Our series of pristine prints is an invitation to reconsider the career of Charles Chaplin, extraordinary performer and complex artist, maker of films that were poignant, pointed, and, above all, funny. This is the way for adults and kids alike to experience Chaplin: not at home, but on the big screen, in the community of an audience.
Read full descriptionChaplin's politically outspoken film also contains some of his funniest scenes, in which Charlie causes complete chaos simply by being human.
The film by which Chaplin wished to be remembered contains some of his most treasured comic nuggets, along with commentary on financial folly.
Chaplin's take on 1950s America is “hugely funny, healthily vulgar [and] always extremely moving.”-N.Y. Times
“Chaplin's most masterful blend of pathos and comedy. . . . You can't leave the planet without seeing this movie at least once.”-S.F. Chronicle. Repeated on Wednesday, December 19.
Chaplin plays a modern Bluebeard in a satiric, surprising “comedy of murders,” based on a story idea by Orson Welles. Repeated on Sunday, December 16.
Playing a faded entertainer, Chaplin evokes the music-hall days of his youth. “A masterpiece. Few cinema artists have delved into their own lives and emotions with such ruthlessness and with such moving results.”-Time Out
Chaplin takes on that other famous guy with a small black moustache. “A time capsule, a timeless document and a profound work of conscience. . . . See it with a crowd.”-S.F. Chronicle
Three shorts hone the edge of social satire that would run through Chaplin's career.
The Tramp becomes an accidental clown in this little-known but irresistibly funny film.
Judith Rosenberg on Piano. Chaplin's comic grace, directorial talents, and penchant for pathos are already evident in these early shorts.
Three shorts find Chaplin's character at work and at play, beleaguered, often exasperated, and hardly innocent.
Richard Schickel's documentary offers “a serious, often illuminating, and unavoidably entertaining account.”-Village Voice
The Tramp and foundling Jackie Coogan live by their wits in a film that's “still fresh, funny and poignant today.”-S.F. Chronicle. With The Pilgrim. Repeated on Saturday, November 24.