Warning: main() [function.main]: open_basedir restriction in effect. File(/Volumes/Bel_22gb/webroot/tabletmag.com/www/siff/assets/includes/im_nvbar_headscripts.inc) is not within the allowed path(s): (/home/mwhybark/:/usr/lib/php:/usr/php4/lib/php:/usr/local/lib/php:/usr/local/php4/lib/php:/tmp) in /home/mwhybark/public_html/siffblog.com/reviews/modern_times_charles_chaplin_in_the_21st_century_003934.html on line 8

Warning: main(/Volumes/Bel_22gb/webroot/tabletmag.com/www/siff/assets/includes/im_nvbar_headscripts.inc) [function.main]: failed to open stream: Operation not permitted in /home/mwhybark/public_html/siffblog.com/reviews/modern_times_charles_chaplin_in_the_21st_century_003934.html on line 8

Warning: main() [function.main]: open_basedir restriction in effect. File(/Volumes/Bel_22gb/webroot/tabletmag.com/www/siff/assets/includes/im_nvbar_headscripts.inc) is not within the allowed path(s): (/home/mwhybark/:/usr/lib/php:/usr/php4/lib/php:/usr/local/lib/php:/usr/local/php4/lib/php:/tmp) in /home/mwhybark/public_html/siffblog.com/reviews/modern_times_charles_chaplin_in_the_21st_century_003934.html on line 8

Warning: main(/Volumes/Bel_22gb/webroot/tabletmag.com/www/siff/assets/includes/im_nvbar_headscripts.inc) [function.main]: failed to open stream: Operation not permitted in /home/mwhybark/public_html/siffblog.com/reviews/modern_times_charles_chaplin_in_the_21st_century_003934.html on line 8

Warning: main() [function.include]: Failed opening '/Volumes/Bel_22gb/webroot/tabletmag.com/www/siff/assets/includes/im_nvbar_headscripts.inc' for inclusion (include_path='.:/usr/lib/php:/usr/local/lib/php') in /home/mwhybark/public_html/siffblog.com/reviews/modern_times_charles_chaplin_in_the_21st_century_003934.html on line 8
Siffblog: Modern Times: Charles Chaplin in the 21st Century - Individual
 
Warning: main() [function.main]: open_basedir restriction in effect. File(/Volumes/Bel_22gb/webroot/tabletmag.com/www/siff/assets/includes/im_navbar.inc) is not within the allowed path(s): (/home/mwhybark/:/usr/lib/php:/usr/php4/lib/php:/usr/local/lib/php:/usr/local/php4/lib/php:/tmp) in /home/mwhybark/public_html/siffblog.com/reviews/modern_times_charles_chaplin_in_the_21st_century_003934.html on line 104

Warning: main(/Volumes/Bel_22gb/webroot/tabletmag.com/www/siff/assets/includes/im_navbar.inc) [function.main]: failed to open stream: Operation not permitted in /home/mwhybark/public_html/siffblog.com/reviews/modern_times_charles_chaplin_in_the_21st_century_003934.html on line 104

Warning: main() [function.main]: open_basedir restriction in effect. File(/Volumes/Bel_22gb/webroot/tabletmag.com/www/siff/assets/includes/im_navbar.inc) is not within the allowed path(s): (/home/mwhybark/:/usr/lib/php:/usr/php4/lib/php:/usr/local/lib/php:/usr/local/php4/lib/php:/tmp) in /home/mwhybark/public_html/siffblog.com/reviews/modern_times_charles_chaplin_in_the_21st_century_003934.html on line 104

Warning: main(/Volumes/Bel_22gb/webroot/tabletmag.com/www/siff/assets/includes/im_navbar.inc) [function.main]: failed to open stream: Operation not permitted in /home/mwhybark/public_html/siffblog.com/reviews/modern_times_charles_chaplin_in_the_21st_century_003934.html on line 104

Warning: main() [function.include]: Failed opening '/Volumes/Bel_22gb/webroot/tabletmag.com/www/siff/assets/includes/im_navbar.inc' for inclusion (include_path='.:/usr/lib/php:/usr/local/lib/php') in /home/mwhybark/public_html/siffblog.com/reviews/modern_times_charles_chaplin_in_the_21st_century_003934.html on line 104
    Siffblog | About Us | Events | Gossip | Highlights | Other | Plugs | Reviews | Sightings |

September 15, 2007

Modern Times: Charles Chaplin in the 21st Century

David Jeffers

Growing old at 18 fps …


Gloria Swanson (1922)

Were he alive today, Charles Chaplin would be 118 years old. The series of two-reel shorts he produced for the Mutual Film Corporation have existed for nearly a century. They entertained our grandparents, and great-grandparents in an age when the Eighteenth Amendment abolished the sale and consumption of alcohol and the fear of imminent war was a constant presence. Understandably, the context in which these films were originally viewed is often difficult for a modern audience to fully realize. Hollywood was young, as were the talented individuals responsible for its creation. In 1916, Gloria Swanson was just seventeen-years-old, at the start of her career with Keystone Film Corporation and working for Mack Sennett who was considered ‘the old man’ at thirty-six. Mabel Normand, Roscoe ‘Fatty’ Arbuckle, Buster Keaton, Wallace Reed, Mary Pickford, Hal Roach and King Vidor were all in their twenties. Their surviving images reveal the great innovation and beauty of Hollywood’s first generation in the flower of youth.

The sense of vitality and newness in Chaplin’s films is reaffirmed through the observations of his of contemporaries. One example, included in Richard Schickel’s 2006 anthology, The Essential Chaplin: Perspectives on the Life and Art of the Great Comedian is, The Art of Charles Chaplin, written by prominent Broadway actress Minnie Maddern Fiske for Harper’s Weekly. Originally published on May 6, 1916, only days before the first of Chaplin’s Mutual films The Floorwalker was released, Mrs. Fiske’s essay revealed a brilliant insight and prophesy which served as the catalyst for serious consideration of Chaplin’s place in civilized culture.

"…let us realize that at the age of twenty-six Charles Chaplin (a boy with a serious, wistful face) has made the whole world laugh. This proves that his work possesses a quality more vital than mere clowning." – Minnie Maddern Fiske



Seattle Theater Group and The Paramount present, Silent Movie Mondays: The Chaplin Triple Play, September 10, 17, 24 and October 1. Musical accompaniment for the series features Dennis James on the Paramount’s original Publix 1, 4/20 Wurlitzer.


Posted by David Jeffers at September 15, 2007 8:00 PM
Comments




Remember me?