazing and innovative and the acting was very local theater production but I understand that’s just how things were done at that time since theater was the prevalent entertainment medium while movies were the new hotness. Overall as one of the first science fiction dystopia movies (one of my favorite genres) I appreciate how it sets a standard that you see repeated in a lot of movies even almost 100 years later.