Analysis Of Charlie Chaplin 's City Lights Essay

In films, Charlie Chaplin and dashing Rudolph Valentino awakened the innocence of movie goers. Al Jolsen lit up the movie screen, as well. It was during this time that Walt Disney produced his first cartoon, Alice's

At first glance, Singin’ in the Rain, directed by Gene Kelly and Stanley Donen (1952) and Sunset Boulevard, directed by Billy Wilder (1950) don’t have too much in common. One is a musical comedy about an actor’s transition from silent films to talkies and the other is a film noir drama about an unsuccessful screenwriter’s murder. But upon closer inspection, these movies are about a common problem: the struggles of the film industry when talking pictures took over.

The film’s main focus largely represents the Hollywood star system to which Norma Desmond is a victim of. The film particularly highlights the fantasy world in which Norma lives in, the world where she is the ‘greatest star’ (Norma Desmond, Sunset Boulevard, 1950). Sunset Boulevard steps into Norma’s mixed up world where hundreds of photos of herself clutter her crumbling mansion and where she watches herself on screen on a weekly basis. The crumbling and deteriorating mansion could be seen as a metaphor for Norma’s fall from stardom, the collapse of her career.

Sunset Boulevard (1950) and Singing in the Rain (1952) both use the transitions from silent to sound movies to help drive the narrative. Director Billy Wilder’s film, Sunset Boulevard and Gene Kelly and Stanley Donen’s Singing in the Rain utilize camera movements and sound to advance the plot.

Lang used it sparingly and its silent sections are among the most dramatic. The purposeful sparseness of sound in the film lulls the viewer into a tranquility that is at various points abruptly disturbed by whistles, bells, and screams.

The star-studded romantic comedy Midnight in Paris is one of Woody Allen’s most recent films which he did both, wrote and directed. It is a film about a man named Gil (Owen Wilson) who travels to Paris with his fiancée’s parents in order to expand his imagination and he ends up embarking on a journey to the 1920s while walking the streets of Paris at night. Not only is this film engaging and witty, but it also manages to provide both, overt and covert examples of postmodernism in film. By analyzing Woody Allen’s 2011film Midnight in Paris, we can identify the presence of many underlying motifs in both the narrative and the characterization of the film when using some of Frederic Jameson and Jean Baudrillard’s concepts on postmodernism.

Charlie Chaplin directed and starred in his legendary film, City Lights. This film was released in 1931, three years after the release of the first film that included audible dialogue, however, the lack of dialogue did not get in Chaplin's way as he produced one of the most well known American comedies. A little over four decades later, another great comedy was produced by the famous comedy group Monty Pythons, which consisted of five British men, Graham Chapman, John Cleese, Eric Idle, Terry Jones, and Michael Palin, and one American animator, Terry Gilliam. Monty Python and the Holy Grail was released in 1975 and has forever left its mark on comedy. When comparing the comedic aspects of Charlie Chaplin's City Lights to Monty Python and the Holy Grail three overarching comedic concepts that differ and evolve as time passes

Every day millions of Americans go to theaters with their families to enjoy movies. Watching films has become one of the most popular activities to do. Although plenty of people know of Charlie Chaplin, most do not know any real information about him. Charlie Chaplin has been a major contributor to America’s advancement in the film industry from his innovative beginnings, and perseverance to improve and succeed, to his overall achievements in history.

Porter had found inspiration from various European film makers and had studied in depth the effect it would have on is target market, when he finally released is first attempt, The life of an American Fireman (1903), he hadn’t polished it as well as he had hoped. However when he released The Great Train Robbery it was clear that he had introduced the west to a new style of film making and changed how narrative was expressed within film forever.

My example that I will be using is Modern Times by Charlie Chaplin. Modern times is a film developed after the industrial revolution. It serves the purpose of critiquing capitalism and the social world. Modern Times begin with a factory worker who starts developing anxiety through the lack of breaks and repetitive work. When the Worker is on break, his boss is always keeping an eye on him and demands him to go back to work due to the loss of production. Soon after, the factory worker goes on lunch break, but is again distracted by his boss due to the desire to try out a new lunch contraption. At first, the new technology seems to work since the factory Worker was being fed. But, after a few seconds the contraption goes haywire and starts hurting the worker. The factory Worker goes back to work, but suddenly starts to mess up. He goes around ruining all his co-workers’ work and even get himself in prison. However, he ends up saving all the cops from the inmates’ revolution and is released early from jail. He does not want to leave since he is treated properly in jail and will be homeless in the outside world. He tries to get himself in prison again, but meets a beautiful woman Gamin who is also homeless and workless. They run off together and commit burglaries to feed themselves, but is soon discovered by the police. They manage to escape and run off to live in a small house by themselves. The factory Worker and the Gamin decides to have lunch together, but finds out that a

As the audience knows well already since the very first scene, Sunset Boulevard does not have what one would call a “happy ending.” In this sense, the movie gives itself away as film noir considering the fact that all such works of cinema which fall in this style category are known to have dark themes predominantly sending a message of hopelessness and meaningless existence. With Joe’s lifeless body floating around in a swimming pool in mind throughout the entire movie, audiences of this motion picture are filled with a sense of pointlessness for Joe’s life, since his personal resolutions and growth as a

At some point in someone’s life the struggle with day to day activities can seem never ending. Modern Times is a film that shows how the ever changing life we live can take a toll on how we choose to live. The tramp, Charlie Chaplin, goes through many hard times in the course of this short film. He worked in a labor intensive factory, got caught in a machine, spent time in jail, failed at several jobs, and finally found his calling of being an entertainer. The woman he was going to spend his life with was homeless and caught stealing bread, but the tramp took the blame.

Charlie Chaplin’s, The gold Rush, made in 1925 has become a huge classic comedy in film History. The historic horrors of the starving 19th century pioneers inspired the sequence in which Charlie and his partner Big Jim (Mack Swain) are snowbound and ravenous. Charlie cooks and eats his boot, with all the airs of a gourmet. In the eyes of the delirious Big Jim, he is transformed into a chicken - a triumph both for the cameramen who had to effect the elaborate trick work entirely in the camera; and for Chaplin who magically becomes a bird. For one shot another actor took a turn in the chicken costume, but it was unusable: no-one else had Chaplin’s gift for

In the 1931 film “City Lights”, Charlie Chaplin “opens our eyes”, so to speak, about how society values trivial elements of people over the deeper person by using blindness. In this film, Chaplin brilliantly mixes lighthearted comedy with deep and complex ideas about problems with society. Chaplin uses music, gags, and a genuine love connection to portray this point in multiple ways throughout the movie. Chaplin also took the bold step of not making a talking movie, even though they were available at the time, making the details in the pictures and sounds he was creating that much more important. What makes “City Lights” so special, and different from other comedies, is Chaplin’s natural blend of comedic scenes with tense and serious scenes. Chaplin weaved together a masterpiece that culminates in the end with the lady seeing who she fell in love with, which is also the moment Chaplin slaps the viewer in the face with the realization that the priorities in society are misguided and that the important things cannot be seen with the eye.

The final and most significant delivery of the meaning of Chaplin’s film is given during the last scene. The audience sees that the flower girl now has her own flower shop, thanks to the kindness of the tramp. She is no longer blind, and now can truly see the world for what it is, thanks to the operation that the tramp’s generosity gave her. When she sees the tramp getting bullied on the street, she is amused and feels bad for him so she tries to offer him some change. Although she now has sight, she cannot see him for who he really is; the