Tuesday, June 19, 2012

City Lights

If you have never seen Charlie Chaplin's "City Lights" you are impoverished.

It has been deemed one of the ten best films of all time, the best romantic comedy of all time and the best silent film of all time. Chaplin made it as a silent movie when "talkies" had become all the rage.  It took him nearly three years to make the movie, sometimes filming literally hundreds of takes of a single scene, including the ending.  It is genius story telling, humanity, slapstick comedy, pathos and one of the most emotional endings... some critics have claimed it is THE finest ending, in film history.  I had a betamax copy of it years ago.  I just found it on youtube... watch it for free!

If you have a dry eye at the end, you are not human.


1 comment:

Grace said...

Ditto, amen, in spades. I try to talk up this movie (which is ironic, now that I think of it) to people that think they don't like any old movies and say that it is STILL some of the best story-telling and emoting out there. But I haven't won any converts, so I'm hoping you have better luck.