Top 100 Movies of All Time: #95

95. MODERN TIMES (1936, CHARLIE CHAPLIN)

Starring: Charlie Chaplin, Paulette Goddard

I am pretty sure that this was one of the Chaplin movies that I didn't see until university. Back in high school, I was first introduced to the genius of Chaplin with City Lights and then subsequently The Gold Rush. After those two films, I did what I could to seek out any more of his work that I could, but that search led me to The Great Dictator and not much else.

So it came as a rather big shock to me when I was sitting in a communications lecture during first year, and the prof decided that he was going to use the lecture time to show us an assortment of clips for Modern Times. And it was brilliant. It was just absolutely hilarious. In the time that I had screened those other films in high-school, and this university class, I had totally forgotten how talented Charlie Chaplin really was.

What I love about Modern Times is that despite the rather simple nature of the whole film, every joke works time and time again. The way in which the events happen is very episodic, yet, you don't care. They are acting almost as individual little vignettes which beneath the surface, are all tightly wound together to make the premise of the whole film. The physical comedy that Chaplin evokes is just timeless as well. The bit at the beginning where he is tightening the nuts and bolts on the conveyor belt is some of the best commitment to a joke that I have ever seen. His coordination is flawless. And then of course there is the new "worker feeding machine" (which the above image is of). I would argue that that sequence is one of the funniest moments in any Chaplin film that I have seen... and it stays as funny, every time that I have seen it.

A large amount of credit is also due to Paulette Goddard. Despite having been made in the 1930's, she transcends the era and makes it look as though she could be playing this part from the present day. That might sound a bit odd, but think about it. When you watch an old movie like this, you are well aware of the era that it is set in because of the way the actors act, or the way they carry themselves, no?? Well, in this film, Goddard overcomes that, and makes it seem as though she is straight out of 1996, or any subsequent year.

My favourite scene in the film, was one that wasn't shown in that communications class. See, the reason that that prof showed us clips, was to initiate visuals about how industrialization was beginning to work at the turn of the century. The scene in which I deem my favourite was one that had nothing to do with industrialization, and thus, I hadn't seen it until I watched the film in full, during another (film) class. The part in the movie that I am referring to is the "The Nonsense Song" sequence. If you have never seen this movie, you may not know then that it isn't actually a silent comedy like the majority of Chaplin's work. It does rely heavily on that typical "silent" humour, but it is in fact Chaplin's first movie he made in the "sound" era.

Anyway, the scene that I love is the most prominent "sound" scene in the movie. Chaplin's Tramp has taken a job at a restaurant with Paulette, and is accidentally mistaken by the crowded room as the night's entertainment. So, he takes his place in the middle of the room, and then gives them all a song... consisting of no real words at all. Instead of taking the opportunity to allow the Tramp, the staple character of Chaplin's repertoire, to speak for the first time ever, he uses the scene to enhance the mystery of the character by having him sing in complete jibberish. The entire sequence is just pure gold, because it comes off as though it's a real song that he's singing. He plays to the crowd, and they laugh at him as though they get what he's joking about, yet there are no recognizable words... just a fake language that he seems to be making up on the spot. Here, watch for yourself:

In an era when silent pictures were becoming extinct, Chaplin embraces his silent film techniques, and makes an absolute classic sound picture without really saying any words at all.