Synopsis
True Blind Love
City Lights is the first silent film that Charlie Chaplin directed after he established himself with sound accompanied films. The film is about a penniless man who falls in love with a flower girl.
City Lights
1931 Directed by Charlie Chaplin
Cast
Charlie Chaplin Virginia Cherrill Harry Myers Al Ernest Garcia Hank Mann Albert Austin Eddie Baker Henry Bergman Buster Brodie Jeanne Carpenter Tom Dempsey James Donnelly Ray Erlenborn Robert Graves Charles Hammond Joseph Herrick Austen Jewell Willie Keeler Robert Parrish John Rand W.C. Robinson Cy Slocum Tony Stabenau Mark Strong Tiny Ward Stanhope Wheatcroft Florence Wix Granville Redmond Florence Lee Show All…
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Spoken Language
Alternative Titles
Svetla velkomesta, Byens lys, Luci della città, Luces de la ciudad, Charlie Chaplin - City Lights, Les lumières de la ville, Stadslichten, Светлините на града, 시티 라이트, 城市之光, 街の灯, Огни большого города, City Lights: A Comedy Romance in Pantomime, 시티라이트, Llums de la ciutat, Světla velkoměsta, Lichter der Großstadt, Τα Φώτα της Πόλης, روشناییهای شهر, Kaupungin valot, Les Lumières de la ville, אורות הכרך, Svjetla velegrada, Nagyvárosi fények, Światła wielkiego miasta, Luzes da Cidade, Luminile orașului, Svetlá veľkomesta, Stadens ljus, Şehir Işıkları, Вогні великого міста, Ánh Sáng Đô Thị
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A lighthearted comedy about homelessness, suicide, disability, manic depression, substance abuse, handguns, bipolar disorder, drunk driving, robbery, rheumatic fever, and incarceration.
Ladies and gentlemen.....the 1930s!
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"you can see now?"
"yes, i can see now."a farcical and romantic vision of a world where appearances, class and suffering can be overcome by the simplest, clumsiest expressions of kindness... even if only briefly.
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Saw it on Criterion in a video store in California so I decided why not.
Only other Chaplin film I’ve seen is “The Gold Rush” and while it was good, it confirmed that silent film ain’t my thing. Regardless, I decided to check this out because everyone says it’s Chaplin’s best and maybe the best silent film ever made.
So yeah, I liked it a lot. I’m a sucker for something that blends drama and comedy together seamlessly and this is obviously one of those. Lots of scenes that I see myself revisiting in the future just for entertainment. It deals with some heavy subject matter in really interesting ways and when put into a historical context this thing is clearly very significant.
Silent film still isn’t my cup of tea, but this film made me appreciate Chaplin as an entertainer on a whole nother level. Glad I own it.
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“You can see now?” “Yes, I can see now.”
Life was hard for the Blind Girl (Virginia Cherrill). Lacking vision was difficult enough without scraping by on the meager earnings from selling flowers on the sidewalk. It was barely enough to pay the rent on her Spartan tenement. Her Grandmother (Florence Lee) was old and frail and could not be a breadwinner, nor did the Great Depression give most people the wherewithal to keep her canary fed and her Grandmother warm. She was daydreamy and not without her limitations, but it was hard not to hope for something better. Yet when confronted with her sightless gaze and simple flower basket, people saw someone blind and poor and alone—someone on whom…
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That last shot is basically like the most joyous moment in all of cinema. Probably always will be.
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ummm this was so cute wtf?
the comedy holds up surprisingly well, and the orchestration is amazing.
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Romanticism is born from denial of the cruelty of the world around you......one of the saddest films.
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"Live life! Be brave!"
Charlie Chaplin makes pure cinematic comedy. Silent (or "pantomime") comedies like this deserve an incalculable amount of respect for being able to deliver jokes without the crutch of dialogue. They truly utilize all the tricks available from film.
During the eight decades since City Lights was released, the comedy genre seems to have forgotten how to do this entirely. Modern comedies rely almost exclusively on funny dialogue, and often on improvised dialogue at that, and while I can appreciate the talent behind these types of performances, they utilize only a very small amount film's potential. Jokes have to be told in flat, close-up shots of actors because the unpredictable nature of that sort of comedy demands…
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In a time when film industry was making its transition to talkies & silent films were becoming obsolete, Charlie Chaplin's City Lights entered into the theatres as a late example of its era yet in the long run, it didn't just turn out to be the greatest achievement of silent filmmaking but has endured the test of time so well that it still remains the quintessential romantic comedy.
The penultimate silent feature from Charlie Chaplin, City Lights chronicles the adventures of The Little Tramp who falls in love with a beautiful blind girl who sells flowers for a living. His desire to make her life better becomes a possibility when he saves a suicidal, drunken but wealthy man from killing himself…
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