Tag Archives: review

Jun 29 2025

1936 – Modern Times

1936 – Modern Times

Part silent, part talkie movie written, directed and starred in by Charlie Chaplin in his last performance as The Tramp. It also starts Paulette Goddard as Gamin, his potential love interest. I saw it for free on YouTube. It is a largely a scathing critique of modern technology in the name of capitalism during the Great Depression, apparently spurred by a conversation he had with Mahatma Ghandi.

Critique of capitalism is “in” these last few years in film – from The Menu, Triangle of Sadness, Glass Onion, Saltburn to the masterpiece that is Parasite, even the recent Mickey 17. And yet, none of these “eat the rich” dramedies did it with so much heart and and had me laughing in stitches like this Charlie Chaplin movie. The Tramp’s character tries and tries to catch a break to start to make a living in a house with his love Gamin among the height of the Great Depression in America. From demeaning work in a factory, literally being reduced to a cog in a machine that needs to function ever faster, to a security guard in a fancy department department store needing to keep his old friends and colleagues out of simply getting a meal. It does says a lot about society, when the main character is happier in prison than out in the workforce.

The Great Depression was no laughing matter. I already alluded to the poverty being ever present in American movies of that time in “It happened one night” and here the desperation is everywhere. Workers showing up in masses when there is a hint of work at a new or re-opened factory, people resorting to stealing food in their desperation, even some clinging to communists ideals and starting marches, strikes and other rebellions to fight back at the capitalists. Within that, the ever optimist figure of The Tramp works perfectly.

It is in this movie that the song Smile, later popularized by Nat King Cole or even bastardized in Joker (Todd Phillips would probably say it was a homage, but I hated that movie) first appears and it is to give us optimism that it will work out somehow – the true essence of The Tramp. Even though he always finds himself in desperate situations, he approaches them with an optimism that somehow it will get better for him. It is this optimism that I always admire in Americans, somehow ingrained in their culture and it shows this culture trait plenty in this movie. And yes, I did turn off the TV at the end of the movie with a smile on my face – it would somehow, someday resolve well for The Tramp, he would be ok!

I do have one point that sat badly with me throughout the whole movie and that is Gamin’s relationship with The Tramp. How old is she supposed to be, anyways? At one point, she runs away from family services that supposedly were shipping her off to an orphanage and in the next few scenes The Tramp services himself as her literal sugar daddy (giving her cake and sweets and later a fancy coat). It’s all played quite fanciful and the music always swells to make you feel ok, but it still gave me the creeps that this young girl attached her future to a much older vagrant, just because he gave her some food and money once. There is an alternative ending in which Gamin takes on vows and The Tramp leaves alone, but Chaplin changed his mind after wanting to make his real life lover and third wife Paulette Goddard famous and give the real her hope that she could succeed.

Ah, well, nonetheless, I do recommend this movie, finally a Charlie Chaplin one in these 100 Movies, the comedy is really strong here and the social critique is also well done. It even has a coherent plot from start to finish, even though you can always show the individual vignettes separately and have a good time (and I even see them some of the now on TikTok).

Jun 1 2025

1934 – It happened one night

1934 – It happened one night

The movie is the prototypical screwball, romantic comedy, directed and co-produced by Frank Capra. It stars Claudette Colbert as Ellie Andrews and Clark Cable as Peter Warne. It is based on the August 1933 short story “Night Bus” by Samuel Hopkins Adams. I rented it for 3,99 Eur on Apple TV.

I love road trips. In fact, I am on a road trip right now and absolutely enjoying crossing the Rockies by train. In 2009 we took as a 3 week road trip across the US with our 3-year old daughter and had an absolute blast, for a long time we had a blog out there which was quite popular in Germany. But one thing I also keep in a very special place in my mind was the 3.5 day trip I took back – the changing scenery, the different food, the evolving character in people and all sorts of other observation you see on roadtrips. My absolute favorite movie of all time is Thelma and Louise and it is also a road movie. Besides the obvious feminist tones, the whole Americana element in it what makes me nostalgic, the greasy diners next to motels on the road, the radio stations that either play country or religious rock, the stretching of the road into the horizon, as far as the eye can see. You want road trip comedy? I’ll watch Planes, Trains and Automobiles every time it comes on the TV and still laugh at all the predictable parts.

So I was super excited to see this movie, it has been on my watchlist forever, hailed as the prototypical romantic comedy with screwball elements. Yes, many of those elements, especially “foes to lovers” seem cliched, but one has to realize that it was often this very movie that started them. Even the way Peter ate his carrot is supposed to be an inspiration for Bugs Bunny (see image below). Add to that the fact that the movie was shot at the height of the Great Depression and the distortion between the extremely rich heiress and the bulk of the people not knowing where their next meal would come from.

But then it had that whole road trip element in there. People making conversation and even entertaining on the bus, the constant search for shelter and food on the road (especially when you run out of money halfway), even the bickering, because something will go wrong (car trouble, crooks wanting to take your money, etc). Some reviews I saw said that the movie dragged, how long can it take to go from Miami to New York? I didn’t feel it, it needed its time! And it had fun along the way.

And the romance? I bought it! First of all, Clark Cable does have a “je ne sais quoi” that makes him unbelievably attractive and when Ellie confesses her love to him, I got heart pangs, such was the rapport she had built up to him. And the hurt felt by both when they thought the other was indifferent to them, I felt it l too. I saw Before Sunrise yesterday and the way Céline and Jesse are at first guarded, but obviously so attracted to each other, it reminded me of this movie so clearly.

So remember, often the journey itself is the destination. And often the people you live those experiences with, will be in your mind forever, having shared an experience that was away from the day to day. So cherish those trips and don’t see them as a drag!

Jan 26 2025

1926 – Faust

1926 – Faust

Produced by Ufa, directed by F. W. Murnau. It stars Gösta Ekman as Faust, Emil Jannings as Mephisto and Camilla Horn as Gretchen. I watched it on YouTube here (did not like the horrible colorization there is on other places).

When I was an adolescent, it was typical that in the 13th year of school, you read the “Faust” by Goethe. I got out of it by reading 2 Thomas Mann books and I still regret it to this day. It may have been harder to interpret, but I am sure it would’ve given me more than that depressive German attitude that “Der Untertan” gave me, a good description, but so, so lost. In any case, reading the “Faust” is still on my backlist, but more like a project that “I’ll do someday” (yeah, right…). Everybody knows its main theme: Faust gets visited by Mephisto, an incarnation of the Devil which offers him youth, fame and fortune in exchange for his soul. Will he take that (Faustian) bargain?

So, with everybody discovering Murnau, because of the remake of Nosferatu, it was quite an easy decision to go with the Faust! It was his last German film at Ufa and is believed together with Nosferatu to be the height of German Expressionism in Film. Of course, having studied and having now worked in Potsdam for many years, the history of Ufa is present at all times. You see the imagery when visiting the Film Studios Babelsberg (the rides are horrible, but the studio and the history are great) or the Film Museum, so I went in to watch the movie knowing that.

The plot is as expected, though I did not know much about the Gretchen part of the story, which is Faust’s potential love story and the wringer she is put through in the last part of the movie. Things I liked in the movie were the artistic expression, like a ballet, almost like they were pausing the movie now and then to pose off, so that you could save the frame. The face contortions and mannerisms of Mephisto are purposively over the top, but I liked that very much. The film drags a bit in the middle, because they need to show the huge fall from grace that Gretchen has, so need to show her good, but boring life, but it distracts from the actual Faust story. Interestingly, the title cards in German were a bit hard to read, so sometimes I reverted to the English subtitles, whose translation was quite good.

In any case, the movie is as prescient today as it was in any time. In a week when during the Trump administration inauguration among the invited guests where the billionaires of tech companies, I was reminded of the quote by Lord Acton:

“Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.”

There is no bargain you make with the devil where you will do good in the end, even if that was your intention in the beginning. And that’s really what this techno super-elite has turned into, Faustian doppelgangers making deals with Trump, seeking eternal fountains of youth, telling themselves that they’re doing good in the world by inventing the next social media app. To assuage their guilt and looking for absolution, they donate a few millions, but are always baffled at why the people see them as evil. People, also in the movie, can sniff the wickedness in Faust a mile away. And so I can only recommend people watch the movie, the style may not be for everybody and the end message is cheesy. But just because it’s cheesy, doesn’t mean it isn’t true.