Monsieur Verdoux
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Movie Reviews of Monsieur Verdoux
Movie Review: KILL A MILLION THEY CALL YOU A HERO; KILL ONE AND THEY KILL YOU
Summary: 5 Stars
THe first scene filmed by Chaplin is the final execution scene in which he sums up the philosophy of the whole film and CHaplin's own pacifist philosophy. If we invade other nations to steal their oil, etc., and kill thousands of innocent bystanders, women and childrne in the process, why are we called heroic and patriotic, but if we delight some lonely old widows and fill their dreams and then relieve them of their sorrow in order to feed our suffering family, why are we a villian?
And why does the grotesquely rudely American Martha Raye (The model for so many current comediennes?) survive? I guess because she was a lottery winner for her wealth, and not a silly lonely old widow.
Check out the streetwalker. Cute. But then corrupted by wealth and gaining money through her munitions manufacturing lover and thus in favor of war and therefore Verdouz loses heart whereas he once admired her pragmatism
Movie Review: A charming, yet disturbing cinematic experience by Chaplin
Summary: 5 Stars
Monsieur Verdoux (Charles Chaplin) is a sad story about Monsieur Verdoux who is a swindling murderer that charms women whom he marries for their assets which he sells after he has murdered a newly acquired wife. Monsieur Verdoux is driven to commit murder as he feels determined to provide the best possible life style for his family. However, Monsieur Verdoux is lost in his determination as it clouds his moral decision making, which he recognizes. Monsieur Verdoux is the darkest of Charles Chaplin's films, and as in his other films it offers a social message. This ominous message becomes apparent from the beginning of the film as Monsieur Verdoux's gravestone is depicted in the initial shot with Chaplin's voiceover that embarks on how he ended up here. Chaplin's direction offers both tragedy and comedy which in the end leaves the audience with a charming, yet disturbing cinematic experience.Movie Review: Darkly witty if rather too long
Summary: 4 Stars
"One murder makes a villain; millions, a hero. Numbers sanctify, my good fellow".
Chaplin pulled few punches in his most cynical film, Verdoux. He abandoned his early poor scamp/tramp image and became the dashing villain, no doubt to the chagrin of many old fans. Chaplin basically mocks capitalism and its attendant greed here, and does so quite well. He himself called this his favorite picture.
There are indeed plenty of sardonic laughs here, and Chaplin is all too perfect as Verdoux. But I got rather tired of it about half way through; perhaps that's my issue and not the film's. When almost no character in the film is very sympathetic, however, it's hard for me to keep too focused. The redemption seems to come when he decides not to poison the young lady he just met on the street after her touching speech about life's little joys; after that it's mostly mild slapstick until his final speech in court about society and governments as the greatest murderers.
There are some hidden little comic gems here, my favorite of which was the passing introduction of a man at the wedding; he looks just like Freud and is called Monsieur Contrepere ("against father"). It's breezed right by with zero sign of it even being a joke; Chaplin's faith in the intelligence of his viewers was always high. He's also to be commended for taking on the phoniness of killing for country in 1947, when America and England were still all aglow from Defeating Evil in WWII. That all killers are evil to some degree was hardly a message anyone wanted to hear then, and still now, in fact. Those truths give Verdoux a certain shine of unpopular honesty that serves it well as times goes by.
It struck me watching this that Chaplin's career has been mirrored to some extent by Woody Allen's. Early light comedies give way to darker themes as the decades pass, and both fell in love with and married a teenager when they were in their fifties, to great public censure. This prompted each to make a few scathing black comedies about the phoniness of society. Somehow I think that, like Chaplin, Allen will be assessed as a national treasure as he nears death, and once gone will be seen as a true genius of cinema. In that light, Verdoux is Chaplin's Lies And Misdemeanors: not very popular at the time but later seen as a real cult classic, with thematic fangs and claws sharp and accurate in both.
This dvd has a fine transfer and a few decent extras, including a nice little doc on the movie and Chaplin, and many posters and trailers. The scenes of Paris are clearly mostly backlot stuff, but look good in the crisp black and white here, with plenty of black depth.
I liked Verdoux and it's certainly a well-shot and written film, but truthfully I doubt that I'll want to see it again. The laughs are too few and the darkness too deep. Nonetheless, I'm glad to have seen it and would recommend it to any fan of Chaplin for another side of his genius, and to anyone who enjoys a truly black comedy.
Movie Review: "Monsieur Verdoux" was a disaster at the American box-office...
Summary: 4 Stars
Abandoning for the first time his character of Charlie the Tramp and creating the new and intriguing one of "Monsieur Verdoux," Charles Chaplin subtitled his first film in seven years "a comedy of murders." This was meant to shock, as was the picture's attack on war and on capitalism as the source of war, not to mention its ironic sidelights on Christianity--but to shock us to our senses...
"Monsieur Verdoux" managed to shock the American middle class, but not in the way its maker had intended... The public connected the distasteful message of this "crazy" film with vague memories of scandals in Chaplin's personal life and his supposed left-wing leanings...
The screen's greatest actor, its most important creative figure, the most famous man in its history, known to more of his contemporaries than even the central figures of the great religions, Chaplin for the first time tasted defeat and failure...
"Limelight," which appeared five years later, was booked into only 3,000 theaters instead of the 12,000 which in earlier days had always been eager for any Chaplin film... This debacle had nothing do with the quality of the picture but stemmed from the efforts of pressure groups which, incensed at Chaplin's defiance of accepted moral and economic standards, exerted all their power to persuade exhibitors not to show and the public not to attend it... Only its tremendous European success, as in the case of "Monsieur Verdoux," saved it from financial catastrophe...
But bigotry and hate were not the only reasons for the failures of these two highly personal confessions... They are the films of a man who has withdrawn to a distance to observe the human comedy, and it is from a distance that he sends us his messages... Their Sophoclean irony and detachment are matched by a latent savage anger and an infinite compassion... They deal in high style with our highest concerns... Above all they seek to speak the truth, not the acceptable truth, not necessarily the whole truth, but the truth as an aging man leaving illusions behind sees it... If they have a film counterpart, it is Von Stroheim's "Greed," and, pressure groups or no, they were bound to meet the fate of "Greed."
Movie Review: One Missed Opportunity
Summary: 4 Stars
I have always enjoyed the silent movie career of Charlie Chaplin. He may still be the greatest actor in the history of American cinema. His later "sound" movies were few and far between owing, I understood, to his political and artistic beliefs. Many have suggested that "Monsieur Verdoux" is the best of his "sound" films. I haven't seen them all so I can't attest to that but I can say that this is a very good movie.
"Monsieur Verdoux" the story of a (then) modern-day Bluebeard. It is a movie in a genre that is known as "black comedy". Sometimes black comedy works well ("Arsenic and Old Lace" and "Dr. Strangelove") and some times it just too overdone ("The War of the Roses" and "Neighbors"). In the case of "Monsieur Verdoux" it is well done but the movies suceeds as well as it does by changing directions. There is a point in which Verdoux actually develops a heart and conscience no matter how briefly. That expression comes back to him in irony after his other world begins falling apart. It is those scenes in the movie that touched me the most. As we returned back to the black comedy I began to lose interest and the movie seemed to hasten to its' end.
"Monsieur Verdoux" is actually a pretty good love story although the message is often obscured by all of Verdoux's nefarious hijinks. It is a movie that tells us that love and kindness still hold the key to a bright tommorrow. Discard these personal qualities and life is merely a house of cards. Embrace them and they will lead you to life's happy ending. I guess the whole movie was needed to tell the story so effectively so I'll quit complaining about too much Bluebeard and not enough Little Tramp.