Wednesday, December 30, 2009

Best Picture Of 1930-31: City Lights (prod. Charles Chaplin), Part Four

[To read "Best Picture Of 1930-31: City Lights (prod. Charles Chaplin), Part One," click here. To read Part Two, click here. To read Part Three, click here.]

The Perfect, Problematic Ending Of City Lights (Spoilers Ahead)
It's a truism when I tell you that it's easier to analyze a flawed work of art than a perfect one. In the former, you can see the man behind the curtain, what levers he pulls, what illusions he's trying to create; in the latter, the artist and his intentions are hidden, the machinery underneath so seamlessly integrated into the final product that you're left with the finished work of art and nothing else.

I remember reading an article in the Washington Post some years ago, the reporter reminiscing about his days as a graduate student and a course he took from William Faulkner. Trying to impress the master, the student asked, in regard to Faulkner's story "The Bear," whether the bear was a positive nature symbol, a negative nature symbol or both a positive and negative nature symbol.

Faulkner thought for a while, then said, "That's a story about a bear."

Even the artist himself doesn't quite know what the finished work means as the alchemy of the creative process turns the dross of his intentions into the gold of art.

And of all the movies that I have written about over the course of the last year, no scene has left me more moved and more bereft of words to describe it or analytical skills even to understand it, than the final scene of Charles Chaplin's City Lights.

Here is the scene in question. (My recommendation is that if you haven't seen the entire movie, see it here first. Better yet, rent it from Netflix ...)



It's such a simple scene, just a man and a woman reunited after a long while, a flower exchanged, and then a look of recognition, a smile and fade to black. The appeal of the movie rests on these final moments; indeed, it was this scene Chaplin had in mind when he first began to work on City Lights. I've watched this scene so many times, sometimes in the context of the movie as a whole, oftentimes not, just watching it again to feel the entire movie reduced to a couple of minutes. It's one of the most perfect moments in movie history.

But what exactly does it mean? What does the action imply about what's going to happen to these two people even five minutes later? Nobody quite knows, least of all me.

Roger Ebert sees it as a scene of pure joy, with no ambiguity. "She sees," he has written, "and yet still smiles at him, and accepts him. The Tramp guessed correctly: She has a good heart, and is able to accept him as himself."

James Berardinelli sees it the same way. "The most touching thing about his relationship with the Flower Girl is that, because she is blind, she cannot see his shabby appearance and does not judge him the way others do. ... And, when her sightlessness has been lifted, her attitude does not change. Her new eyes see past the hobo's clothing."

Yet Daniel Eagan in his essay on the movie for America's Film Legacy: The Authoritative Guide To The Landmark Movies In The National Film Registry calls the final scene "a delicate, open-ended encounter that forces the two main characters to erase their dreams, step out of their fantasies, and face up to an unforgiving reality."

Leslie Halliwell, in awarding one of the few four-star ratings in his wonderfully idiosyncratic film guide, noted "Nothing [Chaplin] did before, or after, compared to the closing moments here, a brilliant moment of recognition and loss ..."

And after noting that the girl accepts the Tramp for who he is, Tim Dirks, in his essay for The Greatest Films website, writes "A question arises: How can she possibly love him, now that she can see him? Their social roles are now reversed in this face-to-face encounter—his identity has changed from a benevolent millionaire to a vagabond, impoverished Tramp. She has turned from a poor, Blind Girl into a prosperous beautiful woman."

Me, I've seen it both ways. The eternal pessimist in me thinks, Yes, she's grateful, loyal, no doubt ready to return the favor of financial aid, but you can also see the dream of marrying a millionaire dying in her eyes and it's a painful death. Which the Tramp knew would happen, and he paid to restore the girl's sight knowing that to do so would end his pretense of wealth and with it, any possibility of romance. Yet he restored her sight anyway.

And yet I watched the scene again last night—I don't know how many times I'd seen it already—and thought, "Well, maybe Ebert is right." But if he is, it's not because of the expression on Virginia Cherrill's face, it's the one on Chaplin's, the shy, happy smile as the camera fades to black. If anything can be interpreted in that scene as the flower girl accepting the Tramp for who he is, it's the Tramp's look of joy—presumably because of what he thinks he sees in her eyes. But I don't know since what I see in her eyes is something different. I'm sure the next time I see City Lights, I'll have yet another opinion.

Maybe your reading of the ending depends on who you think is the "light" of the movie's title. Is it the girl, kind, generous, innocent? Or is it the self-sacrificing Tramp? Me, I'm inclined to judge deeds not motives and it's the Tramp's deeds that make the difference in people's lives. He is the city's light.

But does that explain the ending?

As he often did, James Agee, the legendary critic and screenwriter, probably wrote best about the moment: "The finest pantomime, the deepest emotion, the richest and most poignant poetry were in Chaplin's work. He could probably pantomime Bryce's The American Commonwealth without ever blurring a syllable and make it paralyzingly funny into the bargain. At the end of City Lights the blind girl who has regained her sight, thanks to the Tramp, sees him for the first time. She has imagined and anticipated him as princely, to say the least; and it has never seriously occurred to him that he is inadequate. She recognizes who he must be by his shy, confident, shining joy as he comes silently toward her. And he recognizes himself, for the first time, through the terrible changes in her face. The camera just exchanges a few quiet close-ups of the emotions which shift and intensify in each face. It is enough to shrivel the heart to see, and it is the greatest piece of acting and the highest moment in movies."

I think above all, the end of City Lights works like the best music, evoking pure emotion that springs from a place within us beyond the centers of reason. And trying to affix words to a pure emotion is like trying pin a medal on a balloon; the act of doing so destroys the very thing you're trying to celebrate.

Chaplin himself, who was always loathe to discuss his methods and the meaning of his films, concluded only, "It's a beautiful scene, beautiful, and because it isn’t over-acted."

If you've seen City Lights, you no doubt have an opinion, and I would love to know what you think. And if you haven't seen it, maybe it's time to, if only to teach the Monkey a thing or two about the movies.

13 comments:

Bellotoot said...

Ah, yes, Mr. Monkey, it's the in psyche of the beholder! For me, the Tramp knows that this woman can't love him. He could pretend when she was blind - and could act on his own love. In fact, he had to. But when she sees him, they both know it's not possible. And her look confirms that she's only grateful. Breaks my heart every time. Sniff!

Mythical Monkey said...

That's the way I usually see it and I also find it heartbreaking in a wonderful sort of way. But then I read this exchange in Roger Ebert's Answer Man column not too long ago and it was so far off from the way I had previously seen City Lights that I began to wonder.

Q. ... In your Great Movie essay [on City Lights], you said, "She sees, and yet still smiles at him, and accepts him. The Tramp guessed correctly: She has a good heart, and is able to accept him as himself." I definitely thought this much, at least. Do you think there is much ambiguity about her feelings in that scene? Is it too much for me to assume she returns his love, more than merely accepting him as a good man who happens to be the Tramp?
David Michael, Milpitas, Calif.

A. I think the power of the scene resides in the fact that she now knows who he really is, and her love is not only unchanged but even enhanced.


Personally, I think the movie works better if the Tramp has made a great sacrifice, giving up the pretend love so that the girl can have her sight. But if Ebert reads it the other way, I can't say that he's wrong. I just think that I'm not wrong either.

Bellotoot said...

To get to the "she loves him" conclusion, I can't get past her insensitivity when she sees him harassed by the street kids or her "I've made a conquest!" quip as the Tramp gazes at her. Is shallow too strong a word? If the roles were reversed, I can't imagine the Tramp reacting similarly. And the Tramp's face never reflects any confidence in her return affection - he appears apprehensive to the end of the scene. Still, like you, I can accept an alternate view of the conclusion (although thinking her love is enhanced goes a little far) - I just don't experience it. Ah, Chaplin! BTW, I wonder, does Ebert think Shane survives at the end of that film? For me, Shane's wound is mortal (as, perhaps, he wants it to be). Hmmm . . . perhaps a darker life view is at work here.

Mythical Monkey said...

Totally agree. There's nothing about what Virginia Cherrill does in the scene that makes me think she loves the Tramp in a romantic sense.

I wonder whether it's possible that Chaplin had envisioned Cherrill falling in love with the Tramp, but decided in the editing room that she hadn't pulled off the appropriate expressions and so held the camera on the Tramp, letting his reaction tell you what her reaction was. I say this based on seeing Georgia Hale's tests for the scene (which show up in the documentary Unknown Chaplin). She clearly is excited to see him.

Now, Chaplin told Hale that he was thrilled with her performance but couldn't afford to go back and reshoot all of Cherrill's work. But was he? Another source I've read (Daniel Eagan's America's Film Legacy) says "Hale was far too practiced, far too mature, to fit how Chaplin saw the flower girl. In the tests you can see him trying to strip the modernity away from Hale, slowing her down, in the process stripping away her individuality. With a Hale or a Gaynor in the flower girl's role, the entire film would have collapsed."

Frankly, Cherrill's not in that much of the movie -- less than a third if you time it out. Would it have been significantly more expensive to reshoot her scenes with Hale if Chaplin really thought Hale was right for the role? Don't know.

In any event, even to the end, the Tramp looks so shy, biting his thumb, looking up at the girl from between his shoulders -- well, to me, that doesn't suggest a guy on the receiving end of unambiguous affection.

By the way, there's one other thing about the end of City Lights that leads me to the darker conclusion and that's the music. Maybe a musician can explain it to me in technical terms, but the particular tune Chaplin uses evokes sadness rather than happiness in me, almost like he's scoring a tragedy.

None of which stops me from loving the scene and the movie as it is -- a celluloid spigot that opens my emotions wide every time I see it.

Bellotoot said...

She loves him, she loves him not. Had to watch City Lights this afternoon. As the end faded out, with that rather - as you observe - somber music, I asked the lovely and talented Yodel Heidi what future exists for the girl and the Tramp. She declared: "She's grateful. But she doesn't love him."

Made me think that Chaplin could have unambiguously conveyed the girl's love but chose not to. Think of the end of Modern Times and you smile (naturally, he had to write a song). The end of City Lights sort of hurts.

Mythical Monkey said...

Say, tell Yodel Heidi that Katie-Bar-The-Door and I say "Happy new year." And happy new year to you, too, Mr. Bellotoot.

You know, as I recall during my interview some 22+ years ago, not only did you have a Rufus T. Firefly nameplate on your desk, but you also had a poster of Chaplin on the wall. I guess we were long overdue for a chat about the end of City Lights, huh.

Bellotoot said...

Yes, there was a Chaplin poster on the wall, and when you saw it, you snuffed out your cigarette and muttered "Chaplin ****!" I don't know what you meant by that, but you left humming "That's Amore."

A Happy New Year to you and Katie-Bar-the-Door and a certain canine girl!

Mythical Monkey said...

you snuffed out your cigarette and muttered "Chaplin ****!" I don't know what you meant by that, but you left humming "That's Amore."

Ah, yes, my foul-mouthed lounge singer youth. Try explaining that on a resume these days!

Anonymous said...

When Charlie Chaplin made this film,especially the last scene,he did it with the intent of how he wanted the audience to feel afterward; the emotions they would feel.

Unknown said...

This scene actually happened to me in real life. I was to lose my sight in one eye if not thru the miracle of modern medical science and some very amazing medical professionals who were there at the right time snd place so that my sight was fully restored. The emotion I felt was gratitude to these doctors and the whole medical field for restoring my sight. No doubt the blind girl felt the same gratitude to be saved from a life without sight and the tramp was overjoyed that he could so profoundly change a life. What would have happened after that? That's a mystery but one thing is not - she would have been eternally grateful. I was moved deeply by this scene.

Unknown said...

This scene actually happened to me in real life. I was to lose my sight in one eye if not thru the miracle of modern medical science and some very amazing medical professionals who were there at the right time snd place so that my sight was fully restored. The emotion I felt was gratitude to these doctors and the whole medical field for restoring my sight. No doubt the blind girl felt the same gratitude to be saved from a life without sight and the tramp was overjoyed that he could so profoundly change a life. What would have happened after that? That's a mystery but one thing is not - she would have been eternally grateful. I was moved deeply by this scene.

ladplay1 said...

I believe that 'City Lights' resides in the list of top 5 movies ever made.

That said, I consider the ending to 'City Lights' to be the saddest moment ever committed to celluloid. It breaks my heart anew with each viewing.

Mythical Monkey said...

City Lights is easily my favorite Chaplin movie (which is saying something) and the end rips my heart out -- every time.