My Favorite Charlie Chaplin Film

I have always preferred Charles Chaplin films to Buster Keaton films. I respect and admire Keaton, who was the master of physical stunts and elaborate gags that have never been matched onscreen. However, I always found Chaplin's universal Tramp a much more appealing figure than the Great Stone Face. The Tramp is instantly sympathetic, the down-on-his-luck everyman pitted against an unfriendly world. Chaplin could certainly deliver the pratfalls and had his share of amazing gag work, but the secret of the Tramp was his humanity, his ability to evoke strong emotions from the audience.

And there was never a Chaplin feature that tugged at the heartstrings more than the first one, "The Kid," made in 1921. It marked the beginning of Chaplin's transition from shorts to full length features, and cemented his status as one of the greatest stars of the silent era. In it, the Tramp adopts an abandoned baby boy, who eventually grows into a cute little tyke played by five-year-old Jackie Coogan. The pair live in poverty and become partners in petty crime and various schemes, but love each other dearly. Eventually the authorities discover the situation and try to separate them, so the Tramp and the Kid go on the run. And after many misadventures and misunderstandings, everything turns out all right in the end.

The movie is schmaltzy and it's sentimental and it's so obvious about its intentions, but I can't overstate how effective "The Kid" still is. The interactions between the kid and the Tramp are clever and endearing. Chaplin's gags incorporate makeshift child care items and he's perfectly at ease playing off his young co-star. And when the police come to take the kid away to the orphanage, and little Jackie Coogan starts crying, the pathos is terrific. It can hardly be any surprise that Coogan became one of the first major child stars in the movies. And then there's Chaplin's performance, warm and gentle in the early scenes, and then desperate and frantic, as he tries to retrieve his little partner. He puts on a terrific chase sequence full of impressive stunts that barely register because the momentum is driven so strongly by the characters' emotions.

Only running 68 minutes, "The Kid" is not as technically inventive or polished as Chaplin's later films, but its storytelling is unmatched. My favorite sequence is where we watch the pair pull off a moneymaking scheme together. The kid breaks a man's windows by throwing rocks at them and running off. The Tramp comes along with a pane of glass to repair the damage, and when he's finished with his work the kid comes out of hiding to rejoin him. However, the kid comes running up to the departing Tramp as they're not quite out of their mark's sight, so the Tramp keeps trying to shoo him away, and they kid keeps doggedly coming back like he's being drawn by a magnet.

The scene is fun on its own, but it is also key to establishing the central relationship between the Tramp and the kid, a relationship that is vital to sustaining the longer melodramatic story. It was the emotional connection of his characters that distinguished Chaplin's films from his peers. Buster Keaton films had romances in them, where Buster would court a love interest, but in the Chaplin films the romances had far more deeply felt heart and heartache. The Tramp was a born romantic, and Chaplin could convey emotion through his pantomime like no other. So when he's separated from the kid, the paternal worry and anguish are palpable through the screen.

"The Kid" is far from perfect. The plot twists are outlandish, the ending is overly optimistic, and there are some sequences that don't really work. At one point the Tramp has a fantastical dream where he imagines he and the kid are reunited in a heavenly paradise full of angels. Everyone is bedecked with wings and harps, and it's amusing at first, but the charm wears off very quickly, and the scene goes on for quite a while. Also, for those Chaplin fans who prefer a high quotient of laughs, "The Kid" isn't nearly as funny as some of his other films or the shorts from the same period.

However, it is among the most moving and most delightful pieces of cinema that Charlie Chaplin ever made, and it still endures. If pressed, I'd probably point to "City Lights" as Chaplin's masterpiece, but "The Kid" remains my favorite of his films for its lovely simplicity and its great big heart. It's also my answer to the commonly asked question, what's the first movie that you would show to someone who has never seen a movie before? "The Kid" is universal, it's timeless, and it's a great example of the power of the cinematic experience.
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What I've Seen - Charlie Chaplin

The Kid (1921)
A Woman of Paris (1923)
The Gold Rush (1925)
The Circus (1928)
City Lights (1931)
Modern Times (1936)
The Great Dictator (1940)
Monsieur Verdoux (1947)
Limelight (1952)

A King in New York (1957)
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