City Lights (1931)

City Lights (Charlie Chaplin, 1931) If there is one film that is the Masterpiece of Charlie Chaplin's career, it is City Lights, combining comedy and melancholy in a nearly seamless flow of images. In 2007, the American Film Institute voted it the 11th greatest movie ever made, while a 2008 poll instituted by Cahiers du Cinema voted it the 17th, and it was voted into the National Film Registry in 1991. Depending on the day he was interviewed, Orson Welles would say it was his favorite film, but Stanley Kubrick voted it his 5th, an appraisal—and ranking—agreed upon by Andrei Tarkovsky.

In 1949, James Agee said that the final scene was "the single greatest piece of acting ever committed to celluloid" and it has been cribbed by both Federico Fellini (The Nights of Cabiria) and Woody Allen (Manhattan) in their work.

The first thing one should know about City Lights is that it is a silent film...with sound. Chaplin wasn't ready to fully commit to "The Talkies" which came into public favor with 1927's The Jazz Singer) when he began work on the film in 1928, and the film compromises, somewhat, with music, sound effects, while maintaining interstitial titles and a predominantly visual narrative. Some of the sound is unnecessary—during an opening unveiling of a statue-tableau, the speaking gas-bags have their voices replaced by Chaplin quacking through a kazoo—but in other sequences, there is a toe-dab into making it essential as, at one point, The Little Tramp swallows a whistle and his resulting hiccups produce a chirping interruption to a pretentious recital. The gag wouldn't work without sound, and the sequence wouldn't work without the sound of the whistle off-screen and the frustrated soloists' reaction to it. Sound, in this instance, becomes essential to Chaplin's silent comedy.

It is also essential to the plot, unusual for a silent film.

The Little Tramp (Chaplin, of course) is going about his day—after being rousted from his sleeping place of a tented statue that has just been unveiled in a pompous civic ceremony—and comes across a blind girl (Virginia Cherrill) selling flowers. She can hear—but not see—the bustle of traffic going by, including a very expensive car with a valet who lets out his rich employer. At this time, the Tramp passes her, and she mistakes him for the rich man who has gone off to his destination, oblivious to the girl. She strikes up a conversation with the Tramp and gives him a flower for his lapel, which moves the Tramp as he realizes she is blind. His instinct is to help, even when she dumps a pail of water on him as he observes her.

Still thinking of the girl that evening, he makes his way to the river, where he encounters a drunk millionaire (Harry Myers) who has gone to the river to kill himself. The Tramp convinces the man not to take his life, and inadvertently gets dumped in the water while trying to intervene. The two take turns trying to save each others' life, and the millionaire declares the Tramp his best friend and takes him into town to reward him with a big swanky dinner at a nightclub.

All well and good while the party lasts. But, when the millionaire sobers up, the Little Tramp is forgotten and tossed out on his ear. So, there are periods when Mr. Millions gets depressed, gets in his cups and the Tramp is back in his favor. This allows the Tramp to be in the glow of his generosity enough that he is able to pay the Girl's rent so that she and her elderly mother won't be tossed out of their walk-up. The Girl, of course, is grateful to her unseen benefactor and her affections are returned by the Tramp. He'll do anything for her.

That includes taking a job as a street-sweeper. That includes being coerced to a boxing match with the promise that the purse will be split 50/50. Even when the original boxer goes on the lam when the police catch up with him, leaving the Tramp to go into the ring with a more able-bodied opponent, who looks like he could use the Tramp for a sweat-towel. But, the Tramp persists. If there's a chance that he can help the Girl—especially with a new treatment for blindness they've discovered in Europe—he will do what he has to do. Love, after all, is blind.

One's sympathies, of course, are with the Tramp. And it is from the moment he's uncovered in the town square, negotiating with the intricacies of his statuesque perch—a moment that has him skewered by an upraised sword or inadvertently having his nose thumbed by an upraised marble hand—that we get an encapsulation of the Tramp's character, making us laugh but also gaining our understanding and sympathies. That sequence, and the film's running attitude, reflects The Little Tramp's rather harmless rebellions—is it rebellion if it's your very nature?—against polite society. The Tramp reflects the downtrodden and hapless among all of us and we see, in him, all our best intentions and our own struggles and mishaps, negotiating with an all too-stolid society.

It's part of Chaplin's comedic conspiracy with the audience—show the situation and let the audience anticipate, combining the tension with the frequent pleasures that come from Chaplin's quick surprises and athleticism. He may be a Tramp, but he's an adept one, a flexible, dexterous soul who does what needs be done (here, quite unselfishly), taking advantage of the situation presented (both character and director/actor share that quality) and making the most of it, teasing the audience with the situations and the larger story, and hoping for the best. The Tramp is an eternal optimist.

But, he's still a Tramp. And there will have to be an inevitable resolution between him and the blind girl. That step carries all the hope, anticipation and irony of a good O. Henry story. And, yes, it may be "the single greatest piece of acting ever committed to celluloid"—on the part of both Cherrill and Chaplin—as its nuanced expressions reflect a depth that's as deep as the heart of its viewer. Read into them what you will—shyness, regret, disappointment, happiness, gratitude, humility, heart-break, joy—they're all true.

And Chaplin stops there, fading to black. It is not the usual, unequivocal "happy ending" one has come to expect from the "Silents." The scene will go on (maybe happily, but probably not) leaving us with our own ideas of love, commitment, and pangs of the unrequited. To go farther would spoil it, one way or another. Orson Welles said "If you want a happy ending, that, of course, depends on where you stop your story", a line that is informed by his knowledge of Shakespeare as much as his knowledge of this film. This ending is as daring as stepping backwards towards an elevator shaft, or approaching an abyss on roller-skates. It promises disaster, like so many of Chaplin's stunts of comedic intent. But Chaplin leaves us there, suspended, but thrilled, nonetheless.