His School

Along with the film editing class this semester, I also took Major Figures in Cinema. This particular section focused primarily on Charles Chaplin. For those who don’t know who this man was, he:

• was possibly the biggest star cinema’s silent film era
• was born and raised in England
• directed, produced, starred in, and composed his larger feature length films
• was riddled with controversy in his personal life
• was exiled from the United States in 1953 (J. Edgar Hoover thought he was a Commie)
• only returned to the US for 10 days in 1973 to accept an Oscar
• passed away on Christmas Day in 1977

I remember my first experience with any of Chaplin’s works was during an Intro to Film class I took one summer at BYU in 2005. We watched his 1931 masterpiece City Lights. I was floored. I didn’t know silent films could be so genuinely funny, yet compelling at the same time. I had no idea Charlie Chaplin was such a genius, and one I would consider to be the father of Comedic film. Not only was he an amazing comedian, he was also a truly gifted storyteller.

Here are some of my favorites from his very extensive filmography:

• The Kid is Chaplin’s first feature length movie. The Little Tramp (the character Chaplin is famous for) finds an orphan baby and raises it as his own. Years later, Social services try to take the boy away from his adoptive father, as seen here:

• The Gold Rush is the film that features this FAMOUS scene:

• City Lights is my favorite. The ending is very sweet. Here’s the funny boxing sequence from that film:

• The Great Dictator was the film Chaplin made ridiculing Adolf Hitler and the Nazi movement. Chaplin said that had he known the full extent of the Nazi atrocities, he would not have made this film (because of how light he makes of something that he did not know was SO serious). It’s a very funny film with a truly powerful speech at the end.

Little know that Chaplin actually wrote the music for “Smile” a song used in his film Modern Times. It was covered during an episode of Glee last season:

He was truly a fascinating subject to study and learn about this semester. Robert Downey, Jr., gave an Oscar-nominated portrayal of Charlie in the 1992 biopic Chaplin. Here’s the trailer for that movie: