City Lights
City Lights | |
---|---|
Directed by | Charlie Chaplin |
Written by | Charlie Chaplin |
Produced by | Charlie Chaplin |
Starring |
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Cinematography | Roland Totheroh Gordon Pollock |
Edited by |
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Music by |
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Distributed by | United Artists |
Release date |
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Running time | 87 minutes |
Country | United States |
Languages | Synchronized Sound English Intertitles |
Budget | $1.5 million |
Box office | $4.25 million (worldwide rentals)[3] |
City Lights is a 1931 American synchronized
Although talking pictures (or films with recorded dialogue) were on the rise when Chaplin started developing the script in 1928, he decided to continue working without dialogue only incorporating sound with the use of a synchronized musical score with sound effects. Filming started in December 1928 and ended in September 1930. City Lights marked the first time Chaplin composed the film score to one of his productions and it was written in six weeks with Arthur Johnston. The main theme, used as a leitmotif for the blind flower girl, is the song "La Violetera" ("Who'll Buy my Violets") from Spanish composer José Padilla. Chaplin lost a lawsuit to Padilla for not crediting him.
City Lights was immediately successful upon release on January 30, 1931, with positive reviews and worldwide rentals of more than $4 million. Today, many critics consider it not only the highest accomplishment of Chaplin's career, but one of the
Plot
Citizens and dignitaries are assembled for the unveiling of a new monument to "Peace and Prosperity". After droning speeches, the veil is lifted to reveal the Little Tramp asleep in the lap of one of the sculpted figures. After several minutes of slapstick, he manages to escape the assembly's wrath to perambulate the city. He rebukes two newsboys who taunt him for his shabbiness, and while coyly admiring a nude statue has a near-fatal encounter with a sidewalk elevator.
The Tramp encounters the beautiful flower girl on a street corner and in the course of buying a flower realizes she is blind; he is instantly smitten. The girl mistakes the Tramp for a wealthy man when the door of a chauffeured automobile slams shut as he departs.
That evening the Tramp saves a drunken millionaire from suicide. The millionaire takes the Tramp – his new best friend – back to his mansion for champagne, then (after another abortive suicide attempt) out for a night on the town. After helping the millionaire home the next morning, he sees the flower girl en route to her street-corner. He gets some money from the millionaire and catches up to the girl; he buys all her flowers and drives her home in the millionaire's car. The millionaire's car is a right-hand drive
After the Tramp leaves, the flower girl tells her grandmother about her kind and wealthy friend. Meanwhile, the Tramp returns to the mansion, where the millionaire – now sober – does not remember him and throws him out. Later that day, the millionaire is once again intoxicated and, seeing the Tramp on the street, invites him home for a lavish party. But the next morning history repeats itself: the millionaire is again sober and the Tramp is again out on his ear.
Finding that the girl is not at her usual street-corner, the Tramp goes to her apartment, where he overhears a doctor tell the grandmother that the girl is very ill: "She has a fever and needs careful attention." Determined to help, the Tramp takes a job as a street sweeper.
On his lunch break, he brings the girl groceries while her grandmother is out selling flowers. To entertain her he reads a newspaper aloud; in it is a story about a Viennese doctor's blindness cure. "Wonderful, then I'll be able to see you", says the girl – and the Tramp is struck by what may happen should she gain her sight and discover that he is not the wealthy man she imagines. He also finds an eviction notice the girl's grandmother has hidden. As he leaves, he promises the girl that he will pay the rent.
The Tramp returns to work to find himself fired – he has been late once too often. A boxer convinces him to fight in a fake bout; they will "go easy" on each other and split the prize money. But the boxer flees on learning he is about to be arrested and is replaced by a no-nonsense fighter who knocks the Tramp out despite the Tramp's creative and nimble efforts to keep out of reach.
The Tramp encounters the drunken millionaire a third time and is again invited to the mansion. The Tramp relates the girl's plight and the millionaire gives him money for her operation. Burglars knock the millionaire out and take the rest of his money. The police find the Tramp with the money given to him by the millionaire, who because of the knock on the head does not remember giving it. The Tramp evades the police long enough to get the money to the girl, telling her he will be going away for a time; in due course he is apprehended and imprisoned.
Months later the Tramp is released. He goes to the girl's customary street corner but she is not there. We learn that the girl – her sight restored – now runs a busy flower shop with her grandmother. But she has not forgotten her mysterious benefactor, whom she imagines to be rich and handsome: when an elegant young man enters the shop she wonders for a moment whether "he" has returned.
The Tramp happens by the shop, where the girl is arranging flowers in the window. He stoops to retrieve a flower discarded in the gutter. After a brief skirmish with his old nemeses, the newsboys, he turns to the shop's window through which he suddenly sees the girl, who has been watching him without (of course) knowing who he is. At the sight of her he is frozen for a few seconds, then breaks into a broad smile. The girl is flattered and giggles to her employee, "I've made a conquest!" Via pantomime through the glass she offers him a fresh flower (to replace the crushed one he took from the gutter) and a coin.
Suddenly embarrassed, the Tramp begins to shuffle away, but the girl steps to the shop door and again offers the flower, which he shyly accepts. She takes his hand and presses the coin into it, then abruptly stops and her smile turns to a look of puzzlement as she recognizes the touch of his hand. She runs her fingers along his arm, his shoulder, his lapels, then gasps, "You?" The Tramp nods and asks, "You can see now?" The girl replies, "Yes, I can see now", and presses his hand to her heart with a tearful smile. Relieved and elated, the Tramp smiles back.
Cast
- Virginia Cherrill as the blind girl
- Florence Lee as her grandmother
- Harry Myersas the eccentric millionaire
- Al Ernest Garcia as his butler (credited as Allan Garcia)
- Hank Mann as the prizefighter
- Charlie Chaplin as The Tramp
Uncredited Cast
- Robert Parrish as a newsboy
- Henry Bergman as The Mayor and the blind girl's downstairs neighbor
- Eddie Baker as a boxing match referee
- Albert Austin as a street sweeper and a burglar
- Jean Harlow as an extra in nightclub scene (cut from film)
Production
Pre-production
Chaplin's feature The Circus, released in 1928, was his last film before the motion picture industry embraced sound recording and brought the silent movie era to a close. As his own producer and distributor (part owner of United Artists), Chaplin could still conceive City Lights as a silent film. Technically the film was a crossover, as its soundtrack had synchronized music and sound effects but no spoken dialogue. The dialogue was presented on intertitles.[9] Chaplin was first contacted by inventor Eugene Augustin Lauste in 1918 about making a sound film, but he never ended up meeting with Lauste.[10] Chaplin was dismissive about "talkies" and told a reporter that he would "give the talkies three years, that's all."[11] He was also concerned about how to adjust the Little Tramp to sound films.[11]
In early 1928, Chaplin began writing the script with Harry Carr. The plot gradually grew from an initial concept Chaplin had considered after the success of The Circus, where a circus clown goes blind and has to conceal his handicap from his young daughter by pretending that his inability to see are pratfalls.[11] This inspired the Blind Girl. The first scenes Chaplin thought up were of the ending, where the newly cured blind girl sees the Little Tramp for the first time.[12] A highly detailed description of the scene was written, as Chaplin considered it to be the center of the entire film.[13]
For a subplot, Chaplin first considered a character even lower on the social scale, a black newsboy. Eventually he opted for a drunken millionaire, a character previously used in the 1921 short The Idle Class.[14] The millionaire plot was based on an old idea Chaplin had for a short in which two millionaires pick up the Little Tramp from the city dump and show him a good time in expensive clubs before dropping him back off at the dump, so when he woke up, the Tramp would not know if it was real or a dream. This was rewritten into a millionaire who is the Tramp's friend when drunk but does not recognize him when sober.[15]
Chaplin officially began pre-production of the film in May 1928 and hired Australian art director Henry Clive to design the sets that summer. Chaplin eventually cast Clive in the role of the millionaire. Although the film was originally set in Paris, the art direction is inspired by a mix of several cities. Robert Sherwood said that "it is a weird city, with confusing resemblances to London, Los Angeles, Naples, Paris, Tangiers and Council Bluffs. It is no city on earth and it is all cities."[16]
On August 28, 1928, Chaplin's mother Hannah Chaplin died at the age of 63. Chaplin was distraught for several weeks and pre-production did not resume until mid fall of 1928.[17] Psychologist Stephen Weissman has hypothesized that City Lights is highly autobiographical, with the blind girl representing Chaplin's mother, while the drunken millionaire represents Chaplin's father.[18] Weissman also compared many of the film's sets with locations from Chaplin's real childhood, such as the statue in the opening scene resembling St. Mark's Church on Kennington Park Road[19] and Chaplin referring to the waterfront set as the Thames Embankment.[20]
Chaplin had interviewed several actresses to play the blind flower girl but was unimpressed with them all. While seeing a film shoot with bathing women in a
Principal photography
Filming for City Lights officially began on December 27, 1928, after Chaplin and Carr had worked on the script for almost an entire year.[24] On the set, Chaplin was noted for doing many more "takes" than other directors at the time.[25] Production began with the first scene at the flower stand where the Little Tramp first meets the Blind Flower Girl. The scene took weeks to shoot, and Chaplin first began to have second thoughts about casting Cherrill. Years later, Cherrill said, "I never liked Charlie and he never liked me."[26] In his autobiography, Chaplin took responsibility for his on-set tensions with Cherrill, blaming the stress of making the film for the conflict. "I had worked myself into a neurotic state of wanting perfection", he remembered.[27][26] Filming the scene continued until February 1929 and again for ten days in early April before Chaplin put the scene aside to be filmed later.[28] He then shot the opening scene of the Little Tramp waking up in a newly unveiled public statue. This scene involved up to 380 extras and was especially stressful for Chaplin to shoot.[28] During this part of shooting, construction was being done at Chaplin Studios because the city of Los Angeles had decided to widen La Brea Avenue and Chaplin was forced to move several buildings away from the road.[29][30]
Chaplin then shot the sequence where the Little Tramp first meets the millionaire and prevents him from committing suicide.
In November, Chaplin began working with Cherrill again in some of the Flower Girl's less dramatic scenes. While waiting for her scenes for several months, Cherrill had become bored and openly complained to Chaplin. During the filming of one scene, Cherrill asked Chaplin if she could leave early so that she could go to a hair appointment.[34] Chaplin fired Virginia Cherrill and replaced her with Georgia Hale, Chaplin's co-star in The Gold Rush.[25] Although Chaplin liked her screen test, even he realized he had shot far too much already to reshoot all of the flower girl's scenes.[35] Chaplin also briefly considered sixteen-year-old actress Violet Krauth, but he was talked out of this idea by his collaborators.[36] Chaplin finally re-hired Cherrill to finish City Lights.[35] She demanded and got a raise to $75 per week.[36] Approximately seven minutes of test footage of Hale survives and is included on the DVD release; excerpts were first seen in the documentary Unknown Chaplin along with an unused opening sequence.[25]
Chaplin then cast Florence Lee as the Blind Girl's grandmother and shot scenes with Cherrill and Lee for five weeks.[36] In late 1929, Chaplin re-shot the first Flower Shop scene with Cherrill. This time, the scene was completed in six days and Chaplin was happy with Cherrill's performance. Chaplin had been shooting the film for a year and was only a little more than half way finished.[37] From March to April 1930, Chaplin shot the scenes inside of the millionaire's house at the Town House on Wilshire Boulevard. He hired Joe Van Meter and Albert Austin, whom he had known since his days working for Fred Karno, as the burglars.[38] In the late spring of 1930, Chaplin shot the last major comedy sequence: the boxing match.[38] Chaplin hired Keystone actor Hank Mann to play the Tramp's opponent. The scene required 100 extras; Chaplin took four days to rehearse, and then six to shoot it, between June 23 and 30.[39] Chaplin was initially nervous over the attendance for this scene so he invited his friends to be extras. Over 100 extras were present. Chaplin's performance in the scene was so humorous that more people arrived daily to be an extra.[40]
In July and August, Chaplin finished up six weeks of smaller scenes, including the two scenes of the Tramp being harassed by newsboys, one of whom was played by a young Robert Parrish.[39]
In September 1930, Chaplin finished the shooting of the iconic final scene which took six days.[39] Chaplin said that he was happy with Cherrill's performance in the scene, and that she had eventually understood the role. When talking about his directing style on set, Chaplin stated that "everything I do is a dance. I think in terms of dance. I think more so in City Lights."[29]
From October to December 1930, Chaplin edited the film and created the title cards.[41] When he completed the film, silent films had become generally unpopular. But City Lights was one of the great financial and artistic successes of Chaplin's career, and it was his personal favorite of his films.[42] Especially fond of the final scene, he said, "[I]n City Lights just the last scene ... I'm not acting ... Almost apologetic, standing outside myself and looking ... It's a beautiful scene, beautiful, and because it isn't over-acted."[25]
The amount of film used for the project was uncharacteristic for the time and was a sign of the long production process. Chaplin shot 314,256 feet of film, and the completed film ran 8,093 feet. This made a shooting ratio of approximately 38.8 feet of film for each foot of film that made it in the final version.[40]
Music
City Lights marked the first time Chaplin composed the
The main theme used as a leitmotif for the blind flower girl is the song "La Violetera" ("Who'll Buy my Violets") from Spanish composer José Padilla.[2] Chaplin was unable to secure the original song performer, Raquel Meller, in the lead role, but used her song anyway as a major theme.[48][49] Chaplin lost a lawsuit to Padilla (which took place in Paris, where Padilla lived) for not crediting him.[50][51] Some modern editions released for video include a new recording by Carl Davis.[52]
Release, reception, and legacy
Two weeks prior to the premiere, Chaplin decided to have an unpublicized preview at Los Angeles'
Chaplin was nervous about the film's reception because silent films were becoming obsolete by then, and the preview had undermined his confidence. Nevertheless, City Lights became one of Chaplin's most financially successful and critically acclaimed works. Following the good reception by American audiences, with estimated theatrical rentals of $2 million,[57] a quarter of which came from its 12-week run at the Cohan,[56] Chaplin went on a sixteen-day world tour between February and March 1931, starting with a premiere at London's Dominion Theatre on February 27.[58] The film was enthusiastically received by Depression-era audiences, earning $4.25 million in worldwide rentals during its initial release.[3]
Reviews were mostly positive. A film critic for the Los Angeles Examiner said that "not since I reviewed the first Chaplin comedies way back in the two-reel days has Charlie given us such an orgy of laughs."[47] The New York Times reviewer Mordaunt Hall considered it "a film worked out with admirable artistry".[59] Variety declared it was "not Chaplin's best picture" but that certain sequences were "hilarious".[60] The New Yorker wrote that it was "on the order of his other [films], perhaps a little better than any of them" and that it gave an impression "not often—oh, very seldom—found in the movies; an indefinable impression perhaps best described as a quality of charm."[61] On the other hand, Alexander Bakshy of The Nation was highly critical of City Lights, objecting to the silent format and over-sentimentality and describing it as "Chaplin's feeblest".[56]
The popularity of City Lights endured, with the film's re-release in 1950 again positively received by audiences and critics. In 1949, the critic James Agee wrote in Life magazine, that the final scene was the "greatest single piece of acting ever committed to celluloid."[62] Richard Meryman called the final scene one of the greatest moments in film history.[41] Charles Silver, Curator of Film at the Museum of Modern Art, stated that the film is so highly regarded because it brought forth a new level of lyrical romanticism that had not appeared in Chaplin's earlier works. He adds that like all romanticism, it is based in the denial of the real world around it. When the film premiered, Chaplin was much older, he was in the midst of another round of legal battles with former spouse Lita Grey, and the economic and political climate of the world had changed. Chaplin uses the Girl's blindness to remind the Tramp of the precarious nature of romanticism in the real world, as she unknowingly assaults him multiple times.[63] Film.com critic Eric D. Snider said that by 1931, most Hollywood filmmakers either embraced sound films, resigned themselves to their inevitability, or just gave up making movies, yet Chaplin held firm with his vision in this project. He also noted that few in Hollywood had the clout to make a silent film at that late date, let alone do it well. One reason was that Chaplin knew the Tramp could not be adapted to talking movies and still work.[62]
Several well-known directors have praised City Lights.
French experimental musician and film critic
City Lights was released as a dual-format
Accolades
In 1952,
The film is recognized by American Film Institute in these lists:
- 1998: AFI's 100 Years...100 Movies – #76[86]
- 2000: AFI's 100 Years...100 Laughs – #38[87]
- 2002: AFI's 100 Years...100 Passions – #10[88]
- 2003: AFI's 100 Years...100 Heroes & Villains: The Tramp – #38 Hero[89]
- 2003: AFI's 100 Years... 100 American Movie Poster Classics – #52[85]
- 2006: AFI's 100 Years...100 Cheers – #33[90]
- 2007: AFI's 100 Years...100 Movies (10th Anniversary Edition) – #11[91]
- 2008: AFI's 10 Top 10: #1 Romantic Comedy Film[92]
See also
- List of United States comedy films
- List of boxing films
References
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- ^ a b "Chaplin as a composer". CharlieChaplin.com. Archived from the original on July 5, 2011.
- ^ a b "Biggest Money Pictures". Variety. June 21, 1932. p. 1.
- ^ Vance, Jeffrey. "City Lights" (PDF). Library of Congress. Retrieved January 9, 2021.
- ^ a b Kehr, Dave (September 26, 1991). "U.S. Film Registry Adds 25 'Significant' Movies". Chicago Tribune. Retrieved June 1, 2020.
- ^ a b "Complete National Film Registry Listing". Library of Congress. Retrieved June 1, 2020.
- ^ Snider, Eric D. (February 15, 2010). "What's the Big Deal: City Lights (1931)". Seattle Post-Intelligencer. Retrieved September 13, 2013.
- ^ 1924 Rolls-Royce 40/50 h.p. 'Silver Ghost' Springfield
- ^ Kamin 2008, p. 136.
- ^ Robinson 1985, p. 387.
- ^ a b c Robinson 1985, p. 389.
- ^ Robinson 1985, p. 391.
- ^ Robinson 1985, p. 393.
- ^ Milton 2011, p. 200.
- ^ Chaplin 1964, p. 325.
- ^ Robinson 1985, p. 295.
- ^ Robinson 1985, pp. 296–297.
- ^ Weissman 2008, p. 71–74.
- ^ Weissman 2008, p. 64.
- ^ Weissman 2008, p. 65.
- ^ Vallance, Tom (November 20, 1996). "Obituary: Virginia Cherrill". The Independent. London. Retrieved October 20, 2018.
- ^ Chaplin 1964, p. 326.
- ^ Weissman 2008, p. 67.
- ^ a b Robinson 1985, p. 398.
- ^ a b c d Robinson, David (2004). "Filming City Lights". CharlieChaplin.com. Archived from the original on November 22, 2010. Retrieved May 12, 2011.
- ^ a b Robinson 1985, p. 399.
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- ^ a b Robinson 1985, p. 400.
- ^ a b c Robinson 1985, p. 401.
- ^ Turnbull, Martin (May 16, 2018). "Moving the Charlie Chaplin Studios 15 feet while widening La Brea Avenue, Los Angeles, 1929". MartinTurnbull.com. Retrieved September 24, 2018.
- ^ Robinson 1985, p. 402.
- ^ Robinson 1985, pp. 402–403.
- ^ Robinson 1985, p. 403.
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- ^ Robinson 1985, p. 411.
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- ^ a b Robinson 1985, p. 412.
- ^ Chaplin 1964, p. 329.
- ^ a b c Robinson 1985, p. 413.
- ^ "Portrait of Charlie Chaplin's Favourite for Sale at Bonhams". Art Daily. July 9, 2010. Archived from the original on March 7, 2012. Retrieved November 22, 2010.
- ^ "Luces de la ciudad". ABC (in Spanish). Madrid. July 27, 1962. p. 30.
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- ^ "Biografía de José Padilla Sánchez" (in Spanish). Marielilasagabaster.net. Archived from the original on March 25, 2012.[unreliable source?]
- ^ Ebert, Roger (December 21, 1997). "City Lights (1931)". Chicago Sun-Times. Retrieved January 9, 2021 – via RogerEbert.com.
- ^ Robinson 1985, p. 414.
- ^ Robinson 1985, p. 415.
- ^ Chaplin 1964, p. 332.
- ^ a b c Flom 1997, pp. 73–74.
- ISBN 978-0-0619-6345-2.
- ^ Maland 2007, p. 107.
- ^ Hall, Mordaunt (February 7, 1931). "Movie Review - City Lights - Chaplin Hilarious in His 'City Lights'; Tramp's Antics in Non-Dialogue Film Bring Roars of Laughter at Cohan Theatre. Takes Fling at 'Talkies'; Pathos Is Mingled With Mirth in a Production of Admirable Artistry". The New York Times. Retrieved September 8, 2011.
- ^ "Film Reviews". Variety. New York: 14. February 11, 1931. Retrieved November 16, 2014.
- ^ Mosher, John C. (February 21, 1931). "The Current Cinema". The New Yorker. pp. 60–61.
- ^ a b c Snider, Eric D. (February 15, 2010). "What's the Big Deal: City Lights". Seattle Post-Intelligencer. Retrieved May 11, 2011.
- ^ Silver, Charles (August 31, 2010). "Charles Chaplin's City Lights". Inside/Out. The Museum of Modern Art. Retrieved May 11, 2011.
- ^ "Orson Welles: City Lights Charlie Chaplin". Irish Film Institute. Retrieved October 9, 2018.
- ^ Ciment, Michel (1982). "Kubrick" Biographical Notes". VisualMemory.com. Retrieved May 11, 2011.
- Sight & Sound. 3 (3). British Film Institute. Archived from the original on August 26, 2012. Retrieved May 11, 2011 – via Nostalghia.com (hosted by UCalgary.ca).
- ^ Ignatiy Vishnevetsky (January 13, 2012). "The Comedy Stylings of Robert Bresson". MUBI. Retrieved June 10, 2021.
- ^ Gladysz, Thomas (November 24, 2010). "Two New Releases Show Genius of Charlie Chaplin". Huffington Post. Retrieved May 10, 2011.
- ^ Vance, Jeffrey. audio commentary track to The Criterion Collection DVD/Blu-ray edition of City Lights. 2013.
- ^ Vance 2003, p. 208.
- ^ Chion 1989.
- ^ Žižek 2013, pp. 1–9.
- ^ a b "City Lights". Roger Ebert. December 21, 1997.
- ^ "The Charles Chaplin Collections at the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County". British Film Institute. Archived from the original on August 12, 2007. Retrieved September 17, 2013.
- ^ Atanasov, Svet (October 26, 2013). "City Lights Blu-ray". Blu-ray.com. Retrieved August 14, 2017.
- ^ "The Sight & Sound Top Ten Poll: 1952 Critics' Poll". British Film Institute. September 5, 2006. Archived from the original on May 14, 2011. Retrieved May 11, 2011.
- ^ "The Sight & Sound Top Ten Poll 2002: The rest of the critics' list". British Film Institute. September 5, 2006. Archived from the original on May 15, 2012. Retrieved May 11, 2011.
- ^ "The Sight & Sound Top Ten Poll 2002: The rest of the directors' list". British Film Institute. September 5, 2006. Archived from the original on March 9, 2012. Retrieved May 11, 2011.
- ^ "AFI's 100 Years... 100 Movies (10th Anniversary Edition)". American Film Institute. Retrieved August 17, 2010.
- ^ "AFI's Top 10 Romantic Comedies". American Film Institute. June 17, 2008. Retrieved June 18, 2008.
- ^ "AFI's 100 Years... 100 Heroes & Villains". American Film Institute. Retrieved August 17, 2010.
- ^ "AFI's 100 Years...100 Laughs". American Film Institute. Retrieved August 18, 2008.
- ^ "AFI's 100 Years...100 Passions" (PDF). American Film Institute. Archived from the original (PDF) on July 16, 2011. Retrieved January 19, 2010.
- ^ "AFI 100 Cheers". June 14, 2006. Retrieved October 19, 2012.
- ^ a b "MovieGoods - AFI Top 100 Movie Posters". March 15, 2007. Archived from the original on March 15, 2007. Retrieved November 25, 2023.
{{cite web}}
: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link) - ^ "AFI's 100 Years...100 Movies" (PDF). American Film Institute. Retrieved August 6, 2016.
- ^ "AFI's 100 Years...100 Laughs" (PDF). American Film Institute. Archived from the original (PDF) on June 24, 2016. Retrieved August 6, 2016.
- ^ "AFI's 100 Years...100 Passions" (PDF). American Film Institute. Retrieved August 6, 2016.
- ^ "AFI's 100 Years...100 Heroes & Villains" (PDF). American Film Institute. Retrieved August 6, 2016.
- ^ "AFI's 100 Years...100 Cheers" (PDF). American Film Institute. Retrieved August 6, 2016.
- ^ "AFI's 100 Years...100 Movies (10th Anniversary Edition)" (PDF). American Film Institute. Retrieved August 6, 2016.
- ^ "AFI's 10 Top 10: Top 10 Romantic Comedy". American Film Institute. Retrieved August 6, 2016.
- ^ "Take One: The First Annual Village Voice Film Critics' Poll". The Village Voice. 1999. Archived from the original on August 26, 2007. Retrieved July 27, 2006.
- ^ Schickel, Richard (January 13, 2010). "City Lights". Time.
- ^ "The 100 Greatest Performances" Archived August 15, 2012, at the Wayback Machine filmsite.org
- Cahiers du cinéma (in French). Archived from the originalon October 18, 2010. Retrieved December 27, 2019.
- Sight & Sound (September 2012). British Film Institute. Archived from the originalon March 1, 2017. Retrieved June 6, 2013.
- Sight & Sound. British Film Institute. 2012. Archived from the originalon February 9, 2016.
- ^ "Sight & Sound Top Ten Poll 2002: The rest of the critics' list". Sight & Sound. British Film Institute. Archived from the original on May 15, 2012. Retrieved April 24, 2009.
- ^ "Sight & Sound 2002 Directors' Greatest Films poll". listal.com.
- ^ "Sight & Sound Top Ten Poll 2002 The Rest of Director's List". old.bfi.org.uk. Archived from the original on February 1, 2017. Retrieved May 30, 2021.
- ^ "100 Greatest American Films". BBC. July 20, 2015. Archived from the original on September 16, 2016. Retrieved July 21, 2015.
- ^ "The 100 greatest comedies of all time". BBC Culture. August 22, 2017. Retrieved September 8, 2017.
- ^ "The 100 best movies of all time". Time Out. April 8, 2021.
Bibliography
- Chaplin, Charlie (1964). ISBN 1612191932.
- Chion, Michel (1989). Les Lumières de la ville, Charles Chaplin: étude critique. Fernand Nathan. ISBN 978-2-09-188623-7.
- Flom, Eric L. (January 1, 1997). Chaplin in the Sound Era: An Analysis of the Seven Talkies. McFarland. ISBN 978-0-7864-0325-7.
- Kamin, Dan (September 5, 2008). The Comedy of Charlie Chaplin: Artistry in Motion. Scarecrow Press. ISBN 978-0-8108-7781-8.
- Maland, Charles J. (September 3, 2007). City Lights. British Film Institute. ISBN 978-1-84457-175-8.
- Milton, Joyce (October 25, 2011). Tramp: The Life of Charlie Chaplin. Premier Digital Publishing. ISBN 978-1-937624-49-1.
- ISBN 0-89659-869-1.
- Robinson, David (1985). Chaplin:His Life and Art. New York: McGraw-Hill Books Company. ISBN 0-07-053181-1.
- Vance, Jeffrey (2003). Chaplin: Genius of the Cinema. New York: Harry N. Abrams. ISBN 0-8109-4532-0.
- Weissman, Stephen M. (2008). Chaplin: A Life. Arcade Publishing. ISBN 978-1-55970-892-0.
- ISBN 978-1-135-30000-5.
External links
- City Lights essay by Jeffrey Vance on the National Film Registry web site
- City Lights essay by Daniel Eagan in America's Film Legacy: The Authoritative Guide to the Landmark Movies in the National Film Registry, A&C Black, 2010 ISBN 0826429777, pages 180-11
- City Lights at IMDb
- City Lights at Rotten Tomatoes
- City Lights at the TCM Movie Database
- City Lights at AllMovie
- City Lights at the American Film Institute Catalog
- Filming City Lights
- City Lights: The Immortal Tramp an essay by Criterion Collection