When I started watching this movie, I expected it to be just like a Buster Keaton. Of course, this movie was only about half as good as Buster's but still, it was refreshing to see a funny movie of quality after some of the shitty movies I have been viewing lately.
This film is about Tramp who goes to Alaska to search for gold. While there, he meets some really wacky characters including Big Jim and Georgia, a girl he is in love with.
I always try to get the bad stuff over with first and this review will be no different. First of all, the gags aren't as funny or daring as Keaton's. During the famous joke, when Chaplin is dancing, I just stared at the screen blank-faced. Not really my sense of humor. A couple of the gags I laughed out loud with like whenever the house was falling off the cliff. If you looking for a really funny movie, however, go for Keaton. This movie can also be slow in parts as well, which led to quite a few moments of boredom.
I did think this movie was entertaining most of the time. I wouldn't say you had to see if you were studying film, but it is kind of a light watch especially after the previous movie.
RATING: ***--
Interesting Facts:
The dancing roll scene was so popular that audiences had the projectionists replay it. Really? I mean, really??
Charles Chaplin's wife was originally going to play Georgia but she got pregnant so the role went to Georgia Hale. Chaplin was having an affair with Hale during production. What a jackass. You will never be Keaton, jerk!
Available on Netflix Instant or YouTube:
Did you watch the later version from the forties. Chaplin made a re-release where all the title cards were replaced by narration. This speeds up the movie greatly and makes it far more watchable.
ReplyDeleteAmanda will know I've never taken to Chaplin as much as everyone expects us too. I'm also very much more a Keaton person.
ReplyDeleteI did try the 'voice over' version TS refers to .. and I'm afraid I found that so irritating I topped after about 10mins.
I don't remember since it was so long ago! So one vote for the rerelease and one against?
ReplyDeleteThere was supposed to be an 's' in that word .. so i stopped watching .. not that is was so bad I topped myself ..
ReplyDeleteSo, I took a short detour from The List to watch a couple of other films that it had inspired me to check out. One of which was The Great Dictator. I was inspired because I always understood it to be both very good and very important, which made it odd to me that it has never been included in any edition of The Book. Having downloaded it, I was then filled with dread that I had to sit through another two hours of Chaplin during which I would discover exactly why it had been excluded.
ReplyDeleteHaving just watched it, I report that it was actually rather good. Certainly a hundred times better than Monsieur Verdoux. The comedy is a bit children's-entertainer, as Amanda kind of put it in the City Lights comments, but somehow endearingly so. Overall it was smart, funny and never boring. It has a speech near the end that might be dismissed as naive, but no more than most of what Jimmy Stewart says in The Mortal Storm and in the context of 1940 it was probably very powerful.
Conclusion: I recommend you look it up yourselves some time
I was surprised The Great Dictator wasn't on the list, since it is so iconic. I wonder why it didn't make it in?
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