Even at 90, ‘City Lights’ keeps wordlessly shining
- Brett Hiner: A Work in Progress
- May 11, 2021
- 848
It seems poignant to be writing about a movie that is celebrating its 90th birthday and noting that movie’s continued importance in not only the film world, but also its societal commentary/relevance as well.
Debates happen quite often on whether films made 30, 40, let alone 90, years ago still hold their weight with modern audiences. Naturally, you have your heavyweights, like “The Wizard of Oz,” “Casablanca,” “Jaws” and “Psycho,” that have lived, and will continue to do so, well beyond their shelf lives. But what about a black and white, silent film released in 1931?
The film is Charlie Chaplin’s “City Lights” — what many film historians believe to be his creative masterpiece and the movie Orson Welles, Stanley Kubrick and Guillermo del Toro list(ed) amongst their favorites.
The plot centers around Chaplin’s infamous “Little Tramp” being mistaken by a blind girl for one who has money (she hears a car door slam and assumes it is his). With this beginning his journey is set in motion as he attempts to make enough money to give the girl a surgery that will cure her blindness.
Willing to do just about anything to win her love, the Tramp’s journey involves him taking on various jobs, including a white-wing, what street cleaners were called when there was such a need to remove animal waste from the streets, where he evades a parade of horses only to encounter a parade of elephants, and a hilarious scene where the Tramp’s ballet skills are put to the test in a boxing match. His plans to have the fight rigged go by the wayside when his opponent flees town to avoid the cops; his new opponent is not agreeable to a fixed fight, so the Tramp has to evade him, literally and figuratively.
I will not spoil whether or not his money-making jobs lead to a successful surgery for the blind girl, but I will say, even with no words being spoken, the film’s ending lands in a place of acceptable ambiguity; Chaplin lets his audience come to their own conclusions about love and the sincerity behind his selfless acts. Amongst many endearing traits, the Tramp is a hopeless romantic.
The film also was Chaplin’s biggest risk. Four years prior to its release, sound had become part of the movies, yet Chaplin insisted on the Tramp not speaking (something a version of the Tramp character eventually does nine years later in “The Great Dictator”), because he felt the minute he did, the magic behind the character would be lost. In his autobiography, published in 1964, he writes, “Dialogue, to my way of thinking, always slows action, because action must wait upon words.”
Despite the troublesome three-year production, upon its release “City Lights” was both a commercial and critical success and is currently ranked #11 on the American Film Institute’s Greatest Films of All Time list.
But as hilarious as moments in the movie are and the many accolades it has received, I think the film is still so relevant today because of Chaplin’s subtle ability to weave social commentary into his films without becoming preachy. With that skill, mixed with his brilliant use of pathos, Chaplin guides his audience to a full understanding of character.
In “City Lights,” that understanding revolves around the treatment of the Tramp, himself.
It is not an accident that the only time the Tramp is noticed, at least when he is not being picked on, is by a blind girl who cannot see him for who he truly is and by a millionaire who befriends him only when he is drunk. Society has no need for the less fortunate, and they are, therefore, ignored, which is made all the more clear when the drunk millionaire sobers up and kicks him out of his house. Chaplin is holding a mirror up to his audience, asking us if we carry the same ideals.
Ironically, by the time “City Lights” was made, Chaplin was a millionaire, several times over, but his cinematic themes and characters were rooted in the poverty of his youth, and he was deeply bothered by the treatment of those less fortunate than him.
When studying visual literacies, “City Lights” is a film I show in class and, if I am being honest, a movie that receives a lukewarm reception from students. With more time we also would be able to discuss, study and understand that Chaplin leads to the Marx Brothers, who lead to the Three Stooges, who lead to the great radio and TV stars like Jack Benny and Bob Hope and Lucille Ball.
Eventually, we get around to film greats Mel Brooks, Gene Wilder, Richard Pryor and “Saturday Night Live” and the onslaught of film comedians who became noticed on that show.
One could argue, “Well, if it were not Chaplin, it would have been somebody else.” That may be true, but history, especially in the visual arts, does not record the “would have beens” but rather the film geniuses. In the case of Chaplin (who starred in, wrote, directed and composed the music for the film) and “City Lights,” genius has never been more clear, even at the age of 90.