April 16 . . .
He was the most influential comic artist the movies ever produced – and arguably the single most important cinema artist, period. He rose from an impoverished, abused childhood that could have come right out of a Dickens novel to being the single most recognized film figure in the world.
Charles Spencer Chaplin was born this day in the tenements of London in 1889. His rise from miserable childhood (his father abandoned the family, his mother went insane, and he and his half-brother Sidney were separated and sent away to horrific child workhouses) to world-renown icon is a story that can’t begin to be told in a movie – though Richard Attenborough tried in ‘Chaplin’ (1992).
If you’ve never seen a Chaplin film, you’re missing one of the great joys of filmdom. His early two-reelers for Mack Sennett allowed him the space, spontaneity and freedom to grow as an artist in an incredibly short time. By the time he had signed with Mutual in 1916 he was the single most popular movie star in the world and was producing works of greatness: The Vagabond, Easy Street, and The Emigrant are masterful short comedies – deftly mingling inventive slapstick, pointed social commentary, and pathos. He expanded into feature films: The seriocomic The Kid (1921), the bittersweet The Circus (1928), the exquisitely romantic City Lights (1931) and the borderline social manifesto that is Modern Times (1936).
But the film he most wanted to be remembered by, and his crowning masterpiece, is The Gold Rush (1925). Chaplin’s iconic Tramp is “the Lone Prospector” in the frozen north during the Klondike Gold Rush. Packed with priceless bits (Chaplin’s celebrated “Oceana Roll” dance; sharing a meal of a boiled shoe, etc.) and pathos, The Gold Rush is Chaplin’s most sustained and enduring work. It’s also proof that comedy is borne of tragedy: The idea for the story was inspired by the real-life Donner Party.
Chaplin never again had such a virtuoso command of the camera and such an expansive, naturalistic canvas to work on. The Gold Rush is that rare thing – a truly epic comedy. (A note: Watch the original 1925 release if possible. Chaplin voiced a narration, added an original score and recut the film in 1942, but the original version is superior.)
Click here to see a little of The Gold Rush . . . http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xoKbDNY0Zwg
1 comment:
Such a comic genious! And he was not inspired BY the others; he was THEIR inspiration!
I did not know of the Donner Party's ironic conection to the comic masterpiece that is "The Gold Rush." You find the most interesting bits of information to share with us.
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