...one of the few motion pictures of the day to stand up and be counted against the forces of tyranny and injustice, for which it must always be commended.
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In the character of the Little Tramp, Charlie Chaplin created one of the screen's immortals, but it was not his only trump card. "The Great Dictator," the famous filmmaker's first completely talkie film, has become as classic as anything he did with only partial help from the little fictional fellow. It's good to see "The Great Dictator" and all of Chaplin's full-length films finally getting their proper due on DVD in "The Chaplin Collection," special-edition, two-disc sets from MK2 and Warner Brothers.
Yes, it wasn't until 1940, well over a dozen years after sound was introduced to film, that Chaplin was dragged kicking and screaming into the talking era. He was, after all, the supreme mime, so it was no wonder his early sound films like "City Lights" (1931) and "Modern Times" (1936) continued to be mostly devoid of dialogue. More directors should take the hint in this day and age. Nevertheless, while "The Great Dictator" does use dialogue, there is still a good deal of visual humor throughout, which was always Chaplin's forte. When the great man is doing his silent bits, the movie is art; when he stops to talk, with few exceptions, it tends to drag. Maybe there's a moral there. Anyway, the movie is a wonderful showcase for Chaplin's talents, as it combines biting satire and serious issues, slapstick and sentimentality, all the trademarks of the famous comic actor, writer, and director.
The plot rails against the horrors of tyranny and racial persecution, specifically against Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy, occasionally straying uncomfortably into preachiness but generally staying within the bounds of farce and caricature. Chaplin opens the picture with the following preface: "This is a story of a period between two World Wars--an interim in which Insanity cut loose, Liberty took a nose dive, and Humanity was kicked around somewhat."
Chaplin plays two parts in the film, which alternates sequences between the characters. His first role is that of the dictator of Tomania, Adenoid Hynkel, a peevish, foolish, and quite mad character whose emblem for his country is not the twisted cross but the double cross. This Hitler imitation is complete with broken, nonsense German and all of the real dictator's mannerisms. By way of further oddity, it has been suggested that Hitler adopted his own abbreviated mustache after watching early Chaplin films. So life imitates art, which in turn imitates life. At least Chaplin's mustache was temporary.
The second role Chaplin plays is that of a Jewish barber living in a Tomanian ghetto. He is, of course, the Little Tramp himself, right down to topcoat, vest, derby hat, and cane. He is forever the small or insignificant man fighting the big and seemingly indomitable enemy and always prevailing in the end, much to the delight of every small guy in the audience. The character remains universal.
Supporting Chaplin in the cast are Paulette Goddard, Chaplin's wife at the time, as Hannah, a local laundress who befriends the barber; Henry Daniell as Garbitsch, Hynkel's evil and calculating advisor (a part in which Chaplin thought the actor a little too calculating, to the point of Chaplin's accusing Daniell of trying to sabotage the film); Reginald Gardiner as Commander Schultz, one of Hynkel's senior officers, whose life the barber had saved many years before in World War I; Billy Gilbert as Field Marshal Herring, a thickheaded soldier who keeps coming up with harebrained military ideas; and perhaps best of all, Jack Oakie as Benzino Napaloni, the egomaniacal dictator of a neighboring country, Bacteria, and the man whom Hynkel grudgingly tries to make an ally. Like Chaplin's Hitler burlesque, Oakie's Mussolini parody is spot on.
Chaplin was unaware of the extent of the persecution facing Jews in Europe at the time he produced his film. He later revealed that he would never have made "The Great Dictator" or depicted Hitler as such a simpleminded blockhead if he had known the full horror of Hitler's crimes and that the Holocaust would eventually claim the lives of millions of innocent people. There are some things, he said, that are simply not the subjects of humor. There is a prescient moment in the movie when Hynkel says he wants not only to wipe out the Jews, he wants to eliminate brunettes next. So close it was to the horrendous truth.
Chaplin's gutsy stand against Hitler, Nazism, Fascism, and Jewish persecution are important contributing factors to the film's significance today, but the script has also got its moments of sheer fun, even if they are sometimes lost in the propaganda. Note the famous globe juggling scene, for instance, with Hynkel daydreaming of world domination by bouncing a balloon of the world around the room with all the grace of a ballet dancer. Then there's the barber shaving a customer to the tune of Brahms' Fifth Hungarian Dance. And a coin-in-the-pudding routine. And Hynkel and Napaloni raising themselves higher and higher in barber chairs, each trying to look down on the other. And a dozen more.
This is not to say the film is without fault, however, classic or not. Its plot line is flimsy and old-fashioned, its characters one-dimensional, and its moralizing sentimental and sometimes strenuously annoying. The barber's culminating speech, as a prime example, goes way over the top, altering the final tone of the picture. Moreover, there are stretches between gags that will seem agonizingly long and slow to viewers used to today's nonstop pacing.
I suspect the film has acquired its classic status as much because it was made by the great Chaplin as because of its actual humor content; and because Chaplin wasn't afraid to attack problems--Hitler and the persecution of the Jews--that most of the rest of the world, especially Hollywood, was turning a blind eye to at the time. Overall, though, with a little patience the movie has far greater pleasures than pains and remains a work worthy of every serious film buff's consideration.
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