Charlie Chaplin: C/D

And it's not really a matter of which "movies" you like, remember. All Chaplin movies are of a piece, just as all WC Fields movies are of a piece (always hating the kids, always drunk, ya know), and the Marx Borthers (always bilking the rich woman out of her fortune, always with the music numbers, ya know), etc. His physical comedy seems a little too WHOOPS! for me -- maybe it's that fast speed he liked because it made things "funnier" -- it's not funnier. It's more precious, that's all.

Precious! OMG that's the word. Chaplin is so fuckin' precious. Put him next to Groucho, and he'd be blown out of the room like a leaf in the breeze by the first snide barb.

kenan have you seen "the immigrant"? you should.

i thought it was the unfunny load of arse when i was 17

this is the second time youve attacked me though, Amatuer(ist) and i am not sure its warranted...and one of the times i wasnt even on the fucking thread--you and a few others just decided to take swings, i didnt know what i did to deserve it, kind of hurtz

can we talk more about mabel normand

>All Chaplin movies are of a piece, just as all WC Fields movies are of a piece ...and the Marx Borthers<

There's a big diff between Easy Street and Limelight, Duck Soup and The Big Store. Less variance in Fields' work, maybe cuz the prime of his film career was in his fifties and youthful exuberance was never part of his persona. Still, It's a Gift kicks Never Give a Sucker an Even Break's ass.

>[Chaplin's] physical comedy seems a little too WHOOPS! for me -- maybe it's that fast speed he liked because it made things "funnier" -- it's not funnier.<

SMS, you have likely seen prints or videos that were mastered at the wrong speed. (ie, makers of silent comedies didn't use beat-up film stock either)

Or maybe people just walked faster in the old days because they weren'
t used to the new technology like the automobile and the motion picture camera and they thought they had to walk faster to keep up with it.

I wonder how many of the Chaplin-bashing tossers have seen each waste of celluloid by Saturday Night Live alumni?

As far as Chaplin is concerned, it seems to me that it became received wisdom in the past few decades that the stoic lover of mature women Buster Keaton is vastly preferable to the schmaltzy cradle-robber Charlie Chaplin, so maybe it is time to redress the balance.

contemporary films are projected at 24fps. silent film speeds varied, but most chaplins should be projected around 16fps. of course for video it's a different issue--there are various ways of making a film appear to be run at the right speed in a video transfer (i think ntsc video is 25fps or something like that, i forget).

Was it mostly Europeans, tho? That would make sense -- his sensibility seems more European than any of his Hollywood contemporaries'. The whole sad-clown/trickster thing maybe resonates more with French and Italian ideas of commedia dell'arte than with broader and/or more deadpan American comedy (which could be why American viewers prefer the very American pacing and mayhem of the Sennett shorts). The most obvious Chaplin descendants I can think of are mostly European (Giulietta Masina, Jacques Tati).

Chaplin (re)invented cinema comedy grammar, hence all who followed are influenced whether they know it or not. Similar to Griffith with melodramas and chase sequences.

how do you mean? as an assertion this is both vague and broad.

max linder's films have some very chaplin-esque qualities, pre-chaplin. though a search for precedents is neverending, almost by definition.

Chiefly, no predecessor incorporated gags, set pieces, etc into a dramatic narrative to the degree he did.

Also, "The Gold Rush" is rather unimpeachable; some utterly majestic sequences...

In terms of his sound films, yes, he doesn't work so well in the format, but do not underestimate "Monsieur Verdoux", a notably dark film, with Chaplin's addressing-the-world tendency for once injecting a note of lasting despair. Well balanced by lighter moments. However, "A King in New York" is forlornly bad; a bitter film that just ends up seeming petty and stillborn. The self-regarding "Limelight" I am undecided about, and "The Great Dictator" is a bizarre panoply of tones and approaches...

And I think that's the rub. Up-thread, there is comment on his Victorian quality. He brings sophisticated physical comedy and high cultural signifiers (self-composed classical scores, lest we forget) together with all of the pathos and spectacle of the Victorian showman - whether Irving or Dan Leno. There are sentimental music-hall type songs/themes, such as "Smile" (melo) and exaggerated villains and desperate situations ('drama'). His tramp's a bit like a Dickensian protagonist, or a persecuted hero in mid-Victorian crime melodramas such as Tom Taylor's "Ticket of Leave Man".

It's not particularly easy to fully enjoy Chaplin on the terms set out by comedy in 2005, or even 1955...

this is amazing

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QcvjoWOwnn4

Saw The Gold Rush at the NY Film Fest today, w/ accompaniment by members of the NY Philharmonic. I didn't know that TGR (and other features of his) can't be theatrically exhibited unless there's an orcgestra of at least 13 pieces playing!

Anyway, tho I prefer Keaton's features in general, the dance of the rolls is one of the all-time great moments. And the laughs still counterbalanced the pathos at that point.

(...of his career, I mean)

if you don't like The Kid you're insane.

ha, forgot about this thread -- i disown most of what i said; chaplin subsequently became more or less my favorite film person ever.

i saw 'city lights' with an audience a couple years ago and it pretty much was the best film experience ever.

probably should quit ending sentences with 'ever.'

this thread just reminded me that i forgot to record Limelight on TCM last night. I've never seen it.

the MI5 file: "It may be that Chaplin is a communist sympathiser but on the information before us he would appear to be no more than a 'progressive', or radical."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2012/feb/17/mi5-spied-on-charlie-chaplin

"City Lights" is being shown here at the end of March with accompaniment by the Cleveland Orchestra and I'm seriously considering going even though I just watched it again on Netflix not two months ago.

Ugh, went w/partner to a screening of The Gold Rush not realising it was the 1942 re-release.

"In 1942, Chaplin released a new version of The Gold Rush, taking the original silent 1925 film and composing and recording a musical score, adding a narration which he recorded himself, and tightening the editing which reduced the film's running time by several minutes.

DO NOT WANT. We ended up leaving about five minutes in; we couldn't take the narration any longer.

p sure I've only happened on to that version on TV long ago

the current DVD version of 'the gold rush' emphasizes that version and tacks on the original version as an 'extra,' apparently at the insistence of chaplin's family.

https://www.commonwealmagazine.org/simone-weil-slavery-capitalism-revolution-christ

"When Charlie Chaplin’s Modern Times was released in 1936, Weil not only recognized its formidable artistic vision and philosophical import, but found herself, whole, in the story: the Little Tramp was her. The film, she realized, uncannily captured the experience of the modern factory worker who, instead of using the machines, was being used and abused by them—to the point of being eaten alive. The poor worker became a tool at the mercy of alien forces: the assembly line, the factory, the whole capitalist system. Weil loved the film, even though watching it brought her no comfort; what she saw on screen was a replay of her own anguish. Just like Chaplin’s Little Tramp, the factory turned her into a thing."

Dana Carvey shared this on FB (public post): https://fb.watch/nu2nxwahL6/?mibextid=NnVzG8

This is one of my favorite #SNL short films. The brilliant Robert Smigel ( Triumph the Insult Comic Dog ) wrote it - and recruited me to play #Chaplin. I thought its premise was inspired. And I never turn down an opportunity to play Chaplin. Unfortunately it never made it to air.
It played at dress rehearsal to crickets, live crickets, and we still maintain that a human audience might have liked it. Here now, for the first time, watch ‘Chaplin’ and, for the trazillionth time, enjoy the magic of #PhilHartman, #JonLovitz, and I.

The philistines didn't get the final joke!

Hilariously, it also reminds me of a story about Paul Simon on the set of One-Trick Pony. I've never seen the movie so I have no idea which scene this refers to, but when they shot the first take, Simon talks with a supporting player who has a line that draws an enormous laugh from everyone after they yell cut. Simon picks up on this, privately talks to the director who then goes over to the other actor and says, "we're going to do another take but this time we're giving your lines to Paul."

Anyone who's seen One-Trick Pony* probably couldn't tell you what scene that was.

*I've seen it twice and own the Warner Archive DVD-R.

eat shit

― Left, Saturday, 24 April 2021 bookmarkflaglink

fuck men

― Left, Saturday, 24 April 2021 bookmarkflaglink

Does this apply to Lennon and McCartney?

It's kind of wild to think SNL has been on long enough to go from that Chaplin sketch bombing in dress to that January Jones Rear Window sketch making the cut and airing in the first 1/3 of an ep 20 or so years later.

The original SNL did a whole parody of Fellini's La Dolce Vita - it's pretty crazy what kind of arthouse film references they've packed into the show over the years. They were rarely funny, but then again SNL was always a very uneven show - it's perfect for clip shows for that reason.

Love Chaplin. Still the greatest comic actor in cinema IMHO.

who has a line that draws an enormous laugh from everyone after they yell cut

there's a similar story about Rodney Dangerfield on the set of Caddyshack... after he does some bit and nobody on the set laughs, he tells Bill Murray "I'm bombing out there, I'm just bombing" and Bill has to remind him that they're shooting a film, and that crew members are not supposed to laugh because it would ruin the take. Dangerfield only knew the standup world at that point

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T95GvS3u4mg

Odenkirk on that Chaplin sketch.

^^Includes the whole sketh for those who don't do the Facebook thing.

I think it would have appeared in either Geena Davis or Dolly Parton's shows from 1989 (the two closest to Chaplin's centennial).

This is one of those sketches that just plays better to creatives (all of whom have probably experienced others stealing their ideas) than it does everyone else

a dana carvey sketch and no one laughed? say it ain’t so

he’s so bad at telegraphing what he’s thinking, instead of just showing off his imitation skills - IN A SILENT SKETCH - that it takes a little while to even understand what the joke is supposed to be

I feel like that's an unfortunate byproduct of modern-day film (and television) comedy in general, and probably a big reason why I've exponentially grown to love Chaplin, Keaton, Lloyd, early Laurel & Hardy, Charley Chase and other silent masters - that era was really the only time where all of a comedy was perfectly geared towards a visual medium for obvious reasons. Meanwhile, so much of a comedy in the modern era is based around sketch comedy and stand-up routines, becoming much more dependent on verbal cues.

*all of comedy

Darn these Talkies have ruined everything

https://img.nbc.com/sites/nbcunbc/files/images/2015/5/04/140208_2723724_Weekend_Update_Segment___Grumpy_Old_Man_anvver_1.jpg

In my day, we didn't have "DIALOGUE"!

That's an extremely clever sketch (idea) that somehow never actually reaches "funny".

I kind of like the few "famous stories about great artists" sketches I can remember from that era - it seems like a concept they really enjoyed doing, partly so they can go to town with depicting gross mischaracterizations. For example, the one where Ringo goes from "I'm just happy to be here!" to being really opinionated about the direction the Beatles should take during their formidable years, and also when Picasso is a loud-mouthed cheap buffoon who pays everything by scribbling a doodle. (Not even that - at one point he sneezes some snot into a tissue and says "why it's another masterpiece from Picasso!" and proceeds to sign it and toss it on to the ground, prompting all the waiters to dive for it.)