My Favorite Movies: Singin' in the Rain (1952)

Singin’ in the Rain is the greatest film musical, yet it begins so unassumingly. There is a quick pre-credits sequence in which stars Gene Kelly, Debbie Reynolds and Donald O’Connor, clad in rubber rain coats, sing a portion of the title song while splashing through a puddle. There’s nothing to this scene, but it has become one of the defining images of American film. Just look at the joy on their faces. They have no idea they’re the featured attractions in one of the most revered motion pictures of all time.

Nothing in Singin’ in the Rain is anything but sincere. The people who were involved in its production wanted nothing more than to entertain, and if their motives were any less noble they never let on. Its reputation today suggests that it has always been a classic, from conception onwards, but that isn’t true. In the early 50s, MGM was churning out musicals like they were going out of style (which they were) and had been since the war. The studio had little faith in the production and did little to promote it. They let Stanley Donen direct even though he was only in his 20s at the time and had little experience. Gene Kelly co-directed, choreographed and starred simultaneously, coming up with most of the movie’s best ideas.

The lack of enthusiasm during the original release of Singin’ in the Rain was not unexpected. It was riding on the coattails of the success of the enormous, award-winningAn American in Paris. The difference between the two is that the former was more of a spectacle and the latter had more heart. It was received well, but not abundantly so, and was quickly forgotten. A revival of interest occurred decades later thanks to film club screenings, which led to a re-evaluation of its merit and eventually its classification of masterpiece. It was not just another movie.

The film can be even more appreciated if seen through the eyes of its era. It came about only thirty years after sound films had officially overturned the silent era, a period in which the musical reigned. Singin’ in the Rain is the story of how movie studios were forced to adapt to the trend. This change didn’t happen overnight. The purchasing of sound equipment and the initially high cost of using it put several big studios out of business, while others lost some of their biggest stars. One of the greatest things in Singin’ in the Rain is the character of Lena Lamont, as played hilariously by Jean Hagen who seems to be channeling Judy Holliday in Born Yesterday. She is the symbol of all those great silent stars who could mime like nobody’s business, but were not gifted with public speaking voices, let alone singing abilities.

The story of the film concerns a fictional studio whose silent period dramas have been successes for years. The appearance of The Jazz Singer causes a serious stir and the studio chief realizes that a sound upgrade is essential for business. This leads to some very funny scenes involving the first day of shooting. The stars are oblivious to the fact that the enormous microphone is picking up every sound on the set, from the thundering clank of a pearl necklace to the actress’ heartbeat. I’m sure many a director spent similarly frustrating sessions during that time, resulting in some truly horrible pictures. It is worth noting that many of the songs in Singin’ in the Rain are from 20s musicals. The title song, for example, was first performed in the wretched Hollywood Revue of 1929, MGM’s biggest moneymaker of that year. Singin’ in the Rain mocks and pays homage to that unfortunate part of Hollywood’s history in equal doses. It also made the public aware of the invention of lip-synching, which would become more frequently used in the coming years when people like Audrey Hepburn, Natalie Wood and Deborah Kerr were cast in musicals despite not having the necessary talent.

The best way to measure a musical film’s true success is to judge whether or not it would still be worth watching even if the songs were taken away. This is one of those rare examples of a musical film where both story and songs complement each other with equal greatness. It is a movie that impresses in every facet, but with musical numbers most of all. Watching these talented individuals put on a show makes one think about how little you have to do to be a star these days. Watch Donald O’Connor perform “Make ‘Em Laugh,” a segment in which he displays effortless self-brutality. He practically turns into a cartoon character, as he runs right into brick walls, slips all over the floor, fights with a dummy and “rearranges” his face.  No matter how many times I watch it, his performance astonishes me. Logically, no human being should be able to do half these things, yet there is O’Connor doing them with a big smile on his face.

Both O’Connor and Gene Kelly were among a cinematic elite, being musical stars that can sing, dance and act. They worked together extremely well, as evidenced in the “Moses Supposes” number, which is comprised almost entirely of tap dancing. Now seen as hokey, I doubt many viewers realize how truly difficult this style of dance is. It requires great amounts of concentration and energy, as well as a nearly impossible flexibility of the body. How these guys can move like that and still make it look so spontaneous must stay a mystery for people like me, ungifted in the ways of dance. Most astonishing of all is Debbie Reynolds in her first starring role, adorably eager and holding her own alongside these two great performers. Watch her especially during the “Good Morning” song. She not only keeps up, she steals the show.

Then there’s that scene, the one in which Gene Kelly and the movie were immortalized; when he actually sings and dances in the rain. Accomplished dancers have pointed out that the dance itself is nothing all that extraordinary. Kelly’s moves are really quite simple; he leaps up on a lamp-post, splashes in a gutter, waves his umbrella around. The scene’s accomplishments stem more from purpose, style and precision than the actual dancing. His character is literally dancing for joy, a joy that I believe extends to the actor as well.Singin’ in the Rain endures precisely because of its joy and its color and its agelessness. They really don’t make them like they used to.

My Favorite Movies: Some Like It Hot (1959)

Two male musicians (Jack Lemmon and Tony Curtis) are suffering under the weight of Prohibition. Their job playing for the band in a saloon disguised as a funeral home is lost when the establishment is raided. They have bet their overcoats on a dog race that went wrong and to make matters worse, they witness the murder of several individuals by a group of gangsters who will not tolerate loose ends. They escape, but know they must get out of the area. The most logical conclusion they come to is to dress up as women and join an all-girl band to avoid detection. Well, nobody’s perfect.

The public is consistently fond of cross-dressing comedies. Look at the success of Dustin Hoffman in Tootsie, Robin Williams in Mrs. Doubtfire or even Julie Andrews in Victor/Victoria. The format is popular partly because of the whole idea of being in someone else’s shoes, but mostly because such a drastic gender clash usually results in great opportunities for humor. In Some Like It Hot, Lemmon and Curtis are friends who can’t quite get along with each other and who have no idea how to be anything but men. They make hilarious women.

Observe the first scene in which they are dressed in drag and walking towards the train station to meet up with the band. They are not only hideous, they are having difficulty walking in heels and they can feel a draft. Lemmon protests, “I feel like everyone’s staring!” Curtis replies, “With those legs?” Even on the simple task of assigning female names, they cannot agree. Since their names are Joe and Jerry, they had previously decided to be known as Josephine and Geraldine. When they get to the train, Joe introduces himself as Josephine, while Jerry squeals, “And I’m Daphne!” They continue to disagree for the rest of the picture and make a perfect comedy duo.

That train scene is also the surprisingly ordinary entrance of star Marilyn Monroe. This is the best film to feature Monroe who, in simply walking across the screen, makes the rest of the movie seem to halt. Her presence makes Curtis speechless, while Lemmon continues to ramble on in his usual fashion, infamously comparing her to “jell-o on springs.” Throughout the film, Monroe’s’ mere presence trumps all other goings-on, no matter how crazy things with the gangsters and the cross-dressing get. Director Billy Wilder and co-star Tony Curtis have both made it clear how much they couldn’t stand working with her, but the results are gold. Monroe’s legendary status may have been built on other movies, like Wilder’s The Seven Year Itch in which she stands over the air vent or Gentlemen Prefer Blondes in which she sings “Diamonds Are a Girl’s Best Friend,” but she was never better than in Some Like It Hot.

There is a story about how much Marilyn had so trouble remembering the line, “Where’s that bourbon?” that Wilder had it printed on a piece of paper and placed inside a dresser drawer on the set so that she could open it and read the line. When she proceeded to open the wrong drawer, Wilder had it placed in all the drawers. Her difficulty in remembering simple lines of dialogue and her frequent troubles with punctuality and depression made her a nightmare on set. It is funny to think that the bubble-headed character she plays in the film isn’t far from the truth. Any other actress wouldn’t have survived in Hollywood with her kind of track record, but the end product was always worth the effort. There’s an extended sequence in Some Like It Hot where Monroe and Curtis are required to kiss again and again. Curtis once described the experience as being “like kissing Hitler.” You would never have guessed it.

You see, Marilyn Monroe was not a great actress in the traditional sense. She did not give great performances. Even here, in her best film, she can be clearly seen struggling with her lines, often resorting to spitting them out as fast as possible. She is occasionally out of breath. Marilyn Monroe was a personality, one of the last great stars of the golden age of Hollywood. Few other stars in film history had such a commanding presence even when doing absolutely nothing. Since she died so young, she is one of those rare celebrities whose entire existence was one of perpetual consistency. She never grew old, forever inhabiting a symbol of 1950s life, the muse for so many pop culture artists.

Tales persist about the troubled shoot that Some Like It Hot had to endure. Besides the aforementioned problems with the cast, filming also had to begin without a completed script because nobody knew where to go with it and the two male stars looked so ghastly in their female get-ups that the entire look of the production had to be re-evaluated to accommodate a more eye-pleasing black and white. However, once it’s up on the screen, nobody thinks about a plagued production. The whole thing feels spontaneous and joyful, as a screwball comedy should. It is so fun and goofy, in fact, that it remains a hilarious film despite its age and a textbook example of how a comedy film should be structured. It is often referred to as not only one of the greatest film comedies, but one of the greatest films, period.

An important part of enjoying a movie like Some Like It Hot is to remember that it is pure escapism. I hate to hear people complain that it isn’t realistic or that the humor is outdated. Obviously, in real life these guys would simply get out of town rather than resorting to such ludicrous lengths, but that is the entire point of the screwball comedy. The crazier it gets the funnier it is. As to the question of whether or not it is dated, well, of course it’s dated. Every movie must age, but it is unfair to judge a movie based solely on how much time has passed since its creation. The question should instead be whether or not the movie has aged with grace, whether or not its content still resonates decades later. Based on the reaction at a public screening of Some Like It Hot I recently attended, it is still very funny. It is the definition of timeless.

This is a miraculous movie, one with such rapid-fire dialogue and absurd situations it would make any sitcom proud, but one which rises above its own clumsy scenarios. The stars gleefully embraced its ridiculousness and made the movie equally funny and classy, even when bordering on the risqué (Some of its more suggestive jokes caused the film not to be approved by the American censors. Its popularity despite this was one of the major things that led to the creation of the ratings system that still exists today.). Then there’s that ending. No, it doesn’t provide much real closure, but it is perfect nonetheless. I won’t repeat the closing line of dialogue, suffice to say that it is one of the greatest of all movie quotes and serves the entire picture with a worthy punch line. I can only think of possibly one other closing line that may be greater. It was in Sunset Boulevard, another Billy Wilder film. That’s probably not a coincidence.

My Favorite Movies: Requiem for a Dream (2000)

I recently had a conversation with a friend of mine who told me that her biggest fear was that her son would someday became a drug addict. She explained how she had seen it happen too many times before; good kids go bad because of one simple misuse of some drug that then takes over their life, destroying it in the process. After she mentioned that she makes her son watch TV specials and movies that could instill in his mind an avoidance of drugs, I immediately recommended Requiem for a Dream. If ever there was a movie that teenagers should see, it’s this one. Not that it won’t do anything for older viewers, too. It is brutally universal.

Based on a novel by Hubert Selby, Jr. that I have put off reading for far too long, the film concerns circumstantial day-to-day events, rather than following a large narrative. Harry (Jared Leto) and Tyrone (Marlon Wayans) are seen at the beginning of the movie stealing Harry’s mom’s TV set to sell for heroin money. They have big plans for their future, hoping to raise enough money peddling small-time drugs to purchase a large amount of hard stuff and be set for life. In on the set-up is Jared’s girlfriend Marion (Jennifer Connelly), who wants to open a fashion shop with her parent’s allowance, but keeps spending it all on her addictions. Then there’s the mother Sarah Goldfarb (Ellen Burstyn), middle-aged and overweight, who receives a phone call erroneously announcing that she has been chosen to appear on a TV show. Obsessed with losing weight for her debut, she is prescribed diet pills by a careless doctor that gradually drive her insane.

 Director Darren Aronofsky’s previous screen credit was the extremely low budget thriller Pi, which got him widespread critical acclaim and the chance to create something with larger funds. His choice to make this movie must have derived from the same passionate drive that fueled Pi and made it so riveting, even in its cheapness. It is very evident throughout the film that he cares about it and the effect it will have on those who see it. He places his story in reality and films it slightly off-kilter, creating an unease in the viewer and giving the picture a nightmarish effect. The result is one of the single most powerful movies I have ever seen. To watch it is to see genius at work.

The entire cast is incredible, mostly because they are so natural in their roles that we never question them. There are numerous scenes that could have been handled with a typical Hollywood melodrama that would have been disastrous. All the little moments of hardship and heartache are played with a deceptive simplicity. Characters act, react, talk and move like real people, not scripted characters. Leto’s desperate aggressiveness, Wayan’s surprising restraint and Connelly’s brave submissiveness are all stand-outs, but Ellen Burstyn’s performance is the highlight of not just this movie, but her entire career. I could never sufficiently describe the potency of her acting here and it stands as one of my all-time favorite film performances. Notice during her monologue about the red dress that the camera drifts slightly off-center. This is because the operator had been crying and fogged up the lens.

I will never forget the first time I watched Requiem for a Dream. I have described the experience as being something like being kicked in the gut until you can’t stand and then being kicked some more. Part of the impact of the film must be attributed to Clint Mansell who wrote the electrifying score, which pulsates throughout with a haunting persistence. The film also uses a unique style of editing that moves as fast as an action movie and uses such devices as split-screens, time-lapse photography and cameras actually attached to the actors they’re pointed at to create the visual versions of getting high (in a bad way) and going crazy. Where most movies have a total of 500 or 600 different shots, Requiem has over 2,000. There are times when the film is so unsettling, so much an affront on the senses that we question the validity of what we’re seeing and are dismayed to discover it’s all real.

The last twenty minutes of the movie have no rival in terms of emotional intensity. To call this finale depressing would be both an understatement and a misnomer. As viewers, we don’t want to see the terrors we are shown, but recognize that there is no other alternative. The characters have spent the entire film careening towards their own destructions and the lasting impact of the picture mostly stems from these closing moments. Like the real side effects of drug addiction, they are too horrible to be believed. It is the disturbing nature of these last scenes that keep the movie out of the hands of the people who would most benefit from it. I would say that for a movie like this, the age at which a young person should view it depends on the maturity level of that person. In my opinion, if they’re old enough to know about drugs, they‘re old enough to see what effects they can have.

What makes Requiem for a Dream a great movie isn’t just that it has a powerful message and great acting. It has been made with such care and energy that it is fresh and urgent today, a dozen years after its conception. I believe it is one of the few modern movies that will prove to be timeless. The difference in reactions to the film will depend on the individual. I have seen it exactly four times and am always incredibly moved by it without fail. I remember one critic writing that at the end of his screening, his hands were bleeding from how tightly he had clenched them and he hadn’t even realized it. That is one of the more extreme ways one can react, but I certainly can’t imagine anyone reaching the opposite extreme. It may not always be pleasant, but nobody can say it didn’t make them care.

My Favorite Movies: Duck Soup (1933)

It can be hard to describe the humor of the Marx brothers to the uninitiated. Anarchic is probably the best adjective to use. There is a story about the brothers having an appointment to meet a studio executive, who did not arrive on time. While waiting, they proceeded to set up a blazing fire in his office, stripped naked and cooked hot dogs. At least, that’s what Groucho has said, but we may not always be able to trust him. When they made their movie A Night in Casablanca, Warner Brothers complained that they couldn’t use the word Casablanca because of its association with their classic film. Groucho claims the brothers were left alone after he told Warners that they shouldn’t use the word Night because of its association with the Marx Brothers film.

Once again, this may not actually be true, but it sounds like something Groucho Marx would do. Then again, it really sounds like something that Rufus T. Firefly would do. Groucho, and for that matter, Chico and Harpo, as well, always played pretty much the same character in all their movies. The difference is that Chico and Harpo dropped the characters once they returned to the real world. Groucho never really did. He didn’t actually go about in that strange crouched walk of his or wear that phony greasepaint moustache, but he never stopped using that lightning-fast double talk, especially when he got his own TV game show, You Bet Your Life, which was pretty much only worth watching for Groucho.

Duck Soup was the last of five movies the Marx Brothers made for Paramount and it was the last to feature the fourth brother Zeppo. He had been with the team since their early days on Broadway, but never received any memorable parts in the films. Even though most of the greatest of their films were made at Paramount, nobody remembers Zeppo. I can’t really blame them. In Duck Soup, for example, he only appears briefly a couple of times as Groucho’s secretary and then does not reappear until the end. Not only that, but he didn’t get any jokes, not even one. It only made sense that he would decide to leave the team and leave the three to their funny business. And they are very funny.

Some of the best skits they ever did, for every scene in a Marx brothers movie is basically a Vaudeville skit mostly separate from the rest of the film, are in Duck Soup. Most famous of these is the mirror scene, in which Harpo, while disguised as Groucho (don’t ask), accidentally breaks a mirror and must pretend to be Groucho while he is standing in front of it. Groucho gets suspicious and begins to perform all manner of crazy stunts to try and trick his reflection. It’s a moment that has been borrowed by many other comedy films, shorts, and shows, which has made it the most well-remembered of the Marx brothers gags. My favorite individual moment in Duck Soup is the scene of expertly timed silent comedy featuring Chico and Harpo, as they infuriate a fellow street vendor by doing obnoxious things with his hat.

The film does have a plot, as all the Marx brothers pictures were forced to have. They worked better when they had as little story as possible to have to work their jokes around. In their worst movies, the brothers would be forgotten for long stretches while other, more boring characters get too much screen time to support the story. In Duck Soup, this never happens and the jokes are used to wonderful effect to support the story, rather than the jokes being weighed down by their forced connection to the plot. Groucho is Rufus T. Firefly, the dictator of Freedonia, a fictional country that inspired the term Freedonian to describe many of our foreign enemies during the second war. Duck Soup is generally about war, though the war doesn’t really strike until the end of the picture. This results in many wonderful jokes.

Harpo rides his horse into a woman’s house and we then see two pairs of shoes and a pair of horseshoes lined up beneath a bed. Chico, who had previously been appointed Secretary of War appears mid-battle and announces that he has transferred to the enemy, but “this side has better food.” Groucho makes an emergency phone call, saying that there are three men and a woman trapped in a house: “Send help and two more women.” He looks over at Margaret Dumont and adds, “Make that three more women.”

Dumont regularly appears in the Marx Brothers films, usually as Groucho’s romantic counterpart, and usually against his will. In this film, he is trying to marry her for her fortune. That doesn’t stop him from being his usual insulting self: “I can see you right now in the kitchen, bending over a hot stove, but I can’t see the stove.” Despite being the only person in the movie who isn’t being silly, Dumont makes an impression mostly by being such a good sport against all of Groucho’s verbal abuse.

Some of the gags in Duck Soup startle us by bending reality. The brothers are rescued at the end of the film by stock footage of firemen, policemen, monkeys and elephants running to their aide. There is also a bizarre scene in which Harpo reveals a tattoo on his stomach of a doghouse and a real dog leaps out and barks. On the whole, though, the jokes revolve around two things: silent, visual gags and fast talk. The former is usually helmed by Chico and Harpo, especially Harpo, who never utters a sound and has a penchant for cutting people’s hats and coattails with a pair of scissors he produces from nowhere. The latter is used primarily by Groucho to fantastic effect.

Seconds after he first appears in the movie, he runs over to Margaret Dumont and rattles off the following speech: “Well, that covers a lot of ground. Say, you cover a lot of ground yourself. You better beat it. I hear they're going to tear you down and put up an office building where you're standing. You can leave in a taxi. If you can't get a taxi, you can leave in a huff. If that's too soon, you can leave in a minute and a huff. You know, you haven't stopped talking since I came here? You must have been vaccinated with a phonograph needle.” Yes, that seems to have happened to Groucho, but combined with Chico and Harpo, what a great record they make.

Will the real John McClane please stand up?

I have this idea in my mind that no human being is really an idiot. There are times however where Wisdom’s evil twin Stupidity takes over your brain and makes you do and think some silly things. The people who go see A Good Day to Die Hard have had their brains dominated by Stupidity and poor Wisdom has been locked away somewhere, screaming, “You’re smarter than this!” Alright, so I’m being over the top, but this is a really stupid movie. I am using stupid in the literal sense, meaning “lacking intelligence.” I refuse to accept that anybody with the gift of reasonable thought can like anything about it. It’s that bad.

There is an early scene where Bruce Willis is in a cab in Russia. The driver can speak English and they chat for an unnecessarily long time. Then the driver sings “New York, New York” badly and with a Russian accent. The scene is not amusing or entertaining in the slightest, goes on for too long and has literally no point. This then goes on for the entire picture. The movie is about an hour and a half long and is made up of three extended action sequences barely tied together by the barest most minimalistic plot possible. Willis’ character is named John McClane, but he isn’t playing the Die Hard character like we know him. It’s more like a bad parody of the classic action flick, and he seems entirely bored throughout. To say he phoned in his appearance is an insult to electronic communication.

McClane is joined by his children in this movie in order to pretend that there is warmth and drama. Jai Courtney plays his son with embarrassing incompetence, making already dreadful lines even worse with his laughably bad delivery. The usually good Mary Elizabeth Winstead briefly appears as the daughter, ridiculously contorting her face to emphasize every word. It is not becoming. There are multiple villains, but who they are, why they are powerful, what they plan to do and what kind of threat they actually pose is never made remotely clear. One of the villains has an extended scene that reeks of desperation, as he munches on a carrot (Remember how Clive Owen did that in Shoot ‘Em Up, that actually good action movie? No?), tap dances (funny for all the wrong reasons) and even points out, “This is not 1986.” Dude, we know.

The diehard Die Hard fans (See what I did there?) will try to defend all this crap by saying that it’s just carefree fun, but it isn’t fun at all. The action sequences that make up most of the movie are some of the most boring, least inspired things of the sort I’ve ever seen. In one, there is lots and lots of highway carnage, as automobiles get all kinds of crushed and go flying all over the place. This scene is extremely lazy, as cars are rammed and thrown, rammed and thrown, rammed and thrown in a seemingly endless cycle that lacks anything akin to creativity or purpose. Close-ups of characters are scattered throughout, as if to pretend that something of any relevance is actually going on.

In another scene, McClane and son are being shot at from outside of a tall building. They both begin running and together, as if it were the most logical thing in the world, jump through a window without really looking, land in a slide that drops them to safety and come out of the whole thing with hardly a scratch. I thought that was bad enough, but before the end of the movie they end up flying through three more glass windows. These result in a bandage and a limp, rather than death, blindness, or at least some cuts from all that glass they just shattered with their bodies. The idiocy doesn’t end there. One main character is shot in the arm at one point. For one thing, he reacts to this without so much as a cringe, as if bullets pierce his flesh every day, but after a scene in which he is declared to be bleeding to death, it is never mentioned again. Seriously, his arm is fine for the rest of the movie. I can suspend disbelief at the movies, but not when being persistently bludgeoned with insanity like in this one.

Those are just the highlights. Literally every second of this movie is loaded to overflowing with illogical actions, idiotic and repetitive dialogue, copycat camerawork and editing and countless character inconsistencies. I sincerely hope that this screenplay was not originally intended to be a Die Hard sequel and they just changed a few names at the last minute to cash in on the success of the series’ reputation. Surely Fox wouldn’t intentionally defecate all over one of their most beloved franchises like this. Do not watch A Good Day to Die Hard for any reason. It bears no resemblance to the other movies of the series that you have every right to love and is just plain intellectual suicide.

Also, the movie never demonstrates how it is a good day to die hard. When is it ever a good day to die hard?

My Favorite Movies: City Lights (1931)

During the silent era of Hollywood, there was a great demand for comedy, particularly of the screwball variety, usually involving lots of visual misunderstandings and chase scenes. Charles Chaplin, Buster Keaton, and Harold Lloyd are regularly recognized as the three masters of that genre during the period. There is usually a great debate amongst critics as to who was the greatest of these artists. The general consensus is usually that Chaplin played things too schmaltzy to be even compared to the incredible Keaton. Chaplin also has his supporters, though, who defend his attempts to provide meaning to his misadventures. Often, Lloyd gets simply forgotten about, but that’s for another day.

I try not to take any sides on this argument, because each of these men were geniuses and they each have wonderful movies to back them up. Of all of the comedies released featuring them, however, my favorite would have to be Chaplin’s City Lights. Although to call it a comedy almost does it an involuntary injustice, making those unfamiliar with the material imagine a bunch of ridiculous buffoonery.

Ridiculous buffoonery has its place, a little of it being in this very movie, but this is actually a very serious movie accompanied by its share of laughs. You see, Harold Lloyd was the everyman, Buster Keaton was the stuntman, and Charlie Chaplin was the romantic. His films would often try to pull at heartstrings even before tugging at the funny bone. His The Kid, for example, left more laughs off the screen then any of his movies, shooting instead for a completely tragic style of storytelling.

City Lights blends the drama and comedy together better than any other attempt of the time. The story has Chaplin’s famous nameless Tramp character encountering a poor blind girl played by Virginia Cherrill. Although the Tramp is equally as poor, he has an accidental millionaire friend who gives him anything he wants while drunk, but does not remember anything when sober.

The scene when the Tramp first meets the girl and buys a single flower from her is the heartbreaking chord that resonates through the rest of the film. He does not realize she is blind at first, and when she drops the flower she is handing him, he picks it up, while she slowly stoops down and begins searching for it. The look on his face at this realization mirrors what we are feeling  for this poor girl. The Tramp falls quite in love with her and begins seeing her under the guise of a gentleman, using the millionaire’s resources, of course.

Chaplin was a great actor as well as a great director. He knew when he needed to be in the spotlight stealing the show and when he needed to submit to the camera for the greater good. The Tramp is not in every scene, with Cherrill getting more screen time than you might expect. Her performance is just as endearing as Chaplin’s, which is a good thing since the whole film depends on her making us feel for her situation.

This movie was meant as an inspiration for those, like the characters in the film, who were still suffering from the Depression. It is also a very defiant film since by 1931 everybody had already converted to talkies, while Chaplin was the only big artist who stuck stubbornly with the notion that silent films had greater artistic quality than the more vulgar show of sound. I applaud his decision, as this story very much benefits from the silence, although appropriate score and sound effects were added in.

At the same time, I am glad that Chaplin did eventually make the shift to sound, because a movie like The Great Dictator wouldn’t have worked without it. You can see him beginning to budge a bit even in this film, with the scene in which the Tramp swallows a whistle being a perfect example. The sound effects added make the scene even funnier, with that little tweet of Chaplin’s hiccups being used to great effect, like accidentally hailing a cab and attracting every dog in the vicinity.

What struck me the most in re-watching City Lights is how charmingly innocent it all is. There is a scene where the Tramp winds up in the middle of a rather wild party, where a girl in a slip is dancing on a table amongst other tomfoolery, and he seems completely oblivious, happily munching on finger food with his back to the world. Another moment finds him taking only two drinks and becoming completely drunk, going so far as to eat the long strings of confetti at a restaurant thinking they are part of his spaghetti.

The Tramp is, after all, a child-like character. Look at the scene where he alludes the millionaire’s butler, runs into the house, and jumps into a tall chair, kicking his feet merrily. His complete devotion to the blind girl, even when aware of the possibility her love may not be returned when she discovers who he is, is heart-warming and refreshing. It kind of makes you feel good to see true, honest people portrayed on the screen as heroes, especially during a time when gangsters and monsters were beginning to be idolized as screen stars.

The best moment in the film is at the very end when the Tramp has been released from a year-long prison sentence after being accused of stealing a thousand dollars that the millionaire had given him. Before his arrest, he had been able to give the money to the girl to get her eyes fixed, which she does. The final scene has him absently walking past her new flower shop, and she eventually realizes who he his. It’s a wonderful moment that must be seen rather than described. Some say it’s corny, just like everything Chaplin did. I say it’s one of the most perfect moments in American cinema; closing out one of the best pictures ever filmed.

My Top Ten Movies of 2012

I wrote a few months ago that 2012 was an average year for movies and it was. I have seen about a third of the 300 or so movies released last year, and of those I only truly enjoyed a handful. But that handful of movies was so great that they made wading through the rest of the year’s crap worth it. Below you will find my top ten favorite movies of the year. Note that a few of these are not necessarily what I would list as the best. These are the movies that had the biggest, most positive impact on me during the year, and they come with my highest recommendation. Also note that a few of these movies are ones I haven’t written proper reviews of yet, if I do at all. The last few weeks have been incredibly busy and my writing may continue at this slow pace for a while into the new year. Anyways, here they are.

#1: Moonrise Kingdom I have been asked why I love this movie so much. I have responded, “How can you not?” Wes Anderson’s latest film is a masterpiece of color, humor, quirks of all kinds and true originality. It is an exercise in cinematic creativity, and if it conforms to any recognizable rule of the movies, I didn’t notice. Even its critics can’t deny that it is at least different. I haven’t seen anything like it and even after several viewings in the past six months it still amazes me. It has quickly become an all-time favorite.

#2: Cloud Atlas Nobody will argue that this was the most discussed and debated movie of the year. In less than three hours, it tells six stories spanning multiple centuries, all told at the same time and starring the same actors, sometimes in roles of different race and sex. I’ve tried to avoid calling it complicated, but it certainly is complex. What it achieves in pushing the boundaries of how complex film can get and still be comprehensible and entertaining is miraculous. Never mind if it tested people’s patience in the process.

#3: Argo Say what you will about Ben Affleck’s abilities as an actor, there can no longer be any question that he is a great modern director. This, his third and best film, is an incredible piece of entertainment mostly because it has a great story that is told with passion and intensity, the very area in which most thrillers seem to struggle. It has impressed me most by holding up immensely well after repeat viewings, never losing any of its charm or impact. If I had to pick an unbiased, all-around best movie of the year, this would be it.

#4: The Master This was one of my biggest “wow” moments of the year, and yet I never told a soul to go watch it. For me, it inspired great feelings of admiration and love for its purely cinematic style. In others, it seems to inspire nothing but confusion and hatred, even if it does have an incomparable performance from Joaquin Phoenix. Besides the controversial allusions to scientology, it features some truly depraved characters who do despicable things, and it is not a pleasant experience. It is uncompromisingly brutal and I wouldn’t have it any other way.

#5: Les Miserables After many years of waiting, the fans of this beloved musical finally got the movie it deserved. Helmed by Tom Hooper and featuring a mostly stellar cast (Who told Russell Crowe he could sing?), the movie’s splendor meets and surpasses all expectations. In addition, it is a masterpiece on a technical level. With all the singing recorded live, the actors are free to continue acting through the songs, rather than adding a barrier between them and the audience with phony lip-synching. Add to that beautiful cinematography and a heartbreaking performance from Anne Hathaway and you have an event not to be missed.

#6: Flight This is one of those star vehicles that actually deserves its star and vice versa. Denzel Washington has already repeatedly proven himself to be one of the best actors of our time, so I shouldn’t have been surprised by how awe-inspiring his performance is here. Assisted by a great supporting cast and powerful lead, Zemeckis’ movie is an inspirational story unlike any you may have seen, mostly because it keeps its inspirations to itself. It is a sometimes uplifting, sometimes down and dirty and always completely captivating movie.

#7: Skyfall Action movies so rarely contain anything much more meaningful than a chase and a shoot-out that you can imagine my shock when the latest James Bond film is genuinely good. It is a great action movie wrapped in a great drama, headlined by moving performances from Daniel Craig and Judi Dench, an insane turn from Javier Bardem and meticulous direction from Sam Mendes. Alternately exciting and moving, it has all those things a Bond movie should have, yet with that dose of humanity that a great movie should have.

#8: Django Unchained Quentin Tarantino is one of my favorite directors because his movies never fail to surprise me. His latest, a story of racial revenge in pre-Civil War America, is no less surprising than his others, but in a surprising way. It is relatively normal. The movie is carefully paced and almost entirely straight-faced, taking its time to tell a sincere story that would have become campy in different hands. Christoph Waltz, who stole the show in Tarantino’s last film, does so again here, and Leonardo DiCaprio gives a performance of startling maturity.

#9: Lincoln This historical epic seems to be the popular favorite of the year for both critics and audiences, and why not? Steven Spielberg has always been able to rope in his viewers more consistently than any other director that comes to mind, and this film is no exception. Daniel Day-Lewis plays the famous president, an ever-present symbol of Americana, less as a historical angel and more as a humble and flawed, but nevertheless powerful, presence. The movie is unendingly entertaining and enlightening, even when dealing with material with which every American is familiar.

#10: Looper In yet another example of a fascinating movie that could have all too easily been bogged down by its own excitement, this thought-provoking time travel flick frequently avoids the temptation to skip over story and character specifics and jump straight to action. Besides the fact that it has the guts to be a major motion picture starring Bruce Willis that has only a fraction of its time devoted to typical mindlessness, it is also an extremely well-written thriller that is almost guaranteed to raise at least a few questions. Joseph Gordon-Levitt also stars in yet another smartly-picked role on an already impressive resume.

Honorable Mentions: Amour, Bernie, Compliance, The Impossible, The Invisible War, The Perks of Being a Wallflower, Safety Not Guaranteed, Seven Psychopaths, Silver Linings Playbook, Wreck-It Ralph