There’s One A.M. with Charlie coming home drunk and does battle with a clock pendulum and a Murphy bed. There’s Behind the Screen where Charlie discovers a woman who disguises herself as a man in order to get a job movies. And the lovely The Immigrant. Among several others. Like, everything…LOL
Really, really difficult to decide. You would think the less films made for a period would make it easier. But nooooooo. We’re talking Chaplin here. It only gets harder with each following era. All of these are superb! I feel like throwing a dart on a list and see where it lands (or where it lands nearest to) to determine which one I like best.
The one I watch the most, so I’m going with it as my answer: Easy Street. Yeah, I know, it’s a cliche answer (at least, I feel it is), but I really like this one. It’s a bit autobiographical (Chaplin grew up on the slums of late Victorian London streets. The more autobiographical he got, the more I loved the film; i.e. Limelight). There’s gang violence in the streets, and Charlie has to temper the ruffians.
Eric Campbell. Now there’s a classic old fashioned bad guy. But I’m getting ahead of myself. And the lovely Edna! I really love the way she is introduced with that angelic light on her as she plays the piano.
Highlights of the film
Charlie literally gaslighting the heavy (Chaplin actually hurt himself with the lamppost. Needed some stitches on his nose. Sacrifice for the sake of the art!), feeling sorry for the woman who he catches stealing food for her large family so he steals more, the cute little kid who scares the police, and the chase at the end where the heavy gets…well, I don’t want to spoil it for you if you haven’t seen it 😉
What a flirt! And a practical joker (to someone who deserves it, really)
Chaplin’s Essanay films are the least watched era for me. He is, understandably, still finding himself as a filmmaker (it was his second year in films after all. As much as a genius as he was to become, not even he could be a master of it in such a short time), but the Tramp character starts to emerge more at this time. “The Tramp” and “A Woman” are good examples of this.
This is also the year that Edna Purviance joined Charlie’s ensemble.
The Tramp is great because of the silliness he gets himself into. This was also one of the first Chaplin films I bought, in some department store that had a small selection of VHS tapes. And that version of the film had narration as well. Maybe affected my love for the film. Also a slightly better paced story than A Woman.
I like how (around 9:30) he gets accidentally sacked by a big bag of flour (?) and gets covered in it. And he does that quick look at the camera. Doesn’t matter how many times I have seen it, it always makes me laugh.
https://youtu.be/BGLVi9XelFE
But A Woman I love because of the amazing job he does in playing a woman (though this wasn’t his first time. That would be A Busy Day). Also the clever way he flips over his adversaries into a nearby pond.
When I was a young fan, I remember looking through a Chaplin book and, seeing a picture of a woman, thinking it was the leading lady. And then reading the caption and thinking “That’s Charlie?!?” in amazement.
Trying to pick from 36 of his Keystone films (only one was feature length) is tough, but there’s one that I really like. And it has cultural and historical significance as well.
Kid Auto Races at Venice.
Not the complete version (missing the ending with Chaplin being yanked by the nose off camera), but it is a good print and pretty good music.
This was the first time the public saw the Tramp character *. Chaplin had made only one film prior to this one, Making a Living.
I love KAR because it’s funny (well, duh) and I love watching the people in the background, who were all real bystanders at a real race. The only actors are Charlie, Henry Lehrman (the director who keeps shoving Charlie out of the way. Also the director of the film.) and Frank D. Williams (poor cameraman who is trying to film the race). Mack Sennett (head of Keystone Studios) did this quite a bit where he would use real events (races, parades, etc.) and shoot a film somehow involving that event. It was cheaper because he wouldn’t have to pay for the extras or the event. So it was with this one, filming a real go cart type race in Venice, California. There’s people who watch Charlie and laugh, or just stare probably wondering who that goofball is with the bowler hat and cane and why is he wandering out in front of the on coming race cars? Does he want to get on camera that badly?
Anyway, it’s a fun little film, and interesting to think how quickly Chaplin’s life would change because of pressure to find the right outfit that worked (and, boy, did it ever!)
*– David Robinson does make a good argument in his wonderful book, Chaplin: His Life and Art that the first Tramp movie that was actually filmed was probably Mabel’s Strange Predicament according to filming schedules and set events, and it wasn’t uncommon to shoot films in different sequence to release dates. But that Kid Auto Races is definitely the first one that was released to the public.
This isn’t too hard to decide on: Edna Purviance (second would be Paulette Goddard). From the time Chaplin hired her for her first movie, A Night Out, she definitely had something special.
I don’t remember when I first saw Edna… The Tramp (somehow I got my hands on a narrated version) maybe? Those early days of fandom are a bit fuzzy (25+ years will do that to ya!), but that’s definitely one of the first times I saw her.
Edna and Charlie in A Burlesque on Carmen
Some of my favorite films she was in was Easy Street, Burlesque on Carmen (a satire on the opera Carmen. She plays the flirtatious Carmen. Her parts are great! The “finished” film is a bit long though… thanks a lot Essanay!), Shoulder Arms, and The Kid (heart-wrenching and beautiful!)
And there is that last appearance, a cameo in Monsieur Verdoux, but according to the wonderful Edna Place site, she isn’t there. She did to a reading for a part for Charlie, but in the end, it didn’t work out. She had been rumored for many years to be in the background, and I looked for her, and haven’t seen anyone that looks like her.
They did a\have a romantic relationship off-screen but nothing that led to marriage, and quite frankly, Chaplin was a bit of a cad to her towards the end of their relationship. They did remain friends until she passed away.
But I thought it was sweet on Chaplin’s part to continue to pay her, even after she stopped working for him and up until her death after he was exiled from the United States. One of her last letters to Charlie that he shared in his autobiography was so sweet and funny, and she begs him to come back to America. “You belong here.” Sadly, she did not live long enough to see that happen. She passed away of throat cancer in 1958.
Three great sites (all sister-sites to each other) to find out more about her are:
Edna’s Place – A great blog. Not updated very often (something I can relate to) but has oodles of info
EdnaPurviance.org – The first Edna site I came across many years ago. Also has extensive database of Chaplin books and documentaries. French version is here.
Leading Ladies – Started by Edna’s grand nieces, Lita and Ellie Hill, and later partnered with Linda Wada (of the above two sites) to help preserve Edna’s memory. You can also buy “The Sea Gull”, a book about the film that was going to be Edna’s last film, but mysteriously destroyed by Chaplin.
I don’t know if “reluctant” is exactly the right word, but it’s the closest word I can think of. Maybe “gradual” is a better word.
Charlie Chaplin is one of those people who just always seemed to have existed. My whole life I have known who he was. Or, should I say, I always knew who the Little Tramp was. Everybody does. Just in silhouette people recognize him. But it was several years before I saw Chaplin without his ultra famous costume on.
Now, I wasn’t crazy about old movies. Silent movies even less so. They were old, usually in black and white, and boring. And silents? No talking? Are you kidding me? The Wizard of Oz and It’s a Wonderful Life were the only ones that I liked. But Chaplin snuck up on me, bit by bit.
One of the earliest memories was Maria from (old school) Sesame Street impersonating him on the show.
Then there was catching a part of a (then new) Chaplin documentary, Unknown Chaplin, when I was 10ish (that doc will show up later in the challenge 😉 ). While it would be a few more years before I became a fan, that one viewing stuck in my memory. Loved how it told the making of (what I found out much later) The Gold Rush.
When I was well into my teens (circa 1989), I got the huge book “Chronicle of the 20th Century” which had small newspaper like articles that covered various historical world events of the last century as if they were happening in the present. And Chaplin was in there. A lot. And I thought to myself “If I was a fan of his, I would love this book even more”.
What really got me hooked was after I became a fan of classic comedy (that started about 1986, when I was 13). It started with the Smothers Brothers. I collected anything (mostly albums) that I could get my hands on. On Dick Smothers solo album Saturday Night at the World, there was a song (side 1, track 4) called “Smile” which I just loved .
I looked on the back of the album to see who wrote it: C. Chaplin, J. Turner, and G. Parsons. Seeing the C. Chaplin, I thought “Is that Charlie Chaplin? The Little Tramp guy? He wrote music too?”.
And when I watched Tom and Dick in interviews, they talked about the comedians who came before them and who they looked up to. That got me curious about those others. I got into Abbott and Costello around 1989. In two different A&C books I saw, for the first time (that I know of), a picture of Chaplin out of costume, which really through me for a loop:
Where’s his mustache? What, it wasn’t real? And his HAIR! It’s WHITE!
And then a short time after that, I got into Laurel and Hardy. While reading “Mr. Laurel and Mr. Hardy” by John McCabe, I read the story that Stan told about being Chaplin’s understudy back in England during their music hall days.
The guys in the middle: Stan (with necktie), and Charlie (no tie)
In it, Stan recalls a story of when the comedy troupe they were in came to America. Both of them were wondering around town when suddenly nature called. There were no public bathrooms, so they went into a saloon. Being proper English gentlemen, they felt they should buy something before using the facilities. So they each bought drinks, quickly gulped them, and then ran to the saloon’s bathrooms. I busted out laughing imagining this happening.
All that was left to finish the job of me becoming a fan was actually watching one of his movies. It was on the tv show “Dead Comics Society” on the Comedy Network (now Comedy Central). It was hosted by Robert Klein. I happened to catch it playing “Modern Times”
A trailer for a re-release of Modern Times (seems to be made around the late 40s, early 50s ?)
I didn’t think I could laugh at a movie as hard or as long as I did this one. The machine feeding Charlie in the factory had my sides hurting from laughing so much! The roller skating scene was amazing. And wow, is it packed with social commentary. And a bit of foreshadowing of Chaplin’s own life. And I discovered where “Smile” came from.
I was a full throttle fan by the time “Chaplin” came out in early 1993. I owned and read a few books, and watched a bunch more movies. Amazed by the fact that he acted, wrote, directed, composed music, produced, built his own studio, co-founded a film corporation, often all at the same time for a number of his films. I watched “Chaplin” in the theater three times, and could tell what was accurate, impressed with some Easter Eggs, and sometimes had me thinking “Where the heck did *that* come from?”. (More thoughts on that movie will show up later in the challenge).
There’s a lot of aspects to Charlie’s life that mad me laugh, cry, be baffled, impressed, roll my eyes, and feel angry (seriously 1952 America? seriously?). As Chaplin said in the beginning of “The Gentleman Tramp” documentary, “I went through a hell of a lot.”
I had so much fun doing the 30 Day Doctor Who Challenge that I thought I would do another one, this time on another one of my top favorites. But this one was not as easy because, unlike the many different Doctor Who challenges that fans have come up with, there was only one that I could find for Charlie, and I only found a few parts of the 30, and that was from a few years ago.
So I decided to create my own, inspired by the bits that I found:
1 How did you become a Chaplin fan 2 Favorite female costar 3 Favorite keystone 4 Favorite Essanay 5 Favorite Mutual 6 Favorite First National 7 Favorite United Artists 8 Thoughts on “Chaplin” the movie starring Robert Downey Jr 9 Favorite all time Chaplin movie 10 Least favorite 11 Favorite soundtrack 12 Favorite song 13 Favorite unreleased film/home movie 14 Favorite heavy (bad guy) 15 If you went back to meet him, at what time in his life would you do so? 16 Favorite non-fiction book 17 Least favorite book 18 Favorite photo of him in costume(Little Tramp or other) 19 Favorite photo out of costume 20 As of right now, what was the last movie you watched 21 what non Chaplin movie reminds you of a Chaplin movie? 22 what was the last Chaplin movie you saw that you had not seen before? 23 Favorite male costar 24 Favorite scene 25 Favorite story about him told by him 26 Favorite story about him told by someone else 27 What film would you recommend to recruit a fan? 28 Favorite fiction book 29 Favorite documentary 30 Favorite piece(s) of memorabilia that you own
For those of you who want to have an image of the list, I created this one:
I was planning on working on this for this month, but some last minute life changes popped up. I don’t know how often I’ll write a post (took me a few days to write this one), but I know how I’ll answer them. Most of them. Some answers change slightly from day to day, mood to mood, lol. But I’m looking forward to it 🙂
So it’s Christmas time once again, and I thought I would share some of the things I like to watch around this time of year. In no real order. Except Charlie Brown. Charlie Brown always comes in first!
A Charlie Brown Christmas
What is there not to like in this classic 1965 cartoon? Everything is so perfect that I can’t imagine it any other way. The characters, the wonderful, upbeat music, how just about every line is quotable.
Added bonus – If you are as old as I am, you might remember the special being preceded by this CBS intro
The Blue Carbuncle
The beautiful Granada series that starred Jeremy Brett and David Burke as Sherlock Holmes and Doctor Watson in this wonderful story set at Christmastime. Ah, a Victorian Christmas! This is one of my favorite episodes of the show. Back when VHS reigned supreme this was the only episode I bought (they cost $15-20 each back then!)
This is based off the original Sir Arthur Conan Doyle story of the same name (text from Wikisource; audio part 1 and part 2 from Project Gutenburg, a fantastic reading!)
Mork’s First Christmas
From the Mork and Mindy tv series, this one has recently been added (though I have seen it at least a dozen times since August). Mork finds out what the true meaning of Christmas is (not a horrible plague…watch to find out his telling of his first encounter with Christmas) And what a sweet ending!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=leOMutMen_k
The Greatest Gift
From one of my favorite scifi shows, Warehouse 13 (I miss that show! 🙁 ), this is their Christmas episode from season 3. Something happens to Pete where he wakes up as if he never was born. The story and title comes from the short story written by Philip Van Doren Stern that led to the film classic “It’s a Wonderful Life”.
Unfortunately, I am not able to find the full episode, so here is a clip from near the beginning:
If you have Netflix, it’s on there. Amazon also has it. Or you can buy it from Google
(Another tv episode that was inspired by It’s a Wonderful Life was also from Mork and Mindy, “It’s a Wonderful Mork“, but it’s not a Christmas episode so I don’t really include it in this list. But it’s really good, and a bit of a tearjerker due to recent events).
It’s a Wonderful Life
There was a time when I was growing up that this movie would be on a bunch of channels, sometimes at the same time. You turn to one channel and it would be at one scene, and go to another channel and it would be at another scene. And it remains and endearing movie, full of heart and makes you realize how much you can make a difference to someone else, even if it’s a small one.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4PlYcT6DmJY
A true classic starring Jimmy Stewart, Donna Reed, and Henry Travers.
The Gold Rush
Not exactly a Chistimasy type of movie, but it takes place over Thanksgiving and Christmas. This 1925 silent film by Charlie Chaplin is considered to be his best. Charlie, as the Little Tramp, goes to the mountains in hopes of finding gold. He encounters a friend. and enemy, boils and eats a shoe, does a dance with rolls, and falls in love.
The below version is the 1942 (tweaked) re-release with Chaplin’s own narration (in place of the typical silent film title cards) and musical score. While I like this one better overall, I like the story of the original better (mostly the same version, just a couple important cuts that Chaplin took out)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q8a83CI1B1o
A Christmas Carol
Take a classic Charles Dickens story, and the 11th Doctor, and you get Doctor Who’s 2010 Christmas episode (my favorite Who Christmas episode so far, though I didn’t quite understand the whole thing about the fish and shark). And there is the absolutely beautiful, operatic song, “Silence is All You Know”
As with Warehouse 13, the full episode is not online for free (that I can find), so below is a trailer and a clip.
This episode is on Netflix, Hulu Plus, Amazon, and a few other places.
Continuing on with Chaplin’s 125th anniversary of his birth and 100th anniversary of his first film! HUZZAH!
I was listening to a song, Perpetuum Mobile by Penguin Cafe Orchestra, and it popped in my head of a scene from a not-so-well-known Charlie Chaplin film that was never released (until a few years ago). The song itself does not necessarily remind one of Chaplin, but the tempo reminded me of the stop motion building of his studio from the film, How to Make Movies (a kind of “behind the scenes” type movie). And other things just fell into place.
Below are embeds of the film (no need to adjust the volume, there is no sound at all for the film), and two different places to listen to the song (your choice). I start the song right after the “Hollywood, Cal.” title card (about 0:14), and the song ends as Charlie finishes eating the lemon and skips away from the camera.
Here is the song on YouTube:
Have Spotify? (Where I first heard the song.)
It’s not a 100% match, but it does match quite a bit of it especially since it’s not an obvious song choice (Maple Leaf Rag always reminds me of Chaplin), and ends at a good spot. Fun to watch 🙂
Some thoughts on the film:
Although the film was never released to the public, Chaplin did release the beginning part of it when he put together three of his silent films together, A Dog’s Life, Should Arms, and The Pilgrim, in 1959 for The Chaplin Revue. He added music (which is wonderful! Especially for guy who couldn’t read or write music) and narrated short intros before each of the three films. Right before A Dog’s Life, he narrates parts of HTMM.
Such as the scene where the 1918 Charlie arrives at the studio, older Chaplin says “Now you see my arrival. (Charlie gets out of car) That’s me. I looked much younger there. (laughs) That was at least ten years ago” he says, 40 years later! Always makes me chuckle.
I just tried looking for it online, and (as of right now) it’s been removed and I cannot find another one.
It is an amazing look (albeit staged) at how he worked at that time of his career. And a lot of fun to see him, for a good amount of the film, as his own person, no costume. Interacting with his cast, directing, going over gags, putting on, and later taking off, his famous tramp costume, and some golf outtakes from The Idle Class.
And like many of his other films, he wrote, produced, directed it, and starred in this one.
The lemon that Chaplin eats is from citrus trees that grew on the lot. The land was covered with them, and when Chaplin build his studio, he kept a few standing.
And now I’ll head off and watch one of The Chaplin Revue collection movies, Shoulder Arms…
This is my test to see how WordPress has improved embedding videos, especially YouTube videos. I was having one heck of a time (more like 2 or 3 heacks) with the older version and could not get it to work, even reading others fixes and trying different browsers.
The video below is one that one of the members posted to the Charlie Chaplin Forum. The montage is from a number of Chaplin’s films ranging from 1915 to 1940. And the song is by Moby called Run On. I think the video is awesome and well timed.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IyymymDfwUk
[EDIT 7/22/14 — I was checking out some of my earlier posts and saw the previous embed was no longer working. So I updated it :). Enjoy!]
