Episode 173
Modern Times (1936) with Molly Rasberry
I am joined this week by Molly Rasberry to discuss Charlie Chaplin's great work Modern Times. The critiques of labor, alienation and so much more are on full display. Let us know what you think!
Molly Rasberry
https://x.com/RasberryRazz
https://letterboxd.com/mbrasberry/
https://mollywoodwrites.wordpress.com/
Left of the Projector Links
https://www.patreon.com/LeftoftheProjectorPod
https://leftoftheprojector.com
https://instagram.com/leftoftheprojector
Transcript
Track 1: Hello and welcome to Left at the Projector. I am your host, Evan,
Speaker:Track 1: back again with another film discussion from the left.
Speaker:Track 1: This week on the show, we are discussing the 1936 film Modern Times,
Speaker:Track 1: directed and starring Charlie Chaplin.
Speaker:Track 1: And with me to discuss, I have Molly Raspberry, who you may know from,
Speaker:Track 1: at least I know from Twitter or X. Thank you for joining me today, Molly.
Speaker:Track 2: Thanks for having me.
Speaker:Track 1: Of course. And I guess since we were just saying before, as I usually send out
Speaker:Track 1: like a list of films, and I know you pretty quickly chose Modern Times.
Speaker:Track 1: But I guess in addition to saying maybe why you chose that, feel free to,
Speaker:Track 1: I don't know, share any background or context as to maybe what led you to pick
Speaker:Track 1: that and, you know, anything you're working on or anything like that.
Speaker:Track 2: Well, funny thing is that I took a class in grad school and it was on historical
Speaker:Track 2: materialism, which I'm sure the Marxist studies people are just like,
Speaker:Track 2: they're perking up their ears like, what?
Speaker:Track 2: What just just like yeah
Speaker:Track 2: and our professor my professor who actually
Speaker:Track 2: he used to i'm not sure if he still does former professor
Speaker:Track 2: he he called himself an anarcho
Speaker:Track 2: syndical syndicalist marxist and
Speaker:Track 2: well a marxist anarcho syndicalist and
Speaker:Track 2: he chose two films one was pierre paulo
Speaker:Track 2: pasalini's film Medea which is Maria Callas's
Speaker:Track 2: only acting role non-opera role
Speaker:Track 2: and it's fantastic I highly recommend it
Speaker:Track 2: it's on the Criterion channel if you have that and
Speaker:Track 2: the other film we watched was Modern Times which I
Speaker:Track 2: thought which I was already a fan of since high
Speaker:Track 2: school because I had been a fan of Charlie Chaplin he
Speaker:Track 2: was probably the first silent film star I became a huge fan of
Speaker:Track 2: I loved the great dictator i love the circus i
Speaker:Track 2: love the gold rush and of course i
Speaker:Track 2: love modern times and i was like this is interesting that we're gonna do this
Speaker:Track 2: one i can understand with the automation but i was like oh this goes even further
Speaker:Track 2: with that even though modern times was kind of the one he's like that's the
Speaker:Track 2: lazy pick i chose because he liked more of pasolini style the more subtle subtle.
Speaker:Track 2: And he thought Chaplin didn't go far enough, but we'll get into that as well,
Speaker:Track 2: because I also have some discussions with some thoughts on that process.
Speaker:Track 2: But yeah, that's my, that was how I got into it.
Speaker:Track 1: Awesome. Yeah. And as a, as a disclosure for this, I think is the first,
Speaker:Track 1: this is definitely the first Charlie Chaplin film I've done on this show.
Speaker:Track 1: And one of the only films I think from this era, the only earlier silent film
Speaker:Track 1: I think I did was the original Nosferatu and like a Dracula episode combining
Speaker:Track 1: a few different versions.
Speaker:Track 1: So this is definitely it you know
Speaker:Track 1: i maybe i you picked the you are i guess the
Speaker:Track 1: perfect person to uh to reign in
Speaker:Track 1: my uh or not reign in because i don't have much knowledge
Speaker:Track 1: on it to uh to add expand expand on uh kind
Speaker:Track 1: of the thoughts on this movie and it's it's one of those ones when
Speaker:Track 1: i think of like the work of charlie chaplin i
Speaker:Track 1: think of other ones he's done you know prior this
Speaker:Track 1: one feels i mean it's funny you said like it's like a slam dunk
Speaker:Track 1: or it's kind of like a obvious pick for
Speaker:Track 1: that kind of class i mean as far as like the legacy and watching it in 2025
Speaker:Track 1: now you know almost 100 years 85 years since it came out i mean how poignant
Speaker:Track 1: would you say it would be you know discussing this now i mean it's and.
Speaker:Track 2: Also how he didn't even go that far with with the with the fordism line the
Speaker:Track 2: factory lines like because when you look in those scenes like you're just now
Speaker:Track 2: you're like I'd rather work in there than the Amazon is assembly.
Speaker:Track 1: Line because.
Speaker:Track 2: This is way worse now that it
Speaker:Track 2: was back then so it's just like and even
Speaker:Track 2: then he was depicting it and it's just clean it's nice the guys are not as grubby
Speaker:Track 2: as you imagine it's not like Upton Sinclair's the jungle which I do need to
Speaker:Track 2: bring up Upton Sinclair a little bit later for some historical context so so
Speaker:Track 2: as you're looking it's like he didn't even depict it like,
Speaker:Track 2: as miserable as he could have or as what it really was and that was fascinating
Speaker:Track 2: to me to learn about and yeah.
Speaker:Track 1: I hadn't even considered that it does make it seem you know you have the the
Speaker:Track 1: like i don't know what you would call him like the foreman or or one of the
Speaker:Track 1: the the person that like the ceo is talking to on the little cool uh future
Speaker:Track 1: future yeah he's like no shirt on he's just like just kind of hulking around like.
Speaker:Track 2: A soviet poster.
Speaker:Track 1: Poster boy yes no.
Speaker:Track 2: Shirt just like a model just right there.
Speaker:Track 1: Yeah and then you yeah and then it's just like when you
Speaker:Track 1: i mean i guess i mean for anyone who hasn't seen this you should definitely
Speaker:Track 1: go check it out you can you can watch it i watched it on the criteria and i
Speaker:Track 1: have the also have the blu-ray but i'm sure you can watch it other where you
Speaker:Track 1: might be able to do it on canopy i don't know if it's yeah probably on there
Speaker:Track 1: and your local library has it too it's a easy first.
Speaker:Track 2: 15 minutes so.
Speaker:Track 1: The most.
Speaker:Track 2: Discussed part so.
Speaker:Track 1: Yes and i mean yeah there's no i mean the
Speaker:Track 1: no uh no don't have to shy away from spoilers but just as like the general i
Speaker:Track 1: guess you could call it plot this is sort of the final film in charlie chaplin's
Speaker:Track 1: like the tramp persona that he uses in this and it kind of retires it and as
Speaker:Track 1: you said like the The opening of this film is basically him working on an assembly line.
Speaker:Track 1: The boss, the CEO is barking orders through like futuristic TV devices where
Speaker:Track 1: it's, you know, as you said, you mentioned Amazon.
Speaker:Track 1: It's hard not to think about, you know, Amazon probably, I don't know,
Speaker:Track 1: watching you through a million cameras at your factory and everything.
Speaker:Track 1: And it feels so, so, so obvious that this is the thing that you would see.
Speaker:Track 1: And it's it's interesting that he critiqued it that way, because I don't know
Speaker:Track 1: how strict like the Ford line would have been then. You know, I don't know.
Speaker:Track 2: It was apparently stricter.
Speaker:Track 1: Oh, wow. OK.
Speaker:Track 2: So, yeah, it was. So, yeah.
Speaker:Track 2: And it's not subtle how it opens because it opens up with like Eisenstein would have been proud.
Speaker:Track 2: It seems like it was even it's basically an intellectual montage when the first
Speaker:Track 2: shot you see a sheep coming in and then it dissolves to the workers coming through
Speaker:Track 2: the subway. And then you get that image of just like, oh, humans are sheep.
Speaker:Track 2: And which is funny because one critic is just like, oh, that's so obvious and so on the nose.
Speaker:Track 2: And you're just like, but Animal Farm is pigs and that's not on the nose.
Speaker:Track 1: So, yeah, I mean, it's there are a lot of I think about films where like things
Speaker:Track 1: are on the nose like that.
Speaker:Track 1: But I don't know when I when you would have seen this in 1936.
Speaker:Track 1: I don't know if the average person necessarily was thinking about it in such
Speaker:Track 1: an obvious way. Right. I mean, no, the context of it.
Speaker:Track 2: Exactly. Exactly with that.
Speaker:Track 2: And then, and of course, with the assembly line, he's doing a monotonous task.
Speaker:Track 2: He's basically, they're making him a part of the machine right there, which is a part of that.
Speaker:Track 2: It basically makes you into automaton right there when you're doing just the bolts.
Speaker:Track 2: And that's what he does, does. And, and it's interesting because it cuts to
Speaker:Track 2: the, the head guy, the head of the factory.
Speaker:Track 2: And he has time to do a puzzle he has
Speaker:Track 2: time smoking right on his desk and his
Speaker:Track 2: entire job is just to tell the foreman with the shirtless adonis
Speaker:Track 2: foreman to be tell them to go faster right now
Speaker:Track 2: and then to just keep track of charlie because charlie because the tramp he
Speaker:Track 2: can't even swat a fly off his face because he has no time to do it which also
Speaker:Track 2: for i love lucy fans yes the scene inspired the chocolate factory scene where
Speaker:Track 2: just like in the chocolate and there's like more sprayed.
Speaker:Track 2: And that was directly inspired by Charlie Chaplin scene with this.
Speaker:Track 2: And it's humiliating because just like swat the fly, just like,
Speaker:Track 2: can't even do that. You don't have leisure time for that.
Speaker:Track 2: And he goes, he even has to clock out for a smoke break.
Speaker:Track 1: Yes.
Speaker:Track 2: I thought was, which is actually very accurate.
Speaker:Track 2: Apparently I had a coworker whose mom worked at Walmart
Speaker:Track 2: and she could not smoke unless it was on her lunch break she was not allowed
Speaker:Track 2: to go out like like that and yeah he just goes to the bathroom bathroom and
Speaker:Track 2: then the television screen right behind him with with the head of the factory
Speaker:Track 2: who is given a voice through this technological component,
Speaker:Track 2: component to say hey get back to work get back
Speaker:Track 2: to work it's like oh he can't even finish his cigarette he there's no
Speaker:Track 2: leisure time with that because and i feel like chaplain was making a point that
Speaker:Track 2: the privileged class has this time to do this and that and it's interesting
Speaker:Track 2: because in the film he is the outlier he is the one who is making a mess of
Speaker:Track 2: this he is the odd one out and so and,
Speaker:Track 2: If you're watching something like an Eisenstein film, the person who's an outlier,
Speaker:Track 2: others join them to join the masses.
Speaker:Track 2: In fact, Chaplin, the original title of this film was going to be called The Masses.
Speaker:Track 2: And that didn't happen, of course. But the workers side with the foreman.
Speaker:Track 2: They side with their boss trying to get him out. And they even say,
Speaker:Track 2: he's crazy because he can't do this job properly.
Speaker:Track 2: So you can have a leftist perspective of the scene where people say,
Speaker:Track 2: oh, this machine drove him crazy and made him basically a robotic and an automaton
Speaker:Track 2: and literally part of the machinery in that famous scene where he's going through
Speaker:Track 2: the conveyor belt and he's inside it.
Speaker:Track 1: I love that.
Speaker:Track 2: It's so good. I love the set piece for it. And they had to bring it back.
Speaker:Track 2: And then you have the right viewing it and say, well, everybody else was doing
Speaker:Track 2: the right thing. So the only reason why he failed wasn't because the dehumanization of capitalism.
Speaker:Track 2: It's because he's just a screw up. So he can't get this right.
Speaker:Track 2: So and I think that's why there's these interpretations with that and why this
Speaker:Track 2: film is more ambiguous than some other Marxist films that you would see at this
Speaker:Track 2: time, especially Soviet cinema.
Speaker:Track 1: Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I think that, again, goes to your point of the film
Speaker:Track 1: doesn't go, you know, as far as it could.
Speaker:Track 1: I mean, it does show another one of my favorite scenes in that opening in the factory.
Speaker:Track 1: One, I want to mention the president works at Electro Steel Corp,
Speaker:Track 1: which is sort of, I think it's just a funny title for their company.
Speaker:Track 1: But then they bring in the group from some other company that's going to get
Speaker:Track 1: them like the automated feeding machine, which I think is also one of my favorite scenes.
Speaker:Track 1: I mean, there's lots of incredible scenes in this, but I learned in the making
Speaker:Track 1: of the film is that he was controlling the little, like the soup and the different
Speaker:Track 1: things underneath the little thing with a hand crank.
Speaker:Track 1: And that, yeah, I mean, it's just it's crazy that they're they're showing you,
Speaker:Track 1: you know, well, you can get your people to work more and eat during their lunch
Speaker:Track 1: hour and they don't even get the smoke break.
Speaker:Track 2: Yes. It's just like we're going to automate everything. And it also brings up
Speaker:Track 2: that that that's the only machine in that in that scene that actually messes
Speaker:Track 2: up and also is so impractical because everybody has to look down to see what
Speaker:Track 2: they're doing. And you can't do that with the feeding machine.
Speaker:Track 1: Yeah.
Speaker:Track 2: And so beyond just messing up and just like flopping the soup on his face and
Speaker:Track 2: just like smashing his face with the sponge, he can't even see what his hands are doing.
Speaker:Track 1: Yeah, all of that.
Speaker:Track 2: It's just so impressive.
Speaker:Track 1: I like when they put the bolts down onto the little, I guess, the feeding...
Speaker:Track 1: But every platform and it comes around and eats the bolts and
Speaker:Track 1: it's like yeah you can't this isn't a practical and actually
Speaker:Track 1: even the boss like sends them away being like oh yeah this even
Speaker:Track 1: this oh yeah i mean i i've created this and the other thing that i saw because
Speaker:Track 1: i think you mentioned uh like a ford automation it seemed that from what i heard
Speaker:Track 1: or had read is that the president i guess who's played by um al garcia was supposed
Speaker:Track 1: to was like looked very similar to,
Speaker:Track 1: forward and so it's like intent like a good way to make him have that almost
Speaker:Track 1: one-to-one comparison but i don't know i i wonder like if maybe you know the
Speaker:Track 1: answer to this like was he constrained in the ability to take things further
Speaker:Track 1: it was his own restraint you think that just kind of put it i.
Speaker:Track 2: Think it was that chaplain he actually believed
Speaker:Track 2: there was a goodness to machines but that he could
Speaker:Track 2: he also believed that they could they could
Speaker:Track 2: go out of control really easily i mean he even spoke
Speaker:Track 2: to mahatma gandhi about him gandhi was strictly against
Speaker:Track 2: machinery as a form of automation automating capitalism he and char and chaplin
Speaker:Track 2: was surprised with that when he was discussing this with him yeah chaplin actually
Speaker:Track 2: did have conversations with gandhi and so and so it was so that's why.
Speaker:Track 2: I think Chaplin would disagree with the assumption, or at least there's that
Speaker:Track 2: ambiguity there that, yes, machinery can actually be a good thing,
Speaker:Track 2: but it also can make us into automatons.
Speaker:Track 2: I mean, even his great dictator speech is like, you are not machines,
Speaker:Track 2: you are humans, fight back, is related to that.
Speaker:Track 2: He does not demonize it like a lot of Marxist people would, especially at the
Speaker:Track 2: the time, Upton Sinclair very much was against these ideas.
Speaker:Track 2: And it was fascinating because before this film, he actually sent in a lot of
Speaker:Track 2: money to Upton Sinclair's California campaign.
Speaker:Track 2: And Upton Sinclair was a true bona fide socialist.
Speaker:Track 2: He wanted to bring the tax level up so high that health insurance,
Speaker:Track 2: food, all this stuff would be paid for, for the masses, for people like that.
Speaker:Track 2: And that would come from the very top and people like Ford, other,
Speaker:Track 2: other and other big, big baron CEOs did not want that.
Speaker:Track 2: So that's why he didn't, he wasn't elected, but that put Charlie on.
Speaker:Track 2: They're nice because Charlie actually helped campaign for Upton Sinclair before this film.
Speaker:Track 1: That's interesting because some of the things I was reading about,
Speaker:Track 1: you know, obviously there's what people didn't, you know, the call,
Speaker:Track 1: you know, as far as him being blacklisted as part of like the,
Speaker:Track 1: you know, having given money to the, what's it called?
Speaker:Track 1: The 10 blacklisted directors and actors.
Speaker:Track 1: He had donated money to their legal funds and all that.
Speaker:Track 1: But from what I understand is that Chaplin was definitely saw a lot of these
Speaker:Track 1: things, but he was described as like a humanist capitalist or a humanistic capitalism.
Speaker:Track 1: It's like he still favored the idea of capitalism. He just wanted it to be reasonable for people.
Speaker:Track 2: And he did, in the 20s, pretend to be a communist.
Speaker:Track 2: And he also, that, of course, he felt that one of the most universal men in
Speaker:Track 2: perspective were the hobos, who basically were the gig economy's people of the day.
Speaker:Track 2: And they had to travel to different places for work, and that's where the tramp came in.
Speaker:Track 2: And and it was funny that was in
Speaker:Track 2: his biography he actually met one of his heroes who would who
Speaker:Track 2: this hobo who wrote about his travels and the hobo basically called him out
Speaker:Track 2: and saying he's a pantomime of of us and i think that really because chaplain
Speaker:Track 2: he had a great job he he had his own studio unite artist so so and but.
Speaker:Track 2: Yeah, it's fascinating because any man who succeeds in Hollywood,
Speaker:Track 2: I don't think could be a full Marxist.
Speaker:Track 2: I don't think there's a possibility of that. You can criticize capitalism,
Speaker:Track 2: but there's there's just no way if you're making millions of dollars.
Speaker:Track 2: So, but yeah, and of course he was sympathetic.
Speaker:Track 2: He grew up on the streets of, he grew up in the streets of England.
Speaker:Track 2: His mom was institutionalized against her will.
Speaker:Track 2: He was separated from his brother for years and he lived on the streets for
Speaker:Track 2: quite a while. So he was the common poor.
Speaker:Track 2: He was, he was that before coming up and, and having America be his new homeland
Speaker:Track 2: after, after, after all that.
Speaker:Track 2: So you could see why he would sympathize with the common folk and why he always
Speaker:Track 2: went back to the tramp and saw him as the universal man, which is also why I
Speaker:Track 2: believe he didn't want to speak.
Speaker:Track 2: Because if he spoke, then he would be giving a voice to a character that had
Speaker:Track 2: a universality. And also he's British.
Speaker:Track 2: So I think he wanted his character to be American or to sound American.
Speaker:Track 1: Well, it's interesting because in this film, there's no talking with the exception
Speaker:Track 1: of the boss. So, like, the CEO is the only person, I believe, that talks on screen.
Speaker:Track 1: There's some of the, like, the song near the end, which isn't on screen.
Speaker:Track 1: And then a couple of those, like, the boss through the, you know,
Speaker:Track 1: video camera surveillance. And I think that also.
Speaker:Track 2: You get the instructions through the gramophone. It's not even a real person
Speaker:Track 2: doing it. It's just a record of someone speaking, too.
Speaker:Track 1: Oh, for which one?
Speaker:Track 2: The one to discuss how that machine works.
Speaker:Track 1: Yes, right, right, yes. Yeah. So like, so really the only voice in this is like
Speaker:Track 1: that of the capitalist essentially.
Speaker:Track 1: And I think having him, you know, decide since this is his last, you know, fully, um,
Speaker:Track 1: before having a film, the, his next one being the great dictator,
Speaker:Track 1: it like, it, it makes, it's like the, it almost seems like, uh,
Speaker:Track 1: the right film and the right kind of, uh,
Speaker:Track 1: plot, like plot line to go through for him to not have a voice in this versus
Speaker:Track 1: the capitalist who is the one.
Speaker:Track 1: That's dictating everything and then in the next one he comes in he's the great
Speaker:Track 1: dictator and it's like almost like the opposite it's skewering fascism exactly.
Speaker:Track 2: Exactly and the people the person who speaks the most in those films are usually
Speaker:Track 2: the common folk except for napoloni.
Speaker:Track 1: Because you were talking about like him being kind of as this every man and
Speaker:Track 1: the you know or Or no, sorry, his upbringing of kind of making it from pretty much nothing.
Speaker:Track 1: And I think one of the aspects of this film that was very interesting,
Speaker:Track 1: I don't even think I might have put it in the notes even,
Speaker:Track 1: is kind of the idea of the American dream and much of the idea for the film,
Speaker:Track 1: again, as you mentioned, his going on tour for meeting Gandhi and all these
Speaker:Track 1: leaders and thinking of making this film.
Speaker:Track 1: And there is very much his...
Speaker:Track 1: Persona of the tramp like trying to make it trying to needing to get a.
Speaker:Track 2: Job like the strike end and it goes.
Speaker:Track 1: Back to work and he he feels like he needs to do the thing you're.
Speaker:Track 2: Supposed to.
Speaker:Track 1: Do as like a good american like get a good job.
Speaker:Track 2: And it's um.
Speaker:Track 1: I think it's portrayed pretty well i don't know what you thought about that.
Speaker:Track 2: I thought it was at parts and it's interesting because there
Speaker:Track 2: was one film where the tramp does reach reach a
Speaker:Track 2: success and actually gets the real ideal
Speaker:Track 2: of the american dream to be rich and famous and that's the
Speaker:Track 2: gold rush where he found the gold but in this
Speaker:Track 2: one his dream he has a very humble
Speaker:Track 2: dream in fact he wants to be with the gamine
Speaker:Track 2: played by his then wife pauline godard godard and actually have a home with
Speaker:Track 2: her and and it's kind of funny how exaggerated some of the scene is because
Speaker:Track 2: like it's even like he wants it's like this leisure time sort of thing which
Speaker:Track 2: capitalism takes away from,
Speaker:Track 2: where, oh, he gets to be at the house, but then also his wife cooks him dinner,
Speaker:Track 2: Paulette Godard, and then he actually has a cow that serves him milk,
Speaker:Track 2: and the cow, he doesn't even need to use the energy or labor to actually milk the cow.
Speaker:Track 2: He just puts the glass under the udder, and the cow just goes,
Speaker:Track 2: and you don't even hear it.
Speaker:Track 2: You just imagine it imagine it just like just like pissing milk right into right into it.
Speaker:Track 2: And of course there's a peach tree right near
Speaker:Track 2: the house and just like this is actually a
Speaker:Track 2: pretty humble goal all things considered except for the cow like like no cow
Speaker:Track 2: would be like that and and it's a fantasy fantasy so so it's just like oh we're
Speaker:Track 2: gonna we're gonna be real citizens we're gonna have that house and all that so.
Speaker:Track 1: And meanwhile like the next house that they have is
Speaker:Track 1: that little like shack by the by like the water that has
Speaker:Track 1: the falling you know everything is falling and is
Speaker:Track 1: that's the i really love the dream
Speaker:Track 1: scene also because one thing i was seeing is that they decided not
Speaker:Track 1: to use any sound effects for any of like the cow or everything it's completely
Speaker:Track 1: just because it was meant to be a dream it's like you have to almost imagine
Speaker:Track 1: these things and then the very next scene i think or very soon after that is
Speaker:Track 1: when they're in that kind of ram that little shack and there are the sound effects that.
Speaker:Track 2: Every single time he enters it a beam just like boop hits him on his head and
Speaker:Track 2: you hear and you hear a thunk sound one is a few sound effects as well.
Speaker:Track 1: The chair goes through the table falls down the the roof caves in the palace
Speaker:Track 1: i think he falls into the water because the door is off the hinges and uh yeah just i don't know oh.
Speaker:Track 2: Then he dives into it like a bass like he thinks it's gonna be a bass but it's
Speaker:Track 2: low tide so he just like poo right in the mud.
Speaker:Track 1: But but all of those it's it's like the
Speaker:Track 1: seeking that like you said like a modest american dream
Speaker:Track 1: and then initially they have this kind of very you
Speaker:Track 1: know uh more than modest you could say just practically nothing and all the
Speaker:Track 1: things they have they've now had to steal like she has the ham that she is slicing
Speaker:Track 1: into the drinking tea from the cans and it's uh yeah i know i don't know what
Speaker:Track 1: else to make of it than than like the attempt to the dream the.
Speaker:Track 2: Slice in the bread i always forget just like when was sliced bread invented
Speaker:Track 2: i'm like it was invented it was invented after betty white was born i do remember
Speaker:Track 2: that but i think sliced bread was not very common still.
Speaker:Track 1: And it was like huge and it was super thick he couldn't take a bite of
Speaker:Track 1: it because it was like the slices were too big i think and
Speaker:Track 1: he like takes the one slice off and i don't know i just that had
Speaker:Track 1: me that was very very funny and it's uh yeah and
Speaker:Track 1: for any for any listeners who like maybe isn't as familiar like i am with uh
Speaker:Track 1: with charlie chaplin like his like comedic genius like it's just genius like
Speaker:Track 1: all these scenes like it's hard to uh to describe uh any of these like we're
Speaker:Track 1: describing like things falling and all these things but you just have to really just see it.
Speaker:Track 2: Have to watch it for yourself as well to really get the genius because they
Speaker:Track 2: have to be so much blocking, so much attention to detail, so much, so much
Speaker:Track 2: rehearsal time because especially with the silent
Speaker:Track 2: film and and apparently he had to direct his cinematography
Speaker:Track 2: it'd be like you need to under under crank this much
Speaker:Track 2: this scene has to be a fast-paced scene and
Speaker:Track 2: just like or no you have to over crank because we're going to go in a little
Speaker:Track 2: bit of slow motion but mostly it was under cranking was the thing and apparently
Speaker:Track 2: it's it was so much that the cinematographer almost just quit because he's such
Speaker:Track 2: perfection because traveler was just such perfections with this with this style wanted it's.
Speaker:Track 1: Almost hard to imagine him doing all the things he's doing on camera while also
Speaker:Track 1: directing like to that great degree it's not it's one thing like obviously people
Speaker:Track 1: direct films they're in all the time but this just seems like next level of
Speaker:Track 1: uh you know as you said control over everything and yeah.
Speaker:Track 2: Yeah of course it was his own studio was with Douglas Fairbanks and Myri Pickford, United Artists.
Speaker:Track 2: So this was his money coming out of it, too.
Speaker:Track 1: That's true, yeah. And I think one thing I saw, too, is that Paulette Goddard
Speaker:Track 1: in, I guess, the only other film they did after this was The Great Dictator.
Speaker:Track 1: I think it led to their breaking up because of how cruel, apparently,
Speaker:Track 1: he was on the set for that film, whereas in this...
Speaker:Track 2: He was also a bit like this, too, apparently, because this was the first role she did for him.
Speaker:Track 2: For him and she also was
Speaker:Track 2: very rich by this time she got a good annulment so nobody
Speaker:Track 2: was thinking to themselves oh she's a gold digger trying to go after
Speaker:Track 2: chaplain like there was thoughts of that but no she was already very independently
Speaker:Track 2: wealthy and she was already already starting to art collect and she was loved
Speaker:Track 2: history which is how she got to got if got married to eric remarsh remarsh who
Speaker:Track 2: wrote all quiet on the western front after after chaplain,
Speaker:Track 2: I think like one husband after Chaplin Chaplin and she comes to the set and
Speaker:Track 2: she's in full makeup like she thinks like she's going to be a big star.
Speaker:Track 2: And he also Chaplin forced her to read both redye her hair back to brunette
Speaker:Track 2: because she grew up brunette,
Speaker:Track 2: but she dyed it blonde so she could be in these reviews and platinum blonde
Speaker:Track 2: was Jean Harlow was the thing. And that's what she was for so long.
Speaker:Track 2: And Chaplin said, no, you have to go back to brunette.
Speaker:Track 2: And he wanted her to go back to brunette anyway during it. And she comes on
Speaker:Track 2: the set and she's got this full makeup, like glamorous Joan Crawford style.
Speaker:Track 2: And he dumps a bucket of water on her for her as the game.
Speaker:Track 2: And he said, you are not supposed to be fabulous. You are an orphan.
Speaker:Track 2: This is how we do the scene.
Speaker:Track 2: And she still looks gorgeous.
Speaker:Track 2: When you first see her, when she's got the banana and she's got the knife between
Speaker:Track 2: her teeth, when she's cutting out the banana, she's still gorgeous without all
Speaker:Track 2: that head of makeup. I think she was at least allowed to have some mascara.
Speaker:Track 2: But otherwise, no, she's not as glamorized as most of the Hollywood starlets were at the time.
Speaker:Track 2: But that's just the side of the control that Chaplin wanted,
Speaker:Track 2: especially to control her image.
Speaker:Track 1: Yeah, I didn't know that. But you're saying like, even in that scene where she's
Speaker:Track 1: got like the black streaks, you know, in the first few scenes of like dirt on her face.
Speaker:Track 1: And it also, they had a bunch of, at least from what I heard,
Speaker:Track 1: again, I've only seen a few of his films. But apparently, like,
Speaker:Track 1: the close-ups of her is, like, wasn't, like, a common thing for him to use in some of his films.
Speaker:Track 1: And, like, also the scene, like, later in the department store when she's lying
Speaker:Track 1: in the bed is, like, a big close-up of her.
Speaker:Track 2: Yes, with the mink coat.
Speaker:Track 1: Yeah, it's, like, I mean, it's, like, you can see...
Speaker:Track 2: Idealization of being the true the
Speaker:Track 2: biggest american dream of being the rich
Speaker:Track 2: rich housewife who can have all these mink coats
Speaker:Track 2: and be on this luxurious bed which i
Speaker:Track 2: feel was also george romero took from took from
Speaker:Track 2: for dawn of the dead where they all got to wear fur
Speaker:Track 2: coats they all got to be in this got to pretend to be part of the upper classes
Speaker:Track 2: so it's interesting to me how both these films use department stores slash malls
Speaker:Track 2: malls to critique on capitalism and hyper capitalism and upper class living i.
Speaker:Track 1: Never thought of those as a comparison i love that i mean i love pretty much
Speaker:Track 1: all those romero movies but yeah i did um yeah i think we i guess we i mean
Speaker:Track 1: we was a couple of scenes i want to like touch on but the thing you're talking
Speaker:Track 1: about where you know he's able to get a job at a department store as like.
Speaker:Track 2: The night watch night.
Speaker:Track 1: Watchman and yeah so and then it probably has like the most famous scene.
Speaker:Track 2: Using that using that letter of letter of recommendation for the prison warden
Speaker:Track 2: even after he lost the job at the shipyard for screwing up the wedge which enough
Speaker:Track 2: some other right-wingers would be like see capitalism is not the issue it's
Speaker:Track 2: just the one individual the one bad apple yes.
Speaker:Track 1: Yeah well actually that maybe that's a good maybe that's a good segue just to
Speaker:Track 1: go back so he if he so chaplain gets arrested or the tramp gets arrested for
Speaker:Track 1: supposedly being part of, you know, a, I guess it's a, he gets the flag off
Speaker:Track 1: the ground. Yeah, the communist rally.
Speaker:Track 2: Union rally, but it's supposed to be a red flag, which you could kind of tell.
Speaker:Track 2: So you're like, oh, there's some communism sort of things going on there. But yes.
Speaker:Track 1: Yeah. So he's put into prison and the prison scenes too are also just phenomenal.
Speaker:Track 1: And the one other, like there's a bunch of funny scenes in there,
Speaker:Track 1: but the one where they like refer to like the nose drugs.
Speaker:Track 1: I don't know how they, I think that's how they called it. Yeah,
Speaker:Track 1: cocaine. And like, I almost can't believe they were able to get away with doing that scene.
Speaker:Track 2: I know, especially after the Hays Code, because this was post-Hays Code,
Speaker:Track 2: because the implementation of it was 1934.
Speaker:Track 1: Yeah, and that scene is just, you know, he becomes all, he accidentally puts
Speaker:Track 1: it onto his food, and then it leads to his, you know,
Speaker:Track 1: wandering around, and then the scene with the jail door just absolutely smashing
Speaker:Track 1: people in the head. with yeah smashing.
Speaker:Track 2: Smashing the people who are trying to take over the jail themselves in the head
Speaker:Track 2: and becoming an accidental hero and also here in the gunshots one of the few
Speaker:Track 2: also sounds you get with the gunshots to show how powerful those are and how
Speaker:Track 2: there actually is a danger there.
Speaker:Track 1: Yeah and it's it's also it's i
Speaker:Track 1: mean you said like an accidental hero but he's also siding with you know the
Speaker:Track 1: police force like he could have if he wanted to he could have let all the prisoners
Speaker:Track 1: go and run away but instead he like oh yeah you know and then he ends up getting
Speaker:Track 1: the little reprieve and the letter from the warden to to be released it's he remains like.
Speaker:Track 2: Can i just stay a little longer and they're like no i think you'll be a great you'll make good.
Speaker:Track 1: Well i mean that's almost like to say you'd want to stay is almost because you're you're
Speaker:Track 1: You're guaranteed food.
Speaker:Track 2: Yeah, you're guaranteed food and housing. You have a bed.
Speaker:Track 1: Yeah, it's crazy to think that someone at that time would, you know,
Speaker:Track 1: most people probably wouldn't make that same.
Speaker:Track 2: There are some cases. I know there was a man who robbed a convenience store
Speaker:Track 2: of just like 20 bucks so he could be arrested so that an operation he needed
Speaker:Track 2: would be paid for because he didn't have any health insurance.
Speaker:Track 2: There was nothing he could do so he was just like i'm going
Speaker:Track 2: to go to jails and that happened in real
Speaker:Track 2: life so and of course then it leads to the
Speaker:Track 2: shipyard where he screws up trying to find a wedge and he ends up destroying
Speaker:Track 2: the luxury and the this great rear projection scene where where the unfinished
Speaker:Track 2: ship just like goes and drowns into the water right behind him after he got
Speaker:Track 2: the wrong wedge And then it goes to an angel of determined to go back to jail.
Speaker:Track 1: Well, I also like just the look of all of the workers at the shipyard as the
Speaker:Track 1: ship is going away and just like, see you later, puts on his coat,
Speaker:Track 1: buttons it and just like walks away.
Speaker:Track 2: Yeah. Like, time to go back to jail.
Speaker:Track 1: Yeah. And then he does, you know, multiple times, like get caught up,
Speaker:Track 1: you know, the police. Yeah, he's well, this is I guess.
Speaker:Track 1: Well, those are later because he's doing it to save Paul Enquadard.
Speaker:Track 2: Well, at first he thought like, oh, I can definitely get this because if I steal
Speaker:Track 2: this, because if I say I steal the bread, I'll go to jail.
Speaker:Track 2: Even though she stole the bread for her sister and her dad, dad,
Speaker:Track 2: who then who is killed in a union in a riot, unfortunately, in a later scene.
Speaker:Track 2: And it's just like, that doesn't work. So he just goes into a restaurant,
Speaker:Track 2: gets all this food, and then he eats it.
Speaker:Track 2: And then he taps on the window right before he goes to the register and be like,
Speaker:Track 2: please come here. Just be like.
Speaker:Track 2: I have no money. I can't pay this. Arrest me. It's so perfect.
Speaker:Track 1: My favorite part of that, too, is right after when he goes to the newsstand
Speaker:Track 1: and gets the cigar while the police is talking on the phone.
Speaker:Track 1: And he gives the kid some things.
Speaker:Track 1: And then he does a little smoke gag where it comes out of his head.
Speaker:Track 1: And goes back to jail.
Speaker:Track 1: Well, then he's in the squad car. And that's when he escapes from the...
Speaker:Track 2: Yeah and that's when he he gets back with the gamine i mean and they're together.
Speaker:Track 1: Yeah i think that's where they end up having the little that's like the
Speaker:Track 1: dream sequence and then they go to the little house and he then gets
Speaker:Track 1: the job at the at the night night watchman and
Speaker:Track 1: then actually you had you had sent me that picture i hadn't
Speaker:Track 1: watched the image about it yet but like one of
Speaker:Track 1: the maybe the most maybe the most famous scenes from
Speaker:Track 1: this film is probably like him roller
Speaker:Track 1: skating in the one of the levels of the department store
Speaker:Track 1: it's just uh the whole department store like
Speaker:Track 1: part i don't know it's a good 15 minutes it's just it's just incredible you
Speaker:Track 1: mentioned yeah the idea of the kind of this capitalist excess you know of the
Speaker:Track 1: the department store and he's stealing food for her downstairs and they go upstairs
Speaker:Track 1: to the toy department and they're roller skating and yeah and.
Speaker:Track 2: Then he puts on the blindfold and he's rolling and
Speaker:Track 2: it looks like it's the edge but it's a glass panel in
Speaker:Track 2: front of the camera that's in the perfect shape
Speaker:Track 2: of of a blank canvas right
Speaker:Track 2: behind it so it looks like it's the bottom it's like the second floor right
Speaker:Track 2: there so it's precariously on the ledge and she's trying to get over there to
Speaker:Track 2: skate but she doesn't know how to skate she's like come back come back it's
Speaker:Track 2: just it's just it's one of the best special effects and and during that time.
Speaker:Track 2: It's just, oh, it's so good.
Speaker:Track 1: Yeah, in the behind the scenes, they have a little maybe a 10-minute,
Speaker:Track 1: a video with a couple of like more modern um sound
Speaker:Track 1: effects and like special effects people like
Speaker:Track 1: who looks a lot of these weren't like written down like this was
Speaker:Track 1: more of a time when you don't want anyone to know how you did these things like
Speaker:Track 1: this is like secret of the trade and so they kind of figured out how it was
Speaker:Track 1: done was able to they apparently watched the scene i guess um frame by frame
Speaker:Track 1: and there's one moment where his skate like is off it's like not visible and So they figured it out.
Speaker:Track 1: But the other thing that made it so good is that there's like a spot where they
Speaker:Track 1: put a piece of wood that goes from the real set to the fake set.
Speaker:Track 1: And it just, you can't, it's, yeah, it's hard to believe you think of like the
Speaker:Track 1: crappiest special effects in movies now that just look horrible. And like, this is just.
Speaker:Track 2: I know. And they did this with a matte painting in a glass panel just right in front of the camera.
Speaker:Track 1: Yeah and that's another thing we didn't mention as far
Speaker:Track 1: as like since you're talking about the special effects is all of
Speaker:Track 1: the scenes in the uh factory like at
Speaker:Track 1: the beginning and then i guess later on when he goes back the second
Speaker:Track 1: time and also one of the yeah a second factory a second
Speaker:Track 1: factory he you know they have these the way they
Speaker:Track 1: built them was they created little models that then put the
Speaker:Track 1: perspective of the camera so it looked like they were
Speaker:Track 1: walking past these giant you know factories but or machinery
Speaker:Track 1: when it was really just like a little you know
Speaker:Track 1: five foot model which is yeah it's incredible
Speaker:Track 1: what they could do in 1936 to
Speaker:Track 1: make it look so good i think a lot of these they said were like based around
Speaker:Track 1: things from um uh like metropolis like they set the like the standard for these
Speaker:Track 1: kind of matte paintings and uh everything but yeah just this me rambling on
Speaker:Track 1: about how just the effects are just.
Speaker:Track 2: Yes and it's fascinating how in comparison to metropolis the machinery literally
Speaker:Track 2: eats workers well for this one it does too but the workers survive they're pretty
Speaker:Track 2: unscathed which in real life would have killed them.
Speaker:Track 1: Killed them so.
Speaker:Track 2: It's a great comedic stuff especially with the with his new boss he gets he
Speaker:Track 2: gets where the boss is just in the machine and his head is sticking out it's
Speaker:Track 2: like it's lunchtime you have to feed me we need to get this done and so we're
Speaker:Track 2: just feeding him from up above above there.
Speaker:Track 1: It like pops the egg in his mouth and he like spits it out and the yeah the
Speaker:Track 1: i guess tea or coffee like through a funnel and everything yeah all of those that whole,
Speaker:Track 1: bit of like the i it seems like a a bit that's used in like more modern joking
Speaker:Track 1: kind of it's where the uh there's like the what is it like a press or like a yeah.
Speaker:Track 2: The pressing machine.
Speaker:Track 1: And it presses the guys the boss's watch and it's like the and his jacket and
Speaker:Track 1: his jacket i don't know that again like this is one of the things where we can
Speaker:Track 1: i can describe it but you just need to uh you need to see it.
Speaker:Track 2: And i do love it it's so big in his head he's just like he's checking to see
Speaker:Track 2: if it still ticks and like no no no so i was like sorry.
Speaker:Track 1: Yeah that that whole that bit is i mean i think from um and i think just like
Speaker:Track 1: purely going by like the the plot i think after that once he leaves the um once
Speaker:Track 1: he gets i guess kicked out or leaves the i know they go back on strike right yeah they go.
Speaker:Track 2: Back on strike we're going back on strike and at first he's upset about it's
Speaker:Track 2: like i have this job it's like nope so.
Speaker:Track 1: Well that's another thing too like they they use strikes as you mentioned before
Speaker:Track 1: like one of them was like a union which then is kind of cross-tied with communism
Speaker:Track 1: and like that you know you're obviously if you're in a union you're a communist
Speaker:Track 1: And I guess leads later to, you know,
Speaker:Track 1: more other than like The Great Dictator.
Speaker:Track 1: I can't think of any films in like the this time and then into the 40s that
Speaker:Track 1: was like so overtly anti-fascist, like referring to communism.
Speaker:Track 1: But in this, they're kind of like talking smack about it a bit like,
Speaker:Track 1: oh, you know, you're always on strike. You're never working.
Speaker:Track 1: You produce these idiots like The Tramp. I don't know.
Speaker:Track 2: It's fascinating because this is still during the Great Depression.
Speaker:Track 2: A lot of people couldn't afford to go on strike because that was all they had. It's fascinating.
Speaker:Track 2: He brings these up with these characters.
Speaker:Track 2: I think there is sympathy for these strikers.
Speaker:Track 2: I think there is, but which other forms of media I don't think would have had
Speaker:Track 2: as much interest in showing them, or at least humanizing them.
Speaker:Track 2: Or, well, if you compare this to a film like Strike with Sergey Eisenstein,
Speaker:Track 2: where the mob actually becomes a mob mentality and they do go for violence,
Speaker:Track 2: But the film actually approves of that violence because that's what they believe the only way to really,
Speaker:Track 2: really get fair and equitable treatment was through those parts.
Speaker:Track 2: Well, with this one, the strikers are very calm. They're nonviolent for the most part.
Speaker:Track 2: And so it's just so you can tell that Chaplin wanted to humanize these people,
Speaker:Track 2: even if they're kind of the masses.
Speaker:Track 2: So yeah and that's what i appreciate with this film and what he was trying to
Speaker:Track 2: do with do with that but also it's kind of like the a lot of people couldn't
Speaker:Track 2: afford to have this time to go on strike because if you if you didn't work you
Speaker:Track 2: died so yeah yeah i mean literally.
Speaker:Track 1: I mean literally you think of the uh like a means like father who had been laid
Speaker:Track 1: off and the the siblings who end up getting you know taken away and they they
Speaker:Track 1: like what does she have She brings home, like,
Speaker:Track 1: the bananas from the dock, and, like, that's all they have to eat,
Speaker:Track 1: and they're living in amounts to, you know,
Speaker:Track 1: one room, maybe a two-room, like...
Speaker:Track 1: You know tiny place and if he doesn't get his job back at the factory they literally
Speaker:Track 1: will well he dies but more of an accidental.
Speaker:Track 2: Yeah trampling.
Speaker:Track 1: I guess it was.
Speaker:Track 2: Um but.
Speaker:Track 1: It's yeah it's like it's kind of heartbreaking when you see that perspective
Speaker:Track 1: of the uh what most people were probably living through at the time the.
Speaker:Track 2: Rate depression like that's the that was the common.
Speaker:Track 1: Uh you know view of most people.
Speaker:Track 2: And it's and it's interesting to me because i
Speaker:Track 2: think there was at the time at first there was there was
Speaker:Track 2: i think it wasn't just just um this ambiguity
Speaker:Track 2: of whether machines were actually good or not the automation because because
Speaker:Track 2: right because the president who was overseeing the great depression when it
Speaker:Track 2: first happened and didn't actually help with it was herbert huber who was originally
Speaker:Track 2: an engineer who designed machinery.
Speaker:Track 2: And that was the idea that he would create this great prosperity.
Speaker:Track 2: And no, he didn't. And they actually had ghettos, they call them Hoovervilles,
Speaker:Track 2: that a lot of these poor people lived in.
Speaker:Track 2: And that's what they live in. And the shack is kind of a Hooverville.
Speaker:Track 1: And I couldn't also help, one
Speaker:Track 1: of the first things I was thinking of as I'm watching the you
Speaker:Track 1: know the the feeding machine and all of
Speaker:Track 1: these improvements of what the capitalists
Speaker:Track 1: believe will help them do things more quickly
Speaker:Track 1: like it'll replace humans like i can't help but think of just you know now we're
Speaker:Track 1: in the age of you know ai and these things they're supposed to make people's
Speaker:Track 1: lives better but the the actual the reality is it's not going to help the average
Speaker:Track 1: working person is going to either displace you and then...
Speaker:Track 1: Not let you work less. It's just going to make it so you don't have a job.
Speaker:Track 2: Exactly. It basically is that idea. And also trying to promote the idea that
Speaker:Track 2: AI is something that can replace real human art.
Speaker:Track 2: But it can't because it doesn't have a soul.
Speaker:Track 2: And it just reproduces what other people make.
Speaker:Track 2: And of course, it takes a lot of energy. which we're already seeing the effects
Speaker:Track 2: of with the california wildfires with with climate change so.
Speaker:Track 1: Yeah i saw something just today as
Speaker:Track 1: to the number of like gallon i know i think it was something it wasn't ai
Speaker:Track 1: i think it was elon musk built some like
Speaker:Track 1: a refinement facility in cal in
Speaker:Track 1: texas and it said it takes like 16 gallons
Speaker:Track 1: per like you know i don't i don't
Speaker:Track 1: remember the exact but something obscene and like it's in a
Speaker:Track 1: place where like they have to have time showers because there isn't enough
Speaker:Track 1: water and like you just think of these finite resources that
Speaker:Track 1: are being uh you know wasted on like someone's horrible like i don't know if
Speaker:Track 1: you saw the that video that was going around of someone making like a ai car
Speaker:Track 1: chase scene from a film and it's like the worst thing you've ever seen in your
Speaker:Track 1: life and like look how cool this is it's.
Speaker:Track 2: Just like it's just it doesn't It's just the idea of creating surplus value,
Speaker:Track 2: but without actually paying for the labor for it.
Speaker:Track 2: And because that's what surplus value is, the idea is that is the work that
Speaker:Track 2: a labor that a labor puts in to make a product that's going to be sold.
Speaker:Track 2: But that product is going to have more money than what the laborer is paid for.
Speaker:Track 2: And that's surplus value.
Speaker:Track 2: And that goes to the capitalists, the person who owns the means of production.
Speaker:Track 2: And that's people like Elon Musk.
Speaker:Track 2: That's the person like the factory owner in the beginning of the scenes.
Speaker:Track 2: Scenes and and those are
Speaker:Track 2: the people who have so much leisure time that they can tweet almost every hour
Speaker:Track 2: like elon muskhead that's why when people are being like billionaires earn their
Speaker:Track 2: money it's just like no they really don't they they have way more time than
Speaker:Track 2: a lot of other working class people do.
Speaker:Track 1: Like literally doing a puzzle at the beginning of this film reading
Speaker:Track 1: the newspaper i mean it's it's kind of amazing the uh you
Speaker:Track 1: know literally nothing has changed other than the fact that you know in this
Speaker:Track 1: film or like the reality of that time ford was a billionaire or whatever his
Speaker:Track 1: wealth is and now it's just magnified because they've you know commodified everything
Speaker:Track 1: they possibly can and um exactly we'll see i think i was gonna this is one of
Speaker:Track 1: the things that i was gonna we'd.
Speaker:Track 1: We kind of went past it but it kind of gets into the like the
Speaker:Track 1: workers and everything and you're talking about like they don't have free time and
Speaker:Track 1: all of this and it just the one of the things i noted down
Speaker:Track 1: was just like the alienation of the worker
Speaker:Track 1: and you have you can see how the other
Speaker:Track 1: people who are in the in the factory at the beginning that
Speaker:Track 1: are like he's doing like the turning of the with the
Speaker:Track 1: wrench and then someone else is hammering it and then someone else
Speaker:Track 1: is doing other small little bits but each of these people like they don't
Speaker:Track 1: even may not even know what they're building or
Speaker:Track 1: like what this is for they're all completely disconnected from everything
Speaker:Track 1: it's just they're just pressing buttons and
Speaker:Track 1: they're like this cog in this machine and like it's the
Speaker:Track 1: they don't see any fruit of their labor and then they
Speaker:Track 1: take away it further using automated feeding machines
Speaker:Track 1: and you know i don't know making them wear diapers on
Speaker:Track 1: you know like or whatever the these horrible
Speaker:Track 1: stories yeah exactly and
Speaker:Track 1: it's just um yeah i mean we're maybe beating i don't mean to say we're like
Speaker:Track 1: beating a dead horse but i think it's it's incredible what even in his restrained
Speaker:Track 1: film as you had said like it's still so uh pretty overt in the uh the message of all of that.
Speaker:Track 2: Yes very much so very much so and it's and of course it of course leads to the
Speaker:Track 2: funny gag where he starts wrenching buttons that.
Speaker:Track 1: Look like.
Speaker:Track 2: It because he has no idea what he was doing in the first place
Speaker:Track 2: so he was just told wrench these screws and
Speaker:Track 2: so everything that looks like them becomes is something he's like i need to
Speaker:Track 2: turn it i am a machine that can't stop and of course it goes to a woman who
Speaker:Track 2: has these buttons that look like it on on her skirt which is near her butts
Speaker:Track 2: and then he does the just the donkey ear jackass,
Speaker:Track 2: thing which is like really riskaged in there and of course it then goes to a
Speaker:Track 2: woman with similar stuff on her breasts where her areolas are and you're like,
Speaker:Track 2: Whoa, this is going really, really risque right there.
Speaker:Track 1: I kind of couldn't believe that they could get away with any of those three
Speaker:Track 1: like bits almost pretty, you know, unexpected for the a lot of those bits in
Speaker:Track 1: this are like kind of surprisingly allowed.
Speaker:Track 1: Oh, I remember you mentioned before, I know you mentioned Upton Sinclair and
Speaker:Track 1: his support from Charlie Chaplin when he was running for us.
Speaker:Track 1: But I think you mentioned also you were going to mention the jungle.
Speaker:Track 1: I don't know if that, if you already got past that part.
Speaker:Track 2: Yeah, the jungle, of course, well, changed everything, which is interesting.
Speaker:Track 2: Well, it changed everything, but not in the way Upton Sinclair suspected,
Speaker:Track 2: because he wanted it to promote a socialist cause to bring up that alienation,
Speaker:Track 2: how capitalism dehumanizes the worker.
Speaker:Track 2: But he described the factory floors and all the non-safety precautions so accurately
Speaker:Track 2: that everybody became disgusted.
Speaker:Track 2: So and that led to the Food and Drug Administration so that all of all the food
Speaker:Track 2: and everything was tested because they were just so gross and disgusting, those factories.
Speaker:Track 2: And I think Upton Sinclair even said said I I was hoping to hit the hit the
Speaker:Track 2: audience's heart, but instead I hit their stomach.
Speaker:Track 1: So well i mean i guess i guess the idea is that instead
Speaker:Track 1: of it the it doesn't actually the because these big corporations and places
Speaker:Track 1: that were probably the ones doing all of the uh the the had the horrible business
Speaker:Track 1: practices probably paid the least amount of taxes and it probably went to all
Speaker:Track 1: the working people who were getting like sick and ill from it and dying yeah.
Speaker:Track 2: And if people like ford they hated fdr because fdr had to sign in the new deal
Speaker:Track 2: deal and that brought in a lot of government regulation on a lot of these factories
Speaker:Track 2: and corporations to make sure they hired people, that they paid them enough,
Speaker:Track 2: all this stuff that they, that work that capitalists got away with and they
Speaker:Track 2: would union bust against because they didn't want those concessions to people.
Speaker:Track 2: They wanted to take as much value from the worker as possible while giving them
Speaker:Track 2: the least amount of money for it and that's what we're still doing today today
Speaker:Track 2: it's just it gotten worse because ceo pay has gone even higher yeah and minimum.
Speaker:Track 1: Wages have remained.
Speaker:Track 2: Stagnant and the price of everything.
Speaker:Track 1: Is uh is magnified yeah and it's yeah the the there i mean i guess you could say,
Speaker:Track 1: I don't know, maybe going to the kind of like the one of the maybe the one of
Speaker:Track 1: the last scenes of the film is when that can mean gets a job singing and dancing
Speaker:Track 1: at like, I guess it's like a club,
Speaker:Track 1: club restaurant type of place and eventually gets a job for the tramp to have
Speaker:Track 1: also be a waiter and then a singer,
Speaker:Track 1: which is also one of the most hysterical scenes like the bringing the food out and the.
Speaker:Track 2: He said, I forgot the words. I forgot the words. He's just like,
Speaker:Track 2: I'll write them on your cuff.
Speaker:Track 2: And of course, that has to go wrong because he immediately starts dancing and he's like, whew!
Speaker:Track 2: And the cuffs just like fly out. He's like, oh.
Speaker:Track 2: And he's just like, doot, doot, doot, doot. And he's looking for the lyrics like, nope, not there.
Speaker:Track 2: He's just like, make something up.
Speaker:Track 2: So he does. And it's this made up language that no one's that has no that is just great.
Speaker:Track 2: And so it keeps that universality with the tramp tramp, because he's not American.
Speaker:Track 2: He's not European. He's not blah, blah, blah.
Speaker:Track 2: So and that's why that works well and still is really funny.
Speaker:Track 2: And we still connect with him. We don't feel distant from him.
Speaker:Track 1: Yeah. Yeah. I mean, he's he's still like, yeah, he's entertaining and he's giving,
Speaker:Track 1: you know, the people uh you know it's not i mean it isn't
Speaker:Track 1: maybe a fancy place i mean i guess the guy is ordering like a nice bottle of
Speaker:Track 1: liquor and a big duck and everything but yeah he's still like uh you know he's
Speaker:Track 1: he needs this job to survive like and then eventually when the gamine gets uh
Speaker:Track 1: is going to be arrested for being what like a vagrant is that what they say
Speaker:Track 1: they're going to arrest i don't.
Speaker:Track 2: Oh oh yeah like a vagrant see gummy and also because she's i'm not sure if a lot of people,
Speaker:Track 2: Well, the resources I talk about do not really bring this up,
Speaker:Track 2: that the gamine is technically underage, and she's with this adult man.
Speaker:Track 2: And I think there are some, it is definitely related to Chaplin's real life,
Speaker:Track 2: because as many people know, he did date women who were much younger than him and his final wife.
Speaker:Track 2: It was interesting because he was afraid to marry Paulette for a long time because
Speaker:Track 2: apparently a Romani woman did his fortune. He said he would have three divorces,
Speaker:Track 2: but his fourth marriage would last. And Paulette was his third marriage.
Speaker:Track 2: And then later on, he married Una Chaplin when she was a teenager,
Speaker:Track 2: even though I think she was 18, 19, against her father's wishes.
Speaker:Track 2: And she was disowned because of that. Well, Una O'Neill.
Speaker:Track 2: So, and the part of the O'Neill clan.
Speaker:Track 2: So so yeah so i think that was a part of that that not only was it a plot relevancy
Speaker:Track 2: thing because she can't really be emancipated because she's awards of the state.
Speaker:Track 1: But also.
Speaker:Track 2: Because chaplain did date teenagers very problematic it's it's very problematic
Speaker:Track 2: but i feel like if we didn't bring it up somebody would say hey you're ignoring
Speaker:Track 2: this issue and it's just yes.
Speaker:Track 1: I agree.
Speaker:Track 2: It is very problematic it is it's wrong then it was wrong now but but yeah.
Speaker:Track 1: Yeah i don't think yeah i don't think by having
Speaker:Track 1: not said it and mentioning it doesn't say where
Speaker:Track 1: yeah we're not neither of us we're not condoning these kind of things and
Speaker:Track 1: it's no separate from the film i think you can separate
Speaker:Track 1: those things and still say that he had some questionable behavior
Speaker:Track 1: as probably 75 of the people
Speaker:Track 1: you know in directors and all these people
Speaker:Track 1: you're gonna do not just from that period from any period
Speaker:Track 1: of time there's gonna have some very true you know i've
Speaker:Track 1: done films with i don't know um you know
Speaker:Track 1: with kevin's like a kevin spacey movie like you know he's
Speaker:Track 1: not not a good person but uh but anyway
Speaker:Track 1: the uh the yeah but then so i guess i think
Speaker:Track 1: i was just leading to the final moment where they kind of have to
Speaker:Track 1: make their escape and they you know just uh you know and this is kind of the
Speaker:Track 1: typical at the end like the tramp is kind of walking away alone but in this
Speaker:Track 1: like he finally has like a a companion and then he's also now kind of retiring
Speaker:Track 1: this uh this persona the the tramp and so it's,
Speaker:Track 1: it i don't know it feels like the most perfect way to end his silent you know
Speaker:Track 1: silent air for him Yeah. The character.
Speaker:Track 1: I don't know. It's just like a perfect bow. I don't know.
Speaker:Track 2: Going into the sunset that there is hope. Fuck up. We'll make through.
Speaker:Track 2: Which is why I think he did still have hope for Pony.
Speaker:Track 2: The american dream even if he had a
Speaker:Track 2: lot of issues with it and it's fascinating because originally
Speaker:Track 2: the ending there was a different ending where the gamine does
Speaker:Track 2: get caught but she joins and she joins a convent and she becomes a nun yeah
Speaker:Track 2: and he visits her and she wishes him well but she wants to stay stay there and
Speaker:Track 2: so he wanders off alone again which is usually the ending for the tramp But this time he changed,
Speaker:Track 2: but he changed it and they did this instead, which I feel actually really does well.
Speaker:Track 2: And he has a companion with him and they can make it.
Speaker:Track 2: And you kind of, and you do believe in the helpful with the song Smile playing
Speaker:Track 2: that he co-composed and also became famous through Michael Jackson.
Speaker:Track 2: Adding with added lyrics that Michael Jackson sang, which Janelle Monae also covered.
Speaker:Track 2: So you see Charlie Chaplin's influence in a lot of places, and he is the universal
Speaker:Track 2: man. It is very universal.
Speaker:Track 2: There's a famous actor, Raj Kapoor, from India, who actually created his own
Speaker:Track 2: version of the Tramp character for two famous films,
Speaker:Track 2: Avara and Shree 420, that also talked a lot about social issues with Indian society over there.
Speaker:Track 2: And I recommend them. Please watch them.
Speaker:Track 2: Watch them. But so, yeah, and you could and just perfect ending. I'm rambling.
Speaker:Track 1: No no you're and it's funny this when i was thinking about the ending i actually
Speaker:Track 1: i haven't i did this movie a while back but i hadn't considered like i'm thinking
Speaker:Track 1: of all now all the influences of like scenes in this i think i just saw some
Speaker:Track 1: video where they were comparing a scene from this and a scene from like a modern
Speaker:Track 1: movie but i think of like the ending of um,
Speaker:Track 1: god now i can't remember uh is it dogma where they
Speaker:Track 1: like stand silent bob walk away with like the monkey like down
Speaker:Track 1: the street it's like it's the same ending in this in the same sense
Speaker:Track 1: it's like the walking off into the sunset and uh you
Speaker:Track 1: know definitely uh you know kevin smith not the
Speaker:Track 1: same caliber necessarily as i mean
Speaker:Track 1: i don't think anyone would say that as uh as uh charlie chaplin but it's like
Speaker:Track 1: the everything about this film and so many of his is like the influences are
Speaker:Track 1: just uh you know too many to count yeah yeah i mean so i guess that's i guess
Speaker:Track 1: that's it was there any um,
Speaker:Track 1: notes you had on the film or anything we left out that you wanted to add in before we finish up?
Speaker:Track 2: I think I just got about mostly everything. I didn't want to get too complex
Speaker:Track 2: for what we were discussing because I was just like, oh, we're not in a grad
Speaker:Track 2: school lecture. Let's go that far.
Speaker:Track 2: Let's not alienate the audience too much.
Speaker:Track 1: Yes yeah or yeah i i might have alienated me
Speaker:Track 1: here no no i i think it's uh it's it's um i think we hit all of like the main
Speaker:Track 1: points that i was thinking of and kind of the the ones that i had read and everything
Speaker:Track 1: like that but i don't know uh any again anyone who hasn't um you know seen any uh
Speaker:Track 1: chaplain movies i don't know maybe this is the best first one to watch i don't
Speaker:Track 1: know uh what would you say if you're like it's telling so like they wanted to
Speaker:Track 1: get into watching some of these era films what would you recommend to them i.
Speaker:Track 2: Think this is a this is a good first watch but i think if you want something
Speaker:Track 2: a little more tender just to just to kind of sink your feet into,
Speaker:Track 2: either the kid or city lights i think would be best what best ones to go with for first chaplain.
Speaker:Track 1: I think that the first one I ever saw was The Great Dictator,
Speaker:Track 1: which I actually don't think was maybe the best first one because it's a talky
Speaker:Track 1: film, so it's not kind of like your typical...
Speaker:Track 1: Tramp uh kind of charlotte chaplin movie so i would say yeah this one would
Speaker:Track 1: be uh could be one of those first ones but um i know we did so we so i skipped
Speaker:Track 1: it over at the beginning i was going to ask you your favorite film of 2024 but
Speaker:Track 1: i'm going to change it since we've already well maybe i'll still ask you that or or if you.
Speaker:Track 2: Don't want to say.
Speaker:Track 1: Your favorite 2024 film i'm curious if you have any just a film you might recommend
Speaker:Track 1: to someone outside of the the chaplin universe just uh you know something you've
Speaker:Track 1: seen you could you can dealer's choice on what what you'd want to.
Speaker:Track 2: Recommend or share well i think my faith my favorite
Speaker:Track 2: film in 2024 which kind of sort of
Speaker:Track 2: is related in a sense is the beast by
Speaker:Track 2: bernard bonello with leah sadow and
Speaker:Track 2: george mckay because it actually is about
Speaker:Track 2: this woman who is going through this procedure through this company
Speaker:Track 2: to erase her past lives so that she
Speaker:Track 2: won't feel any emotions so she can function better in
Speaker:Track 2: the society society she is so basically becoming
Speaker:Track 2: sort of a robot to actually fit in with everyone else
Speaker:Track 2: and to fit the masses masses and
Speaker:Track 2: it goes back in time to her
Speaker:Track 2: past lives with this man that she was in love with and and
Speaker:Track 2: this man exists still in her present time
Speaker:Track 2: present time and they are starting to
Speaker:Track 2: reconnect and it's fascinating that she's trying to be trying
Speaker:Track 2: to say should i still go through this procedure to remove
Speaker:Track 2: these emotions so i basically will become a robot and to
Speaker:Track 2: fit into the society to function to work work
Speaker:Track 2: and and it's fascinating how we still have these films that will bring up these
Speaker:Track 2: ideas that people have to become automatons to function that they have to be
Speaker:Track 2: not individuals but instead part of the masses to make the society function
Speaker:Track 2: as it's supposed to be, this capitalist world.
Speaker:Track 2: And I love...
Speaker:Track 2: Love The Beast for that. I love how it goes into that.
Speaker:Track 2: I love how it adapts to Henry James short novelette, even though it adds a sci-fi element.
Speaker:Track 2: And I think it does relate to modern times. It's got very similar themes about
Speaker:Track 2: that and keeping your own individuality when the world around you is trying
Speaker:Track 2: to crush it out to make you fit into this tiny socket, this part of the machine.
Speaker:Track 1: Yeah this has been on my watch as i need to i'm like
Speaker:Track 1: catching up on some of the ones from the i haven't seen and
Speaker:Track 1: that's been sitting on my criterion uh like watches
Speaker:Track 1: i need to to watch that um i
Speaker:Track 1: think the last time i think i shared in my in a previous
Speaker:Track 1: episode recently that i think my favorite film
Speaker:Track 1: for 2024 at least on my current ranking i'm
Speaker:Track 1: gonna do like a like a episode on just with a couple other people we just go
Speaker:Track 1: through our top 10 but i think it was kneecap but because i've already said
Speaker:Track 1: that i'm gonna say one of my other favorite films from the year which i think
Speaker:Track 1: i think it technically came out in 2023 but it was released in the u.s in 2024 was red rooms,
Speaker:Track 1: which was a which is really an incredible film i mean i think some other content warning.
Speaker:Track 2: It's french it's french canadian though for people who are scared of that.
Speaker:Track 1: Yes it's it's definitely yeah it's um it's
Speaker:Track 1: not a film that's maybe for the faint of
Speaker:Track 1: heart it's it's it's weird i i actually recently explained
Speaker:Track 1: it to someone as it's um uh oh
Speaker:Track 1: gosh the non-flanking on the film the oliver stone movie from
Speaker:Track 1: like the 90s that was uh natural i think of it as that but like good and i always
Speaker:Track 1: say that because like that movie kind of had like the over-the-top attempt to
Speaker:Track 1: like show you the evils of like uh you know violence and and the and all of
Speaker:Track 1: these things and this is like a much more restrained version of that, but like,
Speaker:Track 1: very very good and i know maybe that's a terrible comparison for someone uh listening but i.
Speaker:Track 2: Mean i just compared modern times and the beast.
Speaker:Track 1: Okay so yeah so there's nothing is off limits but i think it's a it's a really
Speaker:Track 1: good uh a good film i don't know if you can watch it anywhere i.
Speaker:Track 2: Know that you can rent it for about four dollars on amazon.
Speaker:Track 1: And i.
Speaker:Track 2: Think it's well worth the rental.
Speaker:Track 1: It is yes i.
Speaker:Track 2: I paid $4.
Speaker:Track 1: So I saw it in the theater when it was like, they were doing like a screening
Speaker:Track 1: of, and I think I just actually bought the, the Blu-ray, which was maybe a gutsy
Speaker:Track 1: decision of, of that film.
Speaker:Track 1: But I thought, you know what? I think I want to, but yeah, that would,
Speaker:Track 1: that would be one of my top films to watch for anyone.
Speaker:Track 1: I don't think I've recommended on this show, but yeah.
Speaker:Track 1: So Molly, thank you so much for coming on
Speaker:Track 1: and talking about modern times and uh i
Speaker:Track 1: guess comparing it to the beast we've uh almost 100
Speaker:Track 1: years apart so that's that's yeah yes and
Speaker:Track 1: um yeah and so you can i guess i'll i'll share where you can people can follow
Speaker:Track 1: you on on the internet and you can listen to this podcast wherever you listen
Speaker:Track 1: to it actually right now since you're listening to it you can just follow uh
Speaker:Track 1: there or at left of the projector dot com. And so thank you again, Molly.
Speaker:Track 2: Thanks for having me again.
Speaker:Track 1: Of course. And we will catch you all next time.
