Monsieur Verdoux (1947) - A Chaplin Turkey
Monsieur Verdoux (1947) is a deeply flawed film from Charles Chaplin. The age had outgrown his skills a fact clearly evident in this his first fully-fledged talky. Technically the film is rigidly and un-cinematically constructed. Many scenes play out like staged skits or pantomime, the actor's (mainly Chaplin's) movements are broad and gestures are indelicate.
Chaplin uses some very simplistic devices to establish character and narrative detail, characters talk broadly about events as if setting a very clear and contrived frame for the events to play out. There is a distinct lack of subtlety to the formal components of Monsieur Verdoux and the film suffers immeasurably as a result. The music is maudlin and overwrought and the tone of the comedy seems to be miscalculated; alternating between broad slapstick and black or ironic humour. It is an uneasy amalgam.
Yet the film's major flaw is Chaplin's outrageous moral agenda. The main character, Verdoux, appears to be sanctioned in murdering a series of victims, the justification is grounded in these characters' crudeness or other such personality flaws. Verdoux is not to be impugned for murdering a woman who is annoying and irritating, and yet he is to be commended for sparing the life of a sweet street-waif who has a naïve and idyllic conception of the world. But it doesn't really matter because he is only really doing all this for his lovely wife, who just happens to be a cripple (the only time the camera moves for the entire film is when it tracks into close-up of the calipers on Madame Verdoux's legs).
Verdoux wouldn't be compelled to randomly kill women if he hadn't been laid off, you see he is forced into a life of crime by an unfeeling capitalist system which rewards the ruthlessness of management. We only know that he's been laid-off because Chaplin includes a ham-fisted segment in which one of his former co-workers bemoans the incident to a friend.
The film moves to some more interesting areas in the last few sequences but these are still simply self-serving. Chaplin tries to vindicate his characters actions by condemning the ruthlessness of governments and corporations who `kill' and `murder' because it is good business. Although the sentiment, to me, is very true, it is framed in such a morally dubious manner that it is has little power or effect. A much better film on a similar subject is Kind Hearts and Coronets which has wit to burn and is wonderfully constructed and perfectly played.
Monsieur Verdoux , on the other hand, is devoid of genuine comedy, subtlety or cinematic merit.
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Chaplin uses some very simplistic devices to establish character and narrative detail, characters talk broadly about events as if setting a very clear and contrived frame for the events to play out. There is a distinct lack of subtlety to the formal components of Monsieur Verdoux and the film suffers immeasurably as a result. The music is maudlin and overwrought and the tone of the comedy seems to be miscalculated; alternating between broad slapstick and black or ironic humour. It is an uneasy amalgam.
Yet the film's major flaw is Chaplin's outrageous moral agenda. The main character, Verdoux, appears to be sanctioned in murdering a series of victims, the justification is grounded in these characters' crudeness or other such personality flaws. Verdoux is not to be impugned for murdering a woman who is annoying and irritating, and yet he is to be commended for sparing the life of a sweet street-waif who has a naïve and idyllic conception of the world. But it doesn't really matter because he is only really doing all this for his lovely wife, who just happens to be a cripple (the only time the camera moves for the entire film is when it tracks into close-up of the calipers on Madame Verdoux's legs).
Verdoux wouldn't be compelled to randomly kill women if he hadn't been laid off, you see he is forced into a life of crime by an unfeeling capitalist system which rewards the ruthlessness of management. We only know that he's been laid-off because Chaplin includes a ham-fisted segment in which one of his former co-workers bemoans the incident to a friend.
The film moves to some more interesting areas in the last few sequences but these are still simply self-serving. Chaplin tries to vindicate his characters actions by condemning the ruthlessness of governments and corporations who `kill' and `murder' because it is good business. Although the sentiment, to me, is very true, it is framed in such a morally dubious manner that it is has little power or effect. A much better film on a similar subject is Kind Hearts and Coronets which has wit to burn and is wonderfully constructed and perfectly played.
Monsieur Verdoux , on the other hand, is devoid of genuine comedy, subtlety or cinematic merit.
