The film that I watched this week was the 1992 film, directed and produced by Richard Attenborough, Chaplin. It is a biopic of Charlie Chaplin's life, right from his childhood to his appearance in 1972 Academy Awards, where he accepted his Honorary Award.
I watched this film because, after doing a presentation on the Silent Era, I was interested in Chaplin's rise to fame and life afterwards. Charlie Chaplin is someone that I had heard of, knew was a movie star in the Silent Era and knew very little else about. It struck me that I had no idea what had happened to him - for someone who is so iconic and so widely known today, surely he must not have just faded into obscurity? As the film was based on his autobiography, My Autobiography, and Chaplin: His Life and Art by David Robinson, I felt that this would probably be a fairly accurate source of information.
The film uses mise en scène, along with the actual action, a lot to convey an implicit meaning. Throughout the entire of the opening scene, Charlie Chaplin (played excellently by Robert Downey Jr.) is slowly removing his make-up in a black and white close up shot. The camera slowly zooms out, and the colour fades in, as Charlie continues to remove his make-up. All the while, there is a voice-over interview with Charlie Chaplin. This cumulatively gives the implication of Chaplin's true self and story being revealed through this film, delving deeper into his story than the picture that the media presented him as. The setting of Chaplin's childhood is littered with images showing how run down and grimy the area he lives in his: horse poo frequently found along the cobbled road, a mangy dog eating food that has been spilled on the street, and vendors dressed in grubby clothes wheeling their carts of goods attempting to sell their wares, amongst other things. There is then a later part, in which Charlie Chaplin in a young teenager, and he has to admit his mother (played by Charlie Chaplin's granddaughter) to the asylum. He is devastated, but continues to entertain her wishes in not stepping on the middle of the floor because she believes it to be a river. As his mother is taken up the stairs by the asylum staff, the door closes between them, reflecting the barrier that Charlie's mother's mental illness puts between them. After this, a lot of bright colours, reds and greens, are used to show the happy possibilities that his life now holds without the burden of being responsible for his mother.
There are several shots throughout the film that emphasise the distance that Charlie Chaplin has come from his humble beginnings once he reaches his fame. One of the first ones is when he walks into his first studio, and the aerial shot, white walls and the white canvas roof that is billowing in the wind, and his positioning - tiny at the door of this massive space - contrasts heavily with the cramped flat that he started in. The white colouring suggests that it is his ultimate dream, and he has finally achieved what he has dreamt of for his life thus far. Another shot that emphasises the contrast is the shot in which Charlie Chaplin leaves the bar by a door that leads into an alley. There is one long shot that continuously follows him as he walks, beginning in an alley where a homeless man sits at the side, bedding down for the night, and following him as he walks on to the main high street, the surroundings becoming gradually higher quality, until he reaches a huge poster, outlined by flashing light bulbs, advertising his most recent film.
There is a very cleverly positioned shot as Charlie Chaplin meets his first love interest, Hetty. She is rather embarrassed and angry at him being in the dressing room, not knowing that he usually helps the girls get ready as she is new. As she is trying to do her lipstick, Charlie holds up the mirror, resulting in this rather interesting shot:
My focus scene for this film is when Chaplin is returning to England for the first time since emigrating to the USA. He is still very much in love with Hetty, one of the show-dancers from when he used to perform in the theatre, even though she is married to someone else. As he says about looking forward to seeing her, one of the men that he is travelling with says, "Has no-one told you?" and proceeds to inform him that *SPOILERS* Hetty died of the flu right after the war. The shot switches to a medium close up of him as the train flies into a tunnel, the whole scene out of the window disappearing and switching to solid black, making an exaggerated sound as it does so. His expression turns blank and he stops shuffling the deck of cards in his hands. As the scene then progresses, he is handed his coat and hat and wipes his tears before going out to face the adoring crowds of fans waiting at the station, as "Smile" by Charlie Chaplin plays over it, the words of hiding your true feelings and putting on a smile, even as the world around you is disintegrating, showing his true feelings. He signs a few autographs and then walks away through the crowd, still smiling and waving.
