If any one person has dominated world cinema by the scope of his creative genius, it has been Charlie Chaplin. Charlie Chaplin has been among the first few in the movie world to truly understand the power of the screen as a tool of education, art and entertainment. Where the others have sought the means of word, spoken or written, Chaplin succeeded in spreading his social gospel through his pantomime.
Charlie Chaplin is considered as one of the greatest filmmakers in the history of cinema, whose movies are still popular throughout the world. In a career spanning over seventy five years, Chaplin gave many memorable performances. This versatile comic genius acted, directed, produced, wrote and composed music for almost all of his films and was recognized as ‘The Little Tramp’, the character he played in his silent films. Chaplin is widely accepted as one of the founding fathers of cinema and has influenced an array of filmmakers and comedians. His films show, through the Little Tramp’s positive outlook on life in a world full of chaos, that the human spirit has and always will remain the same. Some of his greatest films include ‘Modern Times’, ‘The Great Dictator’, ‘The Gold Rush’, ‘The Immigrant’ and ‘The Kid’.
Charlie Chaplin’s movies have always had a message of intense personal flavour and conviction. Charlie Chaplin provoked thought with his tender comedies. His humor focused on the simplicity of daily routines and the funniness within them. People all over the world identified with Chaplin’s character because he had the same problems, they had. He had to work. He was often broke. He felt pain and sadness. He fell in love, and the women he fell in love with didn’t always fall in love with him. Chaplin made people laugh at situations that were sometimes painful—situations that his audience had experienced themselves. The audience worldwide recognized Chaplin on the screen as the Tramp, characterized by: his clown shoes, cane, top hat and a mustache.
Charlie Chaplin was a keen observer of the social structure that existed in the society. Chaplin through his films portrayed the day to day struggles that the working classes faced within that structure. Most of Chaplin’s films consist of a social message. Chaplin created depictions of class inequality in a new highly popular medium that reached large, cross-class audience not only in the United States but internationally. Chaplin’s personal experience in London’s poor districts during his childhood and his British cultural background made him a keen critic of the class difference which he portrayed in his American films. Charlie Chaplin had more to him than just comedy. Charlie Chaplin opened his films with a static title card which announced the story of the film briefly to the audience.
Opening Title of Modern Times (1936)
Charlie Chaplin had a very rough childhood that truly affected his cinematic style. Themes of Chaplin’s own troubled life are very clearly visible in his films. Charlie Chaplin’s dissenting views against the American Capitalist culture made him a victim of McCarthyism and forced him to leave the country which was home to him for 40 years. Often people overlook and fail to appreciate the critical film making of Charlie Chaplin. Charlie Chaplin was one of the first few film-makers to truly understand and exploit the real potential of visuals in his films which continue to fascinate scholars and cinema buffs till date.
Chaplin had hired his own publicity staff by 1916 and was in control of the print exposure he got. Charlie Chaplin was not as quiet about his art as his silent screen persona would appear, in contrast he published prolifically throughout his career about film as a new art, his reaction to the American audience , his character of the tramp. His initial writings were confined to the publicity pieces of his early years.
The earliest serious attention given to Chaplin and his films came from France, where the culture traditionally recognized arts and their benefits to the society. For the French, Chaplin represented the first artist on the screen who could reveal the human condition in a single gesture, bring lyricism to the physical brutality of his activities and promote a universalstatement on the nature of man and authority in the complex technocratic world of the twentieth century. Louis Dullec, key member of the French Impressionists (1920s) felt Chaplin’s films had all the tenets to prove film as art with its own expressive potential.
Kuriyama (1992), in her article “Chaplin’s Impure Comedy: The Art of Survival” goes a little in depth about Chaplin’s failed marriages. Charlie Chaplin’s first wife was named Mildred Harris and Chaplin married her, despite their iffy relations, only because she claimed she was pregnant. The claim was false, but soon Harris did actually become pregnant. Chaplin’s first son was born deformed and died a few days later. Charlie Chaplin blamed himself for the baby’s death and suffered his first extreme case of depression. Kuriyama (1992), believes that Charlie Chaplin’s inability to control his life actually drove him to perfect his films. She also believes that Chaplin wouldn’t have been the same as an actor and a director if not for all the tragedy that occurred in his life.
Charlie Chaplin’s movies not only give comic relief but also consist of elements of utopia which Chaplin often employs to depict and fulfill his version of the ‘the American Dream’. The use of elements of utopia and cynicism can be seen almost ubiquitously in most of his films. For Instance famously, in Modern Times (1936) Charlie Chaplin and the Gamin enter into an idealized dream sequence – it is a comical and stereotypical vision of the perfect American home in a capitalistic society. They collectively imagine, through a dissolve, their happy life together in a bright cheery home. Chaplin is shown wearing a blazer over the clothes he wore in the initial factory sequence, which suggests that he dreams of a better standard of life and a higher position at his workplace just like any normal American. He also wears a scarf to add swagger and humor to his look. The gamine on the other hand is dressed like the stereotypical American wife; she is well dressed, has a charming smile, is always happy to serve her husband and always keeps the house nice and tidy. This sequence represents Chaplin’s American Dream. Chaplin is shown plucking an orange from a nearby tree just outside the window. Grapes are visible beyond the kitchen door which are also easily plucked. An obliging cow is quickly summoned outside the kitchen door, always available for fresh milk. And a steak is cooking on the stove. The Tramp is inspired to promise: “I’ll do it! We’ll get a home, even if I have to work for it.” They are brought back to the rough reality of their situation when a policeman motions them to move along. The dream sequence is backed by an appropriately fantasy like musical theme which is soft and melodious like the innocent dream of the pair of vagabonds.
In the same movie, Modern Times, in a Jail sequence Chaplin is shown enjoying all the modern comforts of home in his cell―good food, an open cell door, and friendly jailers. He reads in the newspaper about unemployment, labor unrest, and other dramatic events in the outside world. His room also consists of a poster of Abraham Lincoln, who was a civil rights activist and perhaps a household name in America.
In this scene, as Chaplin reads about the harsh life in America outside the jail room, we can hear the twerking of birds which is accompanied by a peaceful soundtrack which gives a normal day like feeling to the scene and momentarily erases the social stigma of the prison, which perhaps is a well crafted cynical social comment by Chaplin on the life in America where just like the rest of the industrial world, it is hard to make a living and the prison perhaps is a safer place to live in where a person is given food, shelter and protection. The presence of the poster of Lincoln in Chaplin’s jail room perhaps symbolises Chaplin’s outlook on social and economic conditions of America. Chaplin perhaps through his pantomimic narrative highpoints the need to initiate social and economic reforms to improve conditions in America. Abraham Lincoln perhaps is a role model for the Tramp who wants to follow in his footsteps to raise his voice against the repressive social and economic structure of America during the Depression years.
The use of elements of utopia and cynicism is very common in Chaplin films. Chaplin uses these elements to give his idea of the perfect or ideal society, which is both thought provoking as well as humorous for the audience. Elements of utopia and cynicism make Chaplin’s cinema standout from the rest with its unique style and form.
Chaplin through his films desires for an egalitarian social system where the working classes have equal civil, political, social and economic rights. Chaplin perhaps desires for a society where individual rights of the working classes such as the freedom of thought and conscience, speech and expression, assembly and movement are protected from infringement by governments and private organizations so that they are not alienated from humanity.
Charlie Chaplin initially resisted the technological advent of sound in movies in 1930s for which he was heavily criticized. Chaplin feared that the addition of sound would lead to severe loss of the advantages of the pantomimic cinema. Chaplin’s resistance was an economic one as he feared loss of his market which he captured through is pantomimic cinema.
Charlie Chaplin
Chaplin was one of the rare film-makers who not only financed and produced all his films, but was the author, actor, director and soundtrack composer of them as well. Chaplin’s contribution to the field of cinema is of great importance because he was one of the first few film-makers to really understand the potential of film and played an vital role in defining film as an art form. Chaplin’s contribution to early cinema still holds relevance and importance in the present day and age and all the modern film-makers are in his debt.
Links to some of Charlie Chaplin’s Films:
minalkumaronjour 