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"Que cherchent-ils au Ciel, tous ces aveugles?" The production was so protracted that it passed through the coming of sound and the Wall Street Crash, both are reflected in the opening scene of muffled speeches and beggars on monuments. ("Peace and Prosperity" are the statues, the Little Tramp gets his pants caught in the former's sword and uses the latter's marble hand to thumb his nose at the inauguration committee.) A smitten vagabond is an affluent benefactor to the flower peddler who can't see (Virginia Cherrill), the Tramp contemplates Blind Beauty adoringly and gets a faceful of dirty water when she empties her can. Her counterpart is the despondent moneybags (Harry Myers) first seen tying a stone around his neck, his suicide attempt is thwarted by the protagonist so the two are great chums for as long as the millionaire is soused. In vino veritas, then "the sober dawn awakens a different man." The purest Charles Chaplin, vision and emotion in "a comedy romance in pantomime." Chatter is rejected in favor of synchronized sound and a plangent score, the defiant anachronism can take or leave new technology, the nightclub sequence showcases a good deal of camera movement. The swallowed whistle and the spaghetti streamer, you've got to take the shit along with the poetry or so learns the street sweeper surrounded by equines and jumbos. "Live life! Be brave!" The search for money to restore the heroine's sight leads to the boxing ring, where the best strategy is to hide from the opposing pugilist behind the referee in an impeccable slapstick ballet. Threadbare undies folded like a lapel handkerchief, a posy crumbled by nervous fingers, the Tramp in tatters but revived in the newfound gaze of his beloved. "You can see now?" "Yes, I can see now." The final close-up remains one of the pinnacles of cinema, Chaplin's pained grin of hope gives way to the blackness behind his "The End" card. Godard has it some eight decades later in Film Socialisme, "un sourire qui congédie l'univers." With Florence Lee, Al Ernest Garcia, and Hank Mann. In black and white.
--- Fernando F. Croce |