City Lights Review- By Michael Carlisle

Title: City Lights
Director: Charlie Chaplin
Year: 1931
Country: US
Language: English

I wish I could relive my introduction to the master of silent cinema, Charles Chaplin. I first saw City Lights in a video production course back in grade 11 and I still remember being enchanted by the lovely little tramp. The slapstick humor of Chaplin's was simple yet incredibly effective. The melodrama elicited great emotional response and could bring even men with heart's of stone to tears. City Lights also required a lot of guts from its director. It was a silent film made four few years after the introduction of sound. Most silent film stars either adjusted to the new practice or were crushed by it, Chaplin stood his ground despite enormous pressure and therefore his film became a great classic.

City Lights is a bittersweet film about a Tramp (Charlie Chaplin) who meets a blind girl selling flowers, and during one of the most ingenious scenes in the history of film, mistakes him for a wealthy gentleman. This presents a challenge for the Tramp. He is very interested in the girl yet the girl may only like him because she thinks he is rich, the little tramp is far too nervous to reveal his secret.When he learns that an operation may restore her sight, he sets off to earn the money she needs to have the surgery. Throughout a series of comedic and sometimes tragic events we follow his journey to getting this money, and wind up with a masterfully tearjerking ending.

Chaplin's disregard for sound was very logical. With silence his film had no boundaries, they could be seen anywhere in the world by anyone. They broke down barriers between nations and became something everyone could enjoy. Besides, Chaplin's popularity was known worldwide, to make a talkie might as well be flipping the bird to all the non-English speakers who adored him. He would only make a talkie when it was absolutely necessary, indeed that held true when The Great Dictator (his first talkie) was released in 1940 as a brutal,brave and essential attack against the ever growing Nazi Regime.

The tramp also didn't express himself through speech. He was a rowdy, funny and emotional character through his actions. His body language is a substitute for speech. He seems to stand apart from the other characters throughout the film, not really having a background, not really having a home. He clearly doesn't belong in society as the only people that seem to interact with him in this film are a drunk millionaire, who immediately forgets who he is once he's sober, and a blind flower girl. The Tramp is a loner and an outcast but that's likely why we root for him.

In conclusion, City Lights will both tug at your heartstrings and tickle your funny bone. The great comedic sequences, which include a hilarious boxing scene in which Chaplin is clearly the underdog, are among the funniest scenes I have seen in film. Rivaled only by the cocaine scene in Chaplin's other masterpiece Modern Times. It is a great thrill to see a comedy that doesn't rely on bad gross out, stoner or pop culture jokes. Unfortunately Chaplin's films are for those who seek them out, I wish they were as mainstream now as they were in the 30's. Chaplin's films show that humor and intelligence don't need to seperate, they can co-exist perfectly.Praise it! 5/5