Monsieur Verdoux Review- By Michael Carlisle

Title: Monsieur Verdoux
Year: 1947
Director: Charles Chaplin
Country: U.S
Language: English

By the time 1947 had rolled along, the great comedic filmmaker Charles Chaplin had made a career out of making sentimental yet political comedies starring his beloved character The Tramp. Unfortunately Chaplin killed The Tramp in 1940 with his first feature length "talkie" The Great Dictator, which was a loud cry against fascism. However this would not be the end of Chaplin's career, he still had more great films like Monsieur Verdoux up his sleeve.

Chaplin stars as Henri Verdoux, a suave yet cynical man who plans to support his family by marrying and murdering rich women for their money. However the job isn't foolproof, Verdoux does run into some problems.

Chaplin's film is a great example of a genre known as "black comedy", which attained great popularity during the decade after World War Two. It was released in 1947, just before the anti-communist Committee was able to kick him out of America. The character of Henri Verdoux is essentially The Tramp, if The Tramp was a complete asshole. Though it's a bit difficult to completely hate the character, as his "business" is solely to feed his family. Perhaps the system is at fault, perhaps the character is as well, Chaplin's film is not black and white in moral, which makes it all the more thought provoking.

Like all Chaplin's films, the comedic and suspenseful timing of this film is perfect. Of course it is also deeply political. Chaplin's character portrayed a small scale version of what is happening throughout the world; people are not treated as human beings but merely for economic gain, for power and for exploitation. Instead of this Chaplin suggests that people need to care more about each other and about what's going on in their world, and put their attention on really important matters. It's strange that the newspaper headlines are of his evil and not the rest of the world's, Chaplin is also making a statement about how poorly the media is doing in portraying important news.

In conclusion, Monsieur Verdoux is a very funny, yet very political Chaplin film. Though it as not as well known as Modern Times or Great Dictator, it certainly is as entertaining. It's a black comedy that matches the tone of the  renowned Ealing Comedies in the UK, though I'd argue that there is much more to learn from this film. Praise it! 4/5