Frame study : Charlie Chaplin's movie The Modern Times and The Great Dictator

           "  Life  is a tragedy when seen in close-up, but a comedy in long-shot.  "  - Charlie Chaplin.

Hello friends !

    Welcome to my world !! Here I am going to present my views on two movies by Charlie Chaplin. I am doing a frame study of this film. The movies are  The Modern Times and The Great Dictator.

     It is an interesting study through the perspective of the modern age and twentieth century. How the camera works, and  how the portrait situation relates to the particular history of the century. How he portrayed comedy with high seriousness, that became noticeable. If you watch both these movies without any deep understanding and context then you may say that these are great comedies. But , if you watch a movie in a critical way then this becomes more serious.

Let's know about  a comedy king with high seriousness, Sir Charles Spenser Cheplin was an English comic actor, filmmaker, and composer who rose to fame in the era of silent film.

Let's have a glimpses of some of the frame that is important to related with the twentieth century.

The Modern Times :

        The opening scene is very metaphorical. Because it suggests that How human beings are bound by time itself.  If you think you are free then that is half truth. Because we are bound by time.we have to do work from time to time.  Because of The invention of the machine and all the things we have become slaves of time. Time is ruling over us in a very crucial way. That is also suggested that the clock showing 6 o' clock,that must be a time to go factory and work.

       

          Here we can see that in the opening scene that Chaplin portrayed a herd of sheep along the fade up scene with the herd of man. That shows us that people don't have enough thinking for their future plan. They do work like sheeps.  The workers assembly line possibly his greatest slapstick encounter with the twentieth century. Here we can see the herd mentality of mankind.

This particular frame shows us the helplessness of the worker. The feeding machine came up with an idea that if you use this machine for your worker then the lunch time will be eliminated and you have more production. And the owner who said let's have a demo.  The worker who can't be denied a demo. Chaplin who suffers a lot from that machine. This particular scene is the most hilarious one. But if we think deeply then we realize that the man who stands near Chaplin who doesn't think about his suffering… and he was working like Chaplin don't have emotions like machines. His behavior is like he was dealing with a machine but actually he experiments on lived human beings.

The final scene in 'The Modern Times' is stunning, and in many ways. There is a message of hope amidst the poverty of the Depression, with Chaplins responding to Goddard feeling overwhelmed and defeated by saying Buck up - never say die. We then see his signature move, walking off down the road, but this time he is not alone, he has Goddard with him, which could be viewed as overcoming through love and togetherness.

2) The Great Dictator :

Click here to reach blog on the Great Dictator... 

If you have another interpretation then write in comment section.

Thank you.