The Bond (1918) – Charlie Chaplin
The Circus (1928) – Charlie Chaplin
The Silent Clowns Film Series
The Bond is a propaganda film short that was made to help sell US Liberty Bonds, in support of World War I. In a first, and only, for Chaplin, the set was all black and had minimal props and furniture that were all white. There were four vignettes describing the bond of friendship, romance, marriage, and patriotic support. At first, Chaplin shares some good times with a friend (Albert Austin), but the friend keeps pulling Charlie back to jawbone some more. In the second, Charlie meets his love (Edna Purviance), and marries her in the third. In the fourth, Charlie urges regular everyday Americans to buy Liberty Bonds in order to knock out the Kaiser (Sydney Chaplin). Charlie knocks out the Kaiser more than one time, for good measure. This short was filmed in a brief amount of time while Chaplin and company were working on another film, and it was distributed to movie theaters for free. It was one of many bond efforts entered into by stars of stage and screen. A fun movie for a worthy cause.
The Circus is a very funny movie that has lots of history associated with it. The 1928 film was never re-released until 1968, due to Chaplin holding on to it for a variety of reasons. When it was re-released, it had a score written by Chaplin, in which he also recorded the vocals to the song that played over the title credits and conducted the orchestra. And he insisted that the film only be shown with that score. An interesting side note is that Chaplin’s original idea was to hire a local, well-known singer for the title credits song for each venue. Oona Chaplin convinced/coerced Charlie into recording a ‘demo’ for the score, and it stuck.
But the film itself! Charlie’s Little Tramp character joins a circus as a clown, though his audition is abysmal. It seems that he can only be funny when he’s not trying. And in those instances he is very funny. At one point, he enters a hall of mirrors (think of those three angled mirrors in a fitting room) that reflects him over and over again, to the point where he can’t tell which is the real him and which is only a reflection. It was laugh-out-loud funny. In another scene, he inadvertently exposes all of the tricks behind the magician’s act, to the utter delight of the circus audience (and us too) and he manages to make a humorous routine by the regular circus clowns even funnier. The mirrors make a return appearance when the Tramp is being hounded by a policeman who follows him into one more of the other clowns’ routine. This time around, the Tramp has a better handle on what’s real, which puts the policeman at a distinct disadvantage. It’s funny all over again.
OK, now for the plot. The Tramp falls for the daughter of the ringmaster but she eventually falls for a newer circus employee, a wirewalker. The Tramp decides to learn and mimic the new fellow’s act and, indeed, has to go on for him as a pseudo-understudy. He bribes a stagehand to rig him up with an invisible harness, so he feels safe, even though he really doesn’t know the ins and outs of the entire routine. The harness works wonders, and he delights the crowd. However, a few monkeys come out and monkey around with him on the high wire and unhitch the harness—but the Tramp is unaware of it. When he learns what’s really going on, he cuts to the chase and ends the routine. There’s some really funny stuff here.
The love triangle and the ringmaster’s cruel treatment of his daughter lead to the Tramp being fired. The daughter runs away from the circus—and that gets a laugh when her ‘dialogue’ frame of the film pops up—but the Tramp knows that he can never assume responsibility nor provide for her. He goes back to the circus, explains it all to the wirewalker, convinces him to marry the daughter, and all three return and confront the ringmaster, who threatens the girl again. The wirewalker informs him that he has married her and will not tolerate that behavior anymore. The ringmaster acquiesces, all three are back with the circus, and as it heads out of town to the next engagement, the Tramp decides to stay behind. He makes his jaunty walk away from us as the film shrinks down to that ever-smaller circle and fades to black. It is very poignant yet also uplifting.
The ‘Sort Of’ referred to in the blog title is because there were some mechanical problems with the beginning of the second reel, where sound and sight were out of sync (or stopped altogether) and the reel had to be rethreaded and started all over. But the projector operator was a trouper and all was right, eventually. What a treat to see this relatively unknown comic masterpiece.
The regular kudos go to Ben Model (playing piano accompaniment for The Bond), Bruce Lawton (for extensive notes about The Circus), and Steve Massa (for program notes on The Bond).
This was the most laughter I’ve heard in a movie theater in a long, long time.
ConcertMeister
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