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Modern Times (1936) with Molly Rasberry · Left of the Projector

• 0:19
  Track 1: Hello and welcome to Left at the Projector. I am your host, Evan,
• 0:22
  Track 1: back again with another film discussion from the left.
• 0:25
  Track 1: This week on the show, we are discussing the 1936 film Modern Times,
• 0:31
  Track 1: directed and starring Charlie Chaplin.
• 0:33
  Track 1: And with me to discuss, I have Molly Raspberry, who you may know from,
• 0:39
  Track 1: at least I know from Twitter or X. Thank you for joining me today, Molly.
• 0:44
  Track 2: Thanks for having me.
• 0:45
  Track 1: Of course. And I guess since we were just saying before, as I usually send out
• 0:50
  Track 1: like a list of films, and I know you pretty quickly chose Modern Times.
• 0:56
  Track 1: But I guess in addition to saying maybe why you chose that, feel free to,
• 1:00
  Track 1: I don't know, share any background or context as to maybe what led you to pick
• 1:04
  Track 1: that and, you know, anything you're working on or anything like that.
• 1:09
  Track 2: Well, funny thing is that I took a class in grad school and it was on historical
• 1:14
  Track 2: materialism, which I'm sure the Marxist studies people are just like,
• 1:19
  Track 2: they're perking up their ears like, what?
• 1:21
  Track 2: What just just like yeah
• 1:24
  Track 2: and our professor my professor who actually
• 1:27
  Track 2: he used to i'm not sure if he still does former professor
• 1:30
  Track 2: he he called himself an anarcho
• 1:34
  Track 2: syndical syndicalist marxist and
• 1:38
  Track 2: well a marxist anarcho syndicalist and
• 1:42
  Track 2: he chose two films one was pierre paulo
• 1:45
  Track 2: pasalini's film Medea which is Maria Callas's
• 1:48
  Track 2: only acting role non-opera role
• 1:51
  Track 2: and it's fantastic I highly recommend it
• 1:54
  Track 2: it's on the Criterion channel if you have that and
• 1:58
  Track 2: the other film we watched was Modern Times which I
• 2:01
  Track 2: thought which I was already a fan of since high
• 2:04
  Track 2: school because I had been a fan of Charlie Chaplin he
• 2:07
  Track 2: was probably the first silent film star I became a huge fan of
• 2:10
  Track 2: I loved the great dictator i love the circus i
• 2:14
  Track 2: love the gold rush and of course i
• 2:16
  Track 2: love modern times and i was like this is interesting that we're gonna do this
• 2:20
  Track 2: one i can understand with the automation but i was like oh this goes even further
• 2:24
  Track 2: with that even though modern times was kind of the one he's like that's the
• 2:28
  Track 2: lazy pick i chose because he liked more of pasolini style the more subtle subtle.
• 2:35
  Track 2: And he thought Chaplin didn't go far enough, but we'll get into that as well,
• 2:40
  Track 2: because I also have some discussions with some thoughts on that process.
• 2:44
  Track 2: But yeah, that's my, that was how I got into it.
• 2:47
  Track 1: Awesome. Yeah. And as a, as a disclosure for this, I think is the first,
• 2:51
  Track 1: this is definitely the first Charlie Chaplin film I've done on this show.
• 2:54
  Track 1: And one of the only films I think from this era, the only earlier silent film
• 3:00
  Track 1: I think I did was the original Nosferatu and like a Dracula episode combining
• 3:05
  Track 1: a few different versions.
• 3:07
  Track 1: So this is definitely it you know
• 3:09
  Track 1: i maybe i you picked the you are i guess the
• 3:12
  Track 1: perfect person to uh to reign in
• 3:15
  Track 1: my uh or not reign in because i don't have much knowledge
• 3:18
  Track 1: on it to uh to add expand expand on uh kind
• 3:21
  Track 1: of the thoughts on this movie and it's it's one of those ones when
• 3:24
  Track 1: i think of like the work of charlie chaplin i
• 3:27
  Track 1: think of other ones he's done you know prior this
• 3:30
  Track 1: one feels i mean it's funny you said like it's like a slam dunk
• 3:33
  Track 1: or it's kind of like a obvious pick for
• 3:36
  Track 1: that kind of class i mean as far as like the legacy and watching it in 2025
• 3:42
  Track 1: now you know almost 100 years 85 years since it came out i mean how poignant
• 3:48
  Track 1: would you say it would be you know discussing this now i mean it's and.
• 3:53
  Track 2: Also how he didn't even go that far with with the with the fordism line the
• 4:01
  Track 2: factory lines like because when you look in those scenes like you're just now
• 4:05
  Track 2: you're like I'd rather work in there than the Amazon is assembly.
• 4:08
  Track 1: Line because.
• 4:08
  Track 2: This is way worse now that it
• 4:11
  Track 2: was back then so it's just like and even
• 4:14
  Track 2: then he was depicting it and it's just clean it's nice the guys are not as grubby
• 4:20
  Track 2: as you imagine it's not like Upton Sinclair's the jungle which I do need to
• 4:25
  Track 2: bring up Upton Sinclair a little bit later for some historical context so so
• 4:30
  Track 2: as you're looking it's like he didn't even depict it like,
• 4:34
  Track 2: as miserable as he could have or as what it really was and that was fascinating
• 4:41
  Track 2: to me to learn about and yeah.
• 4:44
  Track 1: I hadn't even considered that it does make it seem you know you have the the
• 4:49
  Track 1: like i don't know what you would call him like the foreman or or one of the
• 4:52
  Track 1: the the person that like the ceo is talking to on the little cool uh future
• 4:58
  Track 1: future yeah he's like no shirt on he's just like just kind of hulking around like.
• 5:02
  Track 2: A soviet poster.
• 5:04
  Track 1: Poster boy yes no.
• 5:08
  Track 2: Shirt just like a model just right there.
• 5:11
  Track 1: Yeah and then you yeah and then it's just like when you
• 5:14
  Track 1: i mean i guess i mean for anyone who hasn't seen this you should definitely
• 5:18
  Track 1: go check it out you can you can watch it i watched it on the criteria and i
• 5:21
  Track 1: have the also have the blu-ray but i'm sure you can watch it other where you
• 5:24
  Track 1: might be able to do it on canopy i don't know if it's yeah probably on there
• 5:28
  Track 1: and your local library has it too it's a easy first.
• 5:31
  Track 2: 15 minutes so.
• 5:33
  Track 1: The most.
• 5:34
  Track 2: Discussed part so.
• 5:35
  Track 1: Yes and i mean yeah there's no i mean the
• 5:38
  Track 1: no uh no don't have to shy away from spoilers but just as like the general i
• 5:43
  Track 1: guess you could call it plot this is sort of the final film in charlie chaplin's
• 5:48
  Track 1: like the tramp persona that he uses in this and it kind of retires it and as
• 5:53
  Track 1: you said like the The opening of this film is basically him working on an assembly line.
• 5:57
  Track 1: The boss, the CEO is barking orders through like futuristic TV devices where
• 6:03
  Track 1: it's, you know, as you said, you mentioned Amazon.
• 6:05
  Track 1: It's hard not to think about, you know, Amazon probably, I don't know,
• 6:09
  Track 1: watching you through a million cameras at your factory and everything.
• 6:12
  Track 1: And it feels so, so, so obvious that this is the thing that you would see.
• 6:18
  Track 1: And it's it's interesting that he critiqued it that way, because I don't know
• 6:22
  Track 1: how strict like the Ford line would have been then. You know, I don't know.
• 6:27
  Track 2: It was apparently stricter.
• 6:29
  Track 1: Oh, wow. OK.
• 6:29
  Track 2: So, yeah, it was. So, yeah.
• 6:32
  Track 2: And it's not subtle how it opens because it opens up with like Eisenstein would have been proud.
• 6:38
  Track 2: It seems like it was even it's basically an intellectual montage when the first
• 6:42
  Track 2: shot you see a sheep coming in and then it dissolves to the workers coming through
• 6:46
  Track 2: the subway. And then you get that image of just like, oh, humans are sheep.
• 6:51
  Track 2: And which is funny because one critic is just like, oh, that's so obvious and so on the nose.
• 6:56
  Track 2: And you're just like, but Animal Farm is pigs and that's not on the nose.
• 7:02
  Track 1: So, yeah, I mean, it's there are a lot of I think about films where like things
• 7:08
  Track 1: are on the nose like that.
• 7:09
  Track 1: But I don't know when I when you would have seen this in 1936.
• 7:13
  Track 1: I don't know if the average person necessarily was thinking about it in such
• 7:16
  Track 1: an obvious way. Right. I mean, no, the context of it.
• 7:19
  Track 2: Exactly. Exactly with that.
• 7:23
  Track 2: And then, and of course, with the assembly line, he's doing a monotonous task.
• 7:27
  Track 2: He's basically, they're making him a part of the machine right there, which is a part of that.
• 7:31
  Track 2: It basically makes you into automaton right there when you're doing just the bolts.
• 7:36
  Track 2: And that's what he does, does. And, and it's interesting because it cuts to
• 7:42
  Track 2: the, the head guy, the head of the factory.
• 7:45
  Track 2: And he has time to do a puzzle he has
• 7:48
  Track 2: time smoking right on his desk and his
• 7:51
  Track 2: entire job is just to tell the foreman with the shirtless adonis
• 7:54
  Track 2: foreman to be tell them to go faster right now
• 7:57
  Track 2: and then to just keep track of charlie because charlie because the tramp he
• 8:01
  Track 2: can't even swat a fly off his face because he has no time to do it which also
• 8:07
  Track 2: for i love lucy fans yes the scene inspired the chocolate factory scene where
• 8:13
  Track 2: just like in the chocolate and there's like more sprayed.
• 8:17
  Track 2: And that was directly inspired by Charlie Chaplin scene with this.
• 8:21
  Track 2: And it's humiliating because just like swat the fly, just like,
• 8:25
  Track 2: can't even do that. You don't have leisure time for that.
• 8:28
  Track 2: And he goes, he even has to clock out for a smoke break.
• 8:33
  Track 1: Yes.
• 8:33
  Track 2: I thought was, which is actually very accurate.
• 8:37
  Track 2: Apparently I had a coworker whose mom worked at Walmart
• 8:40
  Track 2: and she could not smoke unless it was on her lunch break she was not allowed
• 8:44
  Track 2: to go out like like that and yeah he just goes to the bathroom bathroom and
• 8:51
  Track 2: then the television screen right behind him with with the head of the factory
• 8:55
  Track 2: who is given a voice through this technological component,
• 8:59
  Track 2: component to say hey get back to work get back
• 9:02
  Track 2: to work it's like oh he can't even finish his cigarette he there's no
• 9:05
  Track 2: leisure time with that because and i feel like chaplain was making a point that
• 9:10
  Track 2: the privileged class has this time to do this and that and it's interesting
• 9:14
  Track 2: because in the film he is the outlier he is the one who is making a mess of
• 9:20
  Track 2: this he is the odd one out and so and,
• 9:23
  Track 2: If you're watching something like an Eisenstein film, the person who's an outlier,
• 9:29
  Track 2: others join them to join the masses.
• 9:31
  Track 2: In fact, Chaplin, the original title of this film was going to be called The Masses.
• 9:36
  Track 2: And that didn't happen, of course. But the workers side with the foreman.
• 9:41
  Track 2: They side with their boss trying to get him out. And they even say,
• 9:44
  Track 2: he's crazy because he can't do this job properly.
• 9:47
  Track 2: So you can have a leftist perspective of the scene where people say,
• 9:52
  Track 2: oh, this machine drove him crazy and made him basically a robotic and an automaton
• 9:57
  Track 2: and literally part of the machinery in that famous scene where he's going through
• 10:00
  Track 2: the conveyor belt and he's inside it.
• 10:02
  Track 1: I love that.
• 10:03
  Track 2: It's so good. I love the set piece for it. And they had to bring it back.
• 10:08
  Track 2: And then you have the right viewing it and say, well, everybody else was doing
• 10:14
  Track 2: the right thing. So the only reason why he failed wasn't because the dehumanization of capitalism.
• 10:20
  Track 2: It's because he's just a screw up. So he can't get this right.
• 10:25
  Track 2: So and I think that's why there's these interpretations with that and why this
• 10:28
  Track 2: film is more ambiguous than some other Marxist films that you would see at this
• 10:33
  Track 2: time, especially Soviet cinema.
• 10:34
  Track 1: Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I think that, again, goes to your point of the film
• 10:39
  Track 1: doesn't go, you know, as far as it could.
• 10:42
  Track 1: I mean, it does show another one of my favorite scenes in that opening in the factory.
• 10:46
  Track 1: One, I want to mention the president works at Electro Steel Corp,
• 10:51
  Track 1: which is sort of, I think it's just a funny title for their company.
• 10:55
  Track 1: But then they bring in the group from some other company that's going to get
• 10:59
  Track 1: them like the automated feeding machine, which I think is also one of my favorite scenes.
• 11:03
  Track 1: I mean, there's lots of incredible scenes in this, but I learned in the making
• 11:08
  Track 1: of the film is that he was controlling the little, like the soup and the different
• 11:13
  Track 1: things underneath the little thing with a hand crank.
• 11:16
  Track 1: And that, yeah, I mean, it's just it's crazy that they're they're showing you,
• 11:20
  Track 1: you know, well, you can get your people to work more and eat during their lunch
• 11:25
  Track 1: hour and they don't even get the smoke break.
• 11:28
  Track 2: Yes. It's just like we're going to automate everything. And it also brings up
• 11:32
  Track 2: that that that's the only machine in that in that scene that actually messes
• 11:37
  Track 2: up and also is so impractical because everybody has to look down to see what
• 11:43
  Track 2: they're doing. And you can't do that with the feeding machine.
• 11:46
  Track 1: Yeah.
• 11:46
  Track 2: And so beyond just messing up and just like flopping the soup on his face and
• 11:52
  Track 2: just like smashing his face with the sponge, he can't even see what his hands are doing.
• 11:59
  Track 1: Yeah, all of that.
• 12:00
  Track 2: It's just so impressive.
• 12:02
  Track 1: I like when they put the bolts down onto the little, I guess, the feeding...
• 12:08
  Track 1: But every platform and it comes around and eats the bolts and
• 12:11
  Track 1: it's like yeah you can't this isn't a practical and actually
• 12:14
  Track 1: even the boss like sends them away being like oh yeah this even
• 12:17
  Track 1: this oh yeah i mean i i've created this and the other thing that i saw because
• 12:22
  Track 1: i think you mentioned uh like a ford automation it seemed that from what i heard
• 12:26
  Track 1: or had read is that the president i guess who's played by um al garcia was supposed
• 12:32
  Track 1: to was like looked very similar to,
• 12:35
  Track 1: forward and so it's like intent like a good way to make him have that almost
• 12:39
  Track 1: one-to-one comparison but i don't know i i wonder like if maybe you know the
• 12:44
  Track 1: answer to this like was he constrained in the ability to take things further
• 12:49
  Track 1: it was his own restraint you think that just kind of put it i.
• 12:53
  Track 2: Think it was that chaplain he actually believed
• 12:57
  Track 2: there was a goodness to machines but that he could
• 13:00
  Track 2: he also believed that they could they could
• 13:03
  Track 2: go out of control really easily i mean he even spoke
• 13:05
  Track 2: to mahatma gandhi about him gandhi was strictly against
• 13:09
  Track 2: machinery as a form of automation automating capitalism he and char and chaplin
• 13:16
  Track 2: was surprised with that when he was discussing this with him yeah chaplin actually
• 13:20
  Track 2: did have conversations with gandhi and so and so it was so that's why.
• 13:27
  Track 2: I think Chaplin would disagree with the assumption, or at least there's that
• 13:33
  Track 2: ambiguity there that, yes, machinery can actually be a good thing,
• 13:37
  Track 2: but it also can make us into automatons.
• 13:41
  Track 2: I mean, even his great dictator speech is like, you are not machines,
• 13:45
  Track 2: you are humans, fight back, is related to that.
• 13:49
  Track 2: He does not demonize it like a lot of Marxist people would, especially at the
• 13:56
  Track 2: the time, Upton Sinclair very much was against these ideas.
• 14:01
  Track 2: And it was fascinating because before this film, he actually sent in a lot of
• 14:07
  Track 2: money to Upton Sinclair's California campaign.
• 14:10
  Track 2: And Upton Sinclair was a true bona fide socialist.
• 14:14
  Track 2: He wanted to bring the tax level up so high that health insurance,
• 14:20
  Track 2: food, all this stuff would be paid for, for the masses, for people like that.
• 14:26
  Track 2: And that would come from the very top and people like Ford, other,
• 14:31
  Track 2: other and other big, big baron CEOs did not want that.
• 14:37
  Track 2: So that's why he didn't, he wasn't elected, but that put Charlie on.
• 14:42
  Track 2: They're nice because Charlie actually helped campaign for Upton Sinclair before this film.
• 14:48
  Track 1: That's interesting because some of the things I was reading about,
• 14:51
  Track 1: you know, obviously there's what people didn't, you know, the call,
• 14:56
  Track 1: you know, as far as him being blacklisted as part of like the,
• 14:59
  Track 1: you know, having given money to the, what's it called?
• 15:03
  Track 1: The 10 blacklisted directors and actors.
• 15:06
  Track 1: He had donated money to their legal funds and all that.
• 15:10
  Track 1: But from what I understand is that Chaplin was definitely saw a lot of these
• 15:15
  Track 1: things, but he was described as like a humanist capitalist or a humanistic capitalism.
• 15:22
  Track 1: It's like he still favored the idea of capitalism. He just wanted it to be reasonable for people.
• 15:27
  Track 2: And he did, in the 20s, pretend to be a communist.
• 15:33
  Track 2: And he also, that, of course, he felt that one of the most universal men in
• 15:38
  Track 2: perspective were the hobos, who basically were the gig economy's people of the day.
• 15:43
  Track 2: And they had to travel to different places for work, and that's where the tramp came in.
• 15:47
  Track 2: And and it was funny that was in
• 15:50
  Track 2: his biography he actually met one of his heroes who would who
• 15:53
  Track 2: this hobo who wrote about his travels and the hobo basically called him out
• 15:57
  Track 2: and saying he's a pantomime of of us and i think that really because chaplain
• 16:04
  Track 2: he had a great job he he had his own studio unite artist so so and but.
• 16:13
  Track 2: Yeah, it's fascinating because any man who succeeds in Hollywood,
• 16:17
  Track 2: I don't think could be a full Marxist.
• 16:21
  Track 2: I don't think there's a possibility of that. You can criticize capitalism,
• 16:24
  Track 2: but there's there's just no way if you're making millions of dollars.
• 16:28
  Track 2: So, but yeah, and of course he was sympathetic.
• 16:31
  Track 2: He grew up on the streets of, he grew up in the streets of England.
• 16:34
  Track 2: His mom was institutionalized against her will.
• 16:37
  Track 2: He was separated from his brother for years and he lived on the streets for
• 16:41
  Track 2: quite a while. So he was the common poor.
• 16:44
  Track 2: He was, he was that before coming up and, and having America be his new homeland
• 16:50
  Track 2: after, after, after all that.
• 16:52
  Track 2: So you could see why he would sympathize with the common folk and why he always
• 16:56
  Track 2: went back to the tramp and saw him as the universal man, which is also why I
• 17:02
  Track 2: believe he didn't want to speak.
• 17:04
  Track 2: Because if he spoke, then he would be giving a voice to a character that had
• 17:09
  Track 2: a universality. And also he's British.
• 17:12
  Track 2: So I think he wanted his character to be American or to sound American.
• 17:16
  Track 1: Well, it's interesting because in this film, there's no talking with the exception
• 17:20
  Track 1: of the boss. So, like, the CEO is the only person, I believe, that talks on screen.
• 17:27
  Track 1: There's some of the, like, the song near the end, which isn't on screen.
• 17:31
  Track 1: And then a couple of those, like, the boss through the, you know,
• 17:35
  Track 1: video camera surveillance. And I think that also.
• 17:38
  Track 2: You get the instructions through the gramophone. It's not even a real person
• 17:41
  Track 2: doing it. It's just a record of someone speaking, too.
• 17:44
  Track 1: Oh, for which one?
• 17:45
  Track 2: The one to discuss how that machine works.
• 17:48
  Track 1: Yes, right, right, yes. Yeah. So like, so really the only voice in this is like
• 17:53
  Track 1: that of the capitalist essentially.
• 17:56
  Track 1: And I think having him, you know, decide since this is his last, you know, fully, um,
• 18:02
  Track 1: before having a film, the, his next one being the great dictator,
• 18:06
  Track 1: it like, it, it makes, it's like the, it almost seems like, uh,
• 18:10
  Track 1: the right film and the right kind of, uh,
• 18:13
  Track 1: plot, like plot line to go through for him to not have a voice in this versus
• 18:18
  Track 1: the capitalist who is the one.
• 18:19
  Track 1: That's dictating everything and then in the next one he comes in he's the great
• 18:23
  Track 1: dictator and it's like almost like the opposite it's skewering fascism exactly.
• 18:28
  Track 2: Exactly and the people the person who speaks the most in those films are usually
• 18:33
  Track 2: the common folk except for napoloni.
• 18:39
  Track 1: Because you were talking about like him being kind of as this every man and
• 18:43
  Track 1: the you know or Or no, sorry, his upbringing of kind of making it from pretty much nothing.
• 18:50
  Track 1: And I think one of the aspects of this film that was very interesting,
• 18:53
  Track 1: I don't even think I might have put it in the notes even,
• 18:56
  Track 1: is kind of the idea of the American dream and much of the idea for the film,
• 19:02
  Track 1: again, as you mentioned, his going on tour for meeting Gandhi and all these
• 19:06
  Track 1: leaders and thinking of making this film.
• 19:07
  Track 1: And there is very much his...
• 19:10
  Track 1: Persona of the tramp like trying to make it trying to needing to get a.
• 19:15
  Track 2: Job like the strike end and it goes.
• 19:17
  Track 1: Back to work and he he feels like he needs to do the thing you're.
• 19:20
  Track 2: Supposed to.
• 19:21
  Track 1: Do as like a good american like get a good job.
• 19:23
  Track 2: And it's um.
• 19:25
  Track 1: I think it's portrayed pretty well i don't know what you thought about that.
• 19:28
  Track 2: I thought it was at parts and it's interesting because there
• 19:31
  Track 2: was one film where the tramp does reach reach a
• 19:35
  Track 2: success and actually gets the real ideal
• 19:39
  Track 2: of the american dream to be rich and famous and that's the
• 19:42
  Track 2: gold rush where he found the gold but in this
• 19:44
  Track 2: one his dream he has a very humble
• 19:47
  Track 2: dream in fact he wants to be with the gamine
• 19:51
  Track 2: played by his then wife pauline godard godard and actually have a home with
• 19:57
  Track 2: her and and it's kind of funny how exaggerated some of the scene is because
• 20:02
  Track 2: like it's even like he wants it's like this leisure time sort of thing which
• 20:07
  Track 2: capitalism takes away from,
• 20:09
  Track 2: where, oh, he gets to be at the house, but then also his wife cooks him dinner,
• 20:15
  Track 2: Paulette Godard, and then he actually has a cow that serves him milk,
• 20:21
  Track 2: and the cow, he doesn't even need to use the energy or labor to actually milk the cow.
• 20:27
  Track 2: He just puts the glass under the udder, and the cow just goes,
• 20:30
  Track 2: and you don't even hear it.
• 20:32
  Track 2: You just imagine it imagine it just like just like pissing milk right into right into it.
• 20:40
  Track 2: And of course there's a peach tree right near
• 20:43
  Track 2: the house and just like this is actually a
• 20:46
  Track 2: pretty humble goal all things considered except for the cow like like no cow
• 20:52
  Track 2: would be like that and and it's a fantasy fantasy so so it's just like oh we're
• 20:58
  Track 2: gonna we're gonna be real citizens we're gonna have that house and all that so.
• 21:04
  Track 1: And meanwhile like the next house that they have is
• 21:06
  Track 1: that little like shack by the by like the water that has
• 21:09
  Track 1: the falling you know everything is falling and is
• 21:12
  Track 1: that's the i really love the dream
• 21:15
  Track 1: scene also because one thing i was seeing is that they decided not
• 21:18
  Track 1: to use any sound effects for any of like the cow or everything it's completely
• 21:24
  Track 1: just because it was meant to be a dream it's like you have to almost imagine
• 21:27
  Track 1: these things and then the very next scene i think or very soon after that is
• 21:30
  Track 1: when they're in that kind of ram that little shack and there are the sound effects that.
• 21:36
  Track 2: Every single time he enters it a beam just like boop hits him on his head and
• 21:40
  Track 2: you hear and you hear a thunk sound one is a few sound effects as well.
• 21:44
  Track 1: The chair goes through the table falls down the the roof caves in the palace
• 21:50
  Track 1: i think he falls into the water because the door is off the hinges and uh yeah just i don't know oh.
• 21:57
  Track 2: Then he dives into it like a bass like he thinks it's gonna be a bass but it's
• 22:00
  Track 2: low tide so he just like poo right in the mud.
• 22:02
  Track 1: But but all of those it's it's like the
• 22:05
  Track 1: seeking that like you said like a modest american dream
• 22:08
  Track 1: and then initially they have this kind of very you
• 22:12
  Track 1: know uh more than modest you could say just practically nothing and all the
• 22:16
  Track 1: things they have they've now had to steal like she has the ham that she is slicing
• 22:20
  Track 1: into the drinking tea from the cans and it's uh yeah i know i don't know what
• 22:26
  Track 1: else to make of it than than like the attempt to the dream the.
• 22:31
  Track 2: Slice in the bread i always forget just like when was sliced bread invented
• 22:34
  Track 2: i'm like it was invented it was invented after betty white was born i do remember
• 22:39
  Track 2: that but i think sliced bread was not very common still.
• 22:42
  Track 1: And it was like huge and it was super thick he couldn't take a bite of
• 22:45
  Track 1: it because it was like the slices were too big i think and
• 22:48
  Track 1: he like takes the one slice off and i don't know i just that had
• 22:51
  Track 1: me that was very very funny and it's uh yeah and
• 22:55
  Track 1: for any for any listeners who like maybe isn't as familiar like i am with uh
• 22:59
  Track 1: with charlie chaplin like his like comedic genius like it's just genius like
• 23:04
  Track 1: all these scenes like it's hard to uh to describe uh any of these like we're
• 23:09
  Track 1: describing like things falling and all these things but you just have to really just see it.
• 23:13
  Track 2: Have to watch it for yourself as well to really get the genius because they
• 23:17
  Track 2: have to be so much blocking, so much attention to detail, so much, so much
• 23:25
  Track 2: rehearsal time because especially with the silent
• 23:28
  Track 2: film and and apparently he had to direct his cinematography
• 23:31
  Track 2: it'd be like you need to under under crank this much
• 23:34
  Track 2: this scene has to be a fast-paced scene and
• 23:38
  Track 2: just like or no you have to over crank because we're going to go in a little
• 23:41
  Track 2: bit of slow motion but mostly it was under cranking was the thing and apparently
• 23:45
  Track 2: it's it was so much that the cinematographer almost just quit because he's such
• 23:49
  Track 2: perfection because traveler was just such perfections with this with this style wanted it's.
• 23:55
  Track 1: Almost hard to imagine him doing all the things he's doing on camera while also
• 23:59
  Track 1: directing like to that great degree it's not it's one thing like obviously people
• 24:03
  Track 1: direct films they're in all the time but this just seems like next level of
• 24:08
  Track 1: uh you know as you said control over everything and yeah.
• 24:13
  Track 2: Yeah of course it was his own studio was with Douglas Fairbanks and Myri Pickford, United Artists.
• 24:19
  Track 2: So this was his money coming out of it, too.
• 24:22
  Track 1: That's true, yeah. And I think one thing I saw, too, is that Paulette Goddard
• 24:26
  Track 1: in, I guess, the only other film they did after this was The Great Dictator.
• 24:31
  Track 1: I think it led to their breaking up because of how cruel, apparently,
• 24:36
  Track 1: he was on the set for that film, whereas in this...
• 24:39
  Track 2: He was also a bit like this, too, apparently, because this was the first role she did for him.
• 24:44
  Track 2: For him and she also was
• 24:47
  Track 2: very rich by this time she got a good annulment so nobody
• 24:50
  Track 2: was thinking to themselves oh she's a gold digger trying to go after
• 24:53
  Track 2: chaplain like there was thoughts of that but no she was already very independently
• 24:56
  Track 2: wealthy and she was already already starting to art collect and she was loved
• 25:00
  Track 2: history which is how she got to got if got married to eric remarsh remarsh who
• 25:07
  Track 2: wrote all quiet on the western front after after chaplain,
• 25:12
  Track 2: I think like one husband after Chaplin Chaplin and she comes to the set and
• 25:16
  Track 2: she's in full makeup like she thinks like she's going to be a big star.
• 25:20
  Track 2: And he also Chaplin forced her to read both redye her hair back to brunette
• 25:25
  Track 2: because she grew up brunette,
• 25:26
  Track 2: but she dyed it blonde so she could be in these reviews and platinum blonde
• 25:31
  Track 2: was Jean Harlow was the thing. And that's what she was for so long.
• 25:35
  Track 2: And Chaplin said, no, you have to go back to brunette.
• 25:38
  Track 2: And he wanted her to go back to brunette anyway during it. And she comes on
• 25:42
  Track 2: the set and she's got this full makeup, like glamorous Joan Crawford style.
• 25:47
  Track 2: And he dumps a bucket of water on her for her as the game.
• 25:53
  Track 2: And he said, you are not supposed to be fabulous. You are an orphan.
• 25:57
  Track 2: This is how we do the scene.
• 25:59
  Track 2: And she still looks gorgeous.
• 26:02
  Track 2: When you first see her, when she's got the banana and she's got the knife between
• 26:06
  Track 2: her teeth, when she's cutting out the banana, she's still gorgeous without all
• 26:11
  Track 2: that head of makeup. I think she was at least allowed to have some mascara.
• 26:14
  Track 2: But otherwise, no, she's not as glamorized as most of the Hollywood starlets were at the time.
• 26:20
  Track 2: But that's just the side of the control that Chaplin wanted,
• 26:23
  Track 2: especially to control her image.
• 26:25
  Track 1: Yeah, I didn't know that. But you're saying like, even in that scene where she's
• 26:29
  Track 1: got like the black streaks, you know, in the first few scenes of like dirt on her face.
• 26:33
  Track 1: And it also, they had a bunch of, at least from what I heard,
• 26:38
  Track 1: again, I've only seen a few of his films. But apparently, like,
• 26:42
  Track 1: the close-ups of her is, like, wasn't, like, a common thing for him to use in some of his films.
• 26:46
  Track 1: And, like, also the scene, like, later in the department store when she's lying
• 26:49
  Track 1: in the bed is, like, a big close-up of her.
• 26:51
  Track 2: Yes, with the mink coat.
• 26:53
  Track 1: Yeah, it's, like, I mean, it's, like, you can see...
• 26:56
  Track 2: Idealization of being the true the
• 26:59
  Track 2: biggest american dream of being the rich
• 27:02
  Track 2: rich housewife who can have all these mink coats
• 27:05
  Track 2: and be on this luxurious bed which i
• 27:10
  Track 2: feel was also george romero took from took from
• 27:13
  Track 2: for dawn of the dead where they all got to wear fur
• 27:16
  Track 2: coats they all got to be in this got to pretend to be part of the upper classes
• 27:21
  Track 2: so it's interesting to me how both these films use department stores slash malls
• 27:27
  Track 2: malls to critique on capitalism and hyper capitalism and upper class living i.
• 27:34
  Track 1: Never thought of those as a comparison i love that i mean i love pretty much
• 27:37
  Track 1: all those romero movies but yeah i did um yeah i think we i guess we i mean
• 27:41
  Track 1: we was a couple of scenes i want to like touch on but the thing you're talking
• 27:44
  Track 1: about where you know he's able to get a job at a department store as like.
• 27:50
  Track 2: The night watch night.
• 27:51
  Track 1: Watchman and yeah so and then it probably has like the most famous scene.
• 27:55
  Track 2: Using that using that letter of letter of recommendation for the prison warden
• 28:00
  Track 2: even after he lost the job at the shipyard for screwing up the wedge which enough
• 28:06
  Track 2: some other right-wingers would be like see capitalism is not the issue it's
• 28:10
  Track 2: just the one individual the one bad apple yes.
• 28:13
  Track 1: Yeah well actually that maybe that's a good maybe that's a good segue just to
• 28:15
  Track 1: go back so he if he so chaplain gets arrested or the tramp gets arrested for
• 28:20
  Track 1: supposedly being part of, you know, a, I guess it's a, he gets the flag off
• 28:25
  Track 1: the ground. Yeah, the communist rally.
• 28:27
  Track 2: Union rally, but it's supposed to be a red flag, which you could kind of tell.
• 28:32
  Track 2: So you're like, oh, there's some communism sort of things going on there. But yes.
• 28:36
  Track 1: Yeah. So he's put into prison and the prison scenes too are also just phenomenal.
• 28:41
  Track 1: And the one other, like there's a bunch of funny scenes in there,
• 28:43
  Track 1: but the one where they like refer to like the nose drugs.
• 28:47
  Track 1: I don't know how they, I think that's how they called it. Yeah,
• 28:48
  Track 1: cocaine. And like, I almost can't believe they were able to get away with doing that scene.
• 28:53
  Track 2: I know, especially after the Hays Code, because this was post-Hays Code,
• 28:58
  Track 2: because the implementation of it was 1934.
• 29:01
  Track 1: Yeah, and that scene is just, you know, he becomes all, he accidentally puts
• 29:05
  Track 1: it onto his food, and then it leads to his, you know,
• 29:09
  Track 1: wandering around, and then the scene with the jail door just absolutely smashing
• 29:15
  Track 1: people in the head. with yeah smashing.
• 29:18
  Track 2: Smashing the people who are trying to take over the jail themselves in the head
• 29:21
  Track 2: and becoming an accidental hero and also here in the gunshots one of the few
• 29:25
  Track 2: also sounds you get with the gunshots to show how powerful those are and how
• 29:30
  Track 2: there actually is a danger there.
• 29:31
  Track 1: Yeah and it's it's also it's i
• 29:34
  Track 1: mean you said like an accidental hero but he's also siding with you know the
• 29:39
  Track 1: police force like he could have if he wanted to he could have let all the prisoners
• 29:43
  Track 1: go and run away but instead he like oh yeah you know and then he ends up getting
• 29:48
  Track 1: the little reprieve and the letter from the warden to to be released it's he remains like.
• 29:54
  Track 2: Can i just stay a little longer and they're like no i think you'll be a great you'll make good.
• 30:00
  Track 1: Well i mean that's almost like to say you'd want to stay is almost because you're you're
• 30:05
  Track 1: You're guaranteed food.
• 30:07
  Track 2: Yeah, you're guaranteed food and housing. You have a bed.
• 30:11
  Track 1: Yeah, it's crazy to think that someone at that time would, you know,
• 30:16
  Track 1: most people probably wouldn't make that same.
• 30:19
  Track 2: There are some cases. I know there was a man who robbed a convenience store
• 30:26
  Track 2: of just like 20 bucks so he could be arrested so that an operation he needed
• 30:30
  Track 2: would be paid for because he didn't have any health insurance.
• 30:34
  Track 2: There was nothing he could do so he was just like i'm going
• 30:37
  Track 2: to go to jails and that happened in real
• 30:39
  Track 2: life so and of course then it leads to the
• 30:42
  Track 2: shipyard where he screws up trying to find a wedge and he ends up destroying
• 30:47
  Track 2: the luxury and the this great rear projection scene where where the unfinished
• 30:52
  Track 2: ship just like goes and drowns into the water right behind him after he got
• 30:57
  Track 2: the wrong wedge And then it goes to an angel of determined to go back to jail.
• 31:03
  Track 1: Well, I also like just the look of all of the workers at the shipyard as the
• 31:08
  Track 1: ship is going away and just like, see you later, puts on his coat,
• 31:11
  Track 1: buttons it and just like walks away.
• 31:13
  Track 2: Yeah. Like, time to go back to jail.
• 31:16
  Track 1: Yeah. And then he does, you know, multiple times, like get caught up,
• 31:22
  Track 1: you know, the police. Yeah, he's well, this is I guess.
• 31:26
  Track 1: Well, those are later because he's doing it to save Paul Enquadard.
• 31:33
  Track 2: Well, at first he thought like, oh, I can definitely get this because if I steal
• 31:38
  Track 2: this, because if I say I steal the bread, I'll go to jail.
• 31:41
  Track 2: Even though she stole the bread for her sister and her dad, dad,
• 31:45
  Track 2: who then who is killed in a union in a riot, unfortunately, in a later scene.
• 31:51
  Track 2: And it's just like, that doesn't work. So he just goes into a restaurant,
• 31:55
  Track 2: gets all this food, and then he eats it.
• 31:58
  Track 2: And then he taps on the window right before he goes to the register and be like,
• 32:03
  Track 2: please come here. Just be like.
• 32:05
  Track 2: I have no money. I can't pay this. Arrest me. It's so perfect.
• 32:12
  Track 1: My favorite part of that, too, is right after when he goes to the newsstand
• 32:16
  Track 1: and gets the cigar while the police is talking on the phone.
• 32:20
  Track 1: And he gives the kid some things.
• 32:22
  Track 1: And then he does a little smoke gag where it comes out of his head.
• 32:25
  Track 1: And goes back to jail.
• 32:28
  Track 1: Well, then he's in the squad car. And that's when he escapes from the...
• 32:34
  Track 2: Yeah and that's when he he gets back with the gamine i mean and they're together.
• 32:38
  Track 1: Yeah i think that's where they end up having the little that's like the
• 32:41
  Track 1: dream sequence and then they go to the little house and he then gets
• 32:44
  Track 1: the job at the at the night night watchman and
• 32:47
  Track 1: then actually you had you had sent me that picture i hadn't
• 32:50
  Track 1: watched the image about it yet but like one of
• 32:52
  Track 1: the maybe the most maybe the most famous scenes from
• 32:56
  Track 1: this film is probably like him roller
• 32:59
  Track 1: skating in the one of the levels of the department store
• 33:01
  Track 1: it's just uh the whole department store like
• 33:05
  Track 1: part i don't know it's a good 15 minutes it's just it's just incredible you
• 33:09
  Track 1: mentioned yeah the idea of the kind of this capitalist excess you know of the
• 33:14
  Track 1: the department store and he's stealing food for her downstairs and they go upstairs
• 33:19
  Track 1: to the toy department and they're roller skating and yeah and.
• 33:23
  Track 2: Then he puts on the blindfold and he's rolling and
• 33:26
  Track 2: it looks like it's the edge but it's a glass panel in
• 33:30
  Track 2: front of the camera that's in the perfect shape
• 33:33
  Track 2: of of a blank canvas right
• 33:37
  Track 2: behind it so it looks like it's the bottom it's like the second floor right
• 33:41
  Track 2: there so it's precariously on the ledge and she's trying to get over there to
• 33:45
  Track 2: skate but she doesn't know how to skate she's like come back come back it's
• 33:50
  Track 2: just it's just it's one of the best special effects and and during that time.
• 33:54
  Track 2: It's just, oh, it's so good.
• 33:56
  Track 1: Yeah, in the behind the scenes, they have a little maybe a 10-minute,
• 34:01
  Track 1: a video with a couple of like more modern um sound
• 34:06
  Track 1: effects and like special effects people like
• 34:09
  Track 1: who looks a lot of these weren't like written down like this was
• 34:12
  Track 1: more of a time when you don't want anyone to know how you did these things like
• 34:16
  Track 1: this is like secret of the trade and so they kind of figured out how it was
• 34:19
  Track 1: done was able to they apparently watched the scene i guess um frame by frame
• 34:25
  Track 1: and there's one moment where his skate like is off it's like not visible and So they figured it out.
• 34:31
  Track 1: But the other thing that made it so good is that there's like a spot where they
• 34:35
  Track 1: put a piece of wood that goes from the real set to the fake set.
• 34:40
  Track 1: And it just, you can't, it's, yeah, it's hard to believe you think of like the
• 34:45
  Track 1: crappiest special effects in movies now that just look horrible. And like, this is just.
• 34:49
  Track 2: I know. And they did this with a matte painting in a glass panel just right in front of the camera.
• 34:56
  Track 1: Yeah and that's another thing we didn't mention as far
• 34:58
  Track 1: as like since you're talking about the special effects is all of
• 35:01
  Track 1: the scenes in the uh factory like at
• 35:04
  Track 1: the beginning and then i guess later on when he goes back the second
• 35:07
  Track 1: time and also one of the yeah a second factory a second
• 35:10
  Track 1: factory he you know they have these the way they
• 35:13
  Track 1: built them was they created little models that then put the
• 35:17
  Track 1: perspective of the camera so it looked like they were
• 35:20
  Track 1: walking past these giant you know factories but or machinery
• 35:23
  Track 1: when it was really just like a little you know
• 35:26
  Track 1: five foot model which is yeah it's incredible
• 35:29
  Track 1: what they could do in 1936 to
• 35:32
  Track 1: make it look so good i think a lot of these they said were like based around
• 35:36
  Track 1: things from um uh like metropolis like they set the like the standard for these
• 35:42
  Track 1: kind of matte paintings and uh everything but yeah just this me rambling on
• 35:48
  Track 1: about how just the effects are just.
• 35:50
  Track 2: Yes and it's fascinating how in comparison to metropolis the machinery literally
• 35:55
  Track 2: eats workers well for this one it does too but the workers survive they're pretty
• 36:01
  Track 2: unscathed which in real life would have killed them.
• 36:03
  Track 1: Killed them so.
• 36:05
  Track 2: It's a great comedic stuff especially with the with his new boss he gets he
• 36:10
  Track 2: gets where the boss is just in the machine and his head is sticking out it's
• 36:14
  Track 2: like it's lunchtime you have to feed me we need to get this done and so we're
• 36:18
  Track 2: just feeding him from up above above there.
• 36:23
  Track 1: It like pops the egg in his mouth and he like spits it out and the yeah the
• 36:27
  Track 1: i guess tea or coffee like through a funnel and everything yeah all of those that whole,
• 36:33
  Track 1: bit of like the i it seems like a a bit that's used in like more modern joking
• 36:40
  Track 1: kind of it's where the uh there's like the what is it like a press or like a yeah.
• 36:45
  Track 2: The pressing machine.
• 36:46
  Track 1: And it presses the guys the boss's watch and it's like the and his jacket and
• 36:51
  Track 1: his jacket i don't know that again like this is one of the things where we can
• 36:55
  Track 1: i can describe it but you just need to uh you need to see it.
• 36:59
  Track 2: And i do love it it's so big in his head he's just like he's checking to see
• 37:05
  Track 2: if it still ticks and like no no no so i was like sorry.
• 37:13
  Track 1: Yeah that that whole that bit is i mean i think from um and i think just like
• 37:20
  Track 1: purely going by like the the plot i think after that once he leaves the um once
• 37:25
  Track 1: he gets i guess kicked out or leaves the i know they go back on strike right yeah they go.
• 37:29
  Track 2: Back on strike we're going back on strike and at first he's upset about it's
• 37:32
  Track 2: like i have this job it's like nope so.
• 37:37
  Track 1: Well that's another thing too like they they use strikes as you mentioned before
• 37:40
  Track 1: like one of them was like a union which then is kind of cross-tied with communism
• 37:45
  Track 1: and like that you know you're obviously if you're in a union you're a communist
• 37:49
  Track 1: And I guess leads later to, you know,
• 37:51
  Track 1: more other than like The Great Dictator.
• 37:54
  Track 1: I can't think of any films in like the this time and then into the 40s that
• 37:58
  Track 1: was like so overtly anti-fascist, like referring to communism.
• 38:03
  Track 1: But in this, they're kind of like talking smack about it a bit like,
• 38:07
  Track 1: oh, you know, you're always on strike. You're never working.
• 38:10
  Track 1: You produce these idiots like The Tramp. I don't know.
• 38:14
  Track 2: It's fascinating because this is still during the Great Depression.
• 38:20
  Track 2: A lot of people couldn't afford to go on strike because that was all they had. It's fascinating.
• 38:26
  Track 2: He brings these up with these characters.
• 38:30
  Track 2: I think there is sympathy for these strikers.
• 38:34
  Track 2: I think there is, but which other forms of media I don't think would have had
• 38:40
  Track 2: as much interest in showing them, or at least humanizing them.
• 38:46
  Track 2: Or, well, if you compare this to a film like Strike with Sergey Eisenstein,
• 38:53
  Track 2: where the mob actually becomes a mob mentality and they do go for violence,
• 38:58
  Track 2: But the film actually approves of that violence because that's what they believe the only way to really,
• 39:05
  Track 2: really get fair and equitable treatment was through those parts.
• 39:09
  Track 2: Well, with this one, the strikers are very calm. They're nonviolent for the most part.
• 39:16
  Track 2: And so it's just so you can tell that Chaplin wanted to humanize these people,
• 39:22
  Track 2: even if they're kind of the masses.
• 39:25
  Track 2: So yeah and that's what i appreciate with this film and what he was trying to
• 39:28
  Track 2: do with do with that but also it's kind of like the a lot of people couldn't
• 39:32
  Track 2: afford to have this time to go on strike because if you if you didn't work you
• 39:37
  Track 2: died so yeah yeah i mean literally.
• 39:39
  Track 1: I mean literally you think of the uh like a means like father who had been laid
• 39:45
  Track 1: off and the the siblings who end up getting you know taken away and they they
• 39:51
  Track 1: like what does she have She brings home, like,
• 39:54
  Track 1: the bananas from the dock, and, like, that's all they have to eat,
• 39:57
  Track 1: and they're living in amounts to, you know,
• 40:01
  Track 1: one room, maybe a two-room, like...
• 40:04
  Track 1: You know tiny place and if he doesn't get his job back at the factory they literally
• 40:10
  Track 1: will well he dies but more of an accidental.
• 40:13
  Track 2: Yeah trampling.
• 40:14
  Track 1: I guess it was.
• 40:15
  Track 2: Um but.
• 40:16
  Track 1: It's yeah it's like it's kind of heartbreaking when you see that perspective
• 40:21
  Track 1: of the uh what most people were probably living through at the time the.
• 40:26
  Track 2: Rate depression like that's the that was the common.
• 40:28
  Track 1: Uh you know view of most people.
• 40:31
  Track 2: And it's and it's interesting to me because i
• 40:35
  Track 2: think there was at the time at first there was there was
• 40:38
  Track 2: i think it wasn't just just um this ambiguity
• 40:42
  Track 2: of whether machines were actually good or not the automation because because
• 40:46
  Track 2: right because the president who was overseeing the great depression when it
• 40:52
  Track 2: first happened and didn't actually help with it was herbert huber who was originally
• 40:56
  Track 2: an engineer who designed machinery.
• 40:59
  Track 2: And that was the idea that he would create this great prosperity.
• 41:03
  Track 2: And no, he didn't. And they actually had ghettos, they call them Hoovervilles,
• 41:08
  Track 2: that a lot of these poor people lived in.
• 41:11
  Track 2: And that's what they live in. And the shack is kind of a Hooverville.
• 41:15
  Track 1: And I couldn't also help, one
• 41:19
  Track 1: of the first things I was thinking of as I'm watching the you
• 41:22
  Track 1: know the the feeding machine and all of
• 41:25
  Track 1: these improvements of what the capitalists
• 41:28
  Track 1: believe will help them do things more quickly
• 41:30
  Track 1: like it'll replace humans like i can't help but think of just you know now we're
• 41:35
  Track 1: in the age of you know ai and these things they're supposed to make people's
• 41:39
  Track 1: lives better but the the actual the reality is it's not going to help the average
• 41:47
  Track 1: working person is going to either displace you and then...
• 41:51
  Track 1: Not let you work less. It's just going to make it so you don't have a job.
• 41:55
  Track 2: Exactly. It basically is that idea. And also trying to promote the idea that
• 42:02
  Track 2: AI is something that can replace real human art.
• 42:06
  Track 2: But it can't because it doesn't have a soul.
• 42:09
  Track 2: And it just reproduces what other people make.
• 42:13
  Track 2: And of course, it takes a lot of energy. which we're already seeing the effects
• 42:19
  Track 2: of with the california wildfires with with climate change so.
• 42:24
  Track 1: Yeah i saw something just today as
• 42:27
  Track 1: to the number of like gallon i know i think it was something it wasn't ai
• 42:30
  Track 1: i think it was elon musk built some like
• 42:33
  Track 1: a refinement facility in cal in
• 42:37
  Track 1: texas and it said it takes like 16 gallons
• 42:40
  Track 1: per like you know i don't i don't
• 42:43
  Track 1: remember the exact but something obscene and like it's in a
• 42:46
  Track 1: place where like they have to have time showers because there isn't enough
• 42:48
  Track 1: water and like you just think of these finite resources that
• 42:51
  Track 1: are being uh you know wasted on like someone's horrible like i don't know if
• 42:58
  Track 1: you saw the that video that was going around of someone making like a ai car
• 43:03
  Track 1: chase scene from a film and it's like the worst thing you've ever seen in your
• 43:06
  Track 1: life and like look how cool this is it's.
• 43:10
  Track 2: Just like it's just it doesn't It's just the idea of creating surplus value,
• 43:14
  Track 2: but without actually paying for the labor for it.
• 43:17
  Track 2: And because that's what surplus value is, the idea is that is the work that
• 43:24
  Track 2: a labor that a labor puts in to make a product that's going to be sold.
• 43:28
  Track 2: But that product is going to have more money than what the laborer is paid for.
• 43:34
  Track 2: And that's surplus value.
• 43:36
  Track 2: And that goes to the capitalists, the person who owns the means of production.
• 43:41
  Track 2: And that's people like Elon Musk.
• 43:43
  Track 2: That's the person like the factory owner in the beginning of the scenes.
• 43:48
  Track 2: Scenes and and those are
• 43:51
  Track 2: the people who have so much leisure time that they can tweet almost every hour
• 43:56
  Track 2: like elon muskhead that's why when people are being like billionaires earn their
• 44:00
  Track 2: money it's just like no they really don't they they have way more time than
• 44:06
  Track 2: a lot of other working class people do.
• 44:08
  Track 1: Like literally doing a puzzle at the beginning of this film reading
• 44:12
  Track 1: the newspaper i mean it's it's kind of amazing the uh you
• 44:15
  Track 1: know literally nothing has changed other than the fact that you know in this
• 44:19
  Track 1: film or like the reality of that time ford was a billionaire or whatever his
• 44:23
  Track 1: wealth is and now it's just magnified because they've you know commodified everything
• 44:28
  Track 1: they possibly can and um exactly we'll see i think i was gonna this is one of
• 44:33
  Track 1: the things that i was gonna we'd.
• 44:35
  Track 1: We kind of went past it but it kind of gets into the like the
• 44:38
  Track 1: workers and everything and you're talking about like they don't have free time and
• 44:41
  Track 1: all of this and it just the one of the things i noted down
• 44:43
  Track 1: was just like the alienation of the worker
• 44:46
  Track 1: and you have you can see how the other
• 44:50
  Track 1: people who are in the in the factory at the beginning that
• 44:53
  Track 1: are like he's doing like the turning of the with the
• 44:55
  Track 1: wrench and then someone else is hammering it and then someone else
• 44:58
  Track 1: is doing other small little bits but each of these people like they don't
• 45:01
  Track 1: even may not even know what they're building or
• 45:04
  Track 1: like what this is for they're all completely disconnected from everything
• 45:07
  Track 1: it's just they're just pressing buttons and
• 45:11
  Track 1: they're like this cog in this machine and like it's the
• 45:13
  Track 1: they don't see any fruit of their labor and then they
• 45:17
  Track 1: take away it further using automated feeding machines
• 45:20
  Track 1: and you know i don't know making them wear diapers on
• 45:23
  Track 1: you know like or whatever the these horrible
• 45:26
  Track 1: stories yeah exactly and
• 45:29
  Track 1: it's just um yeah i mean we're maybe beating i don't mean to say we're like
• 45:33
  Track 1: beating a dead horse but i think it's it's incredible what even in his restrained
• 45:38
  Track 1: film as you had said like it's still so uh pretty overt in the uh the message of all of that.
• 45:46
  Track 2: Yes very much so very much so and it's and of course it of course leads to the
• 45:52
  Track 2: funny gag where he starts wrenching buttons that.
• 45:55
  Track 1: Look like.
• 45:56
  Track 2: It because he has no idea what he was doing in the first place
• 45:59
  Track 2: so he was just told wrench these screws and
• 46:02
  Track 2: so everything that looks like them becomes is something he's like i need to
• 46:07
  Track 2: turn it i am a machine that can't stop and of course it goes to a woman who
• 46:13
  Track 2: has these buttons that look like it on on her skirt which is near her butts
• 46:17
  Track 2: and then he does the just the donkey ear jackass,
• 46:22
  Track 2: thing which is like really riskaged in there and of course it then goes to a
• 46:26
  Track 2: woman with similar stuff on her breasts where her areolas are and you're like,
• 46:32
  Track 2: Whoa, this is going really, really risque right there.
• 46:35
  Track 1: I kind of couldn't believe that they could get away with any of those three
• 46:39
  Track 1: like bits almost pretty, you know, unexpected for the a lot of those bits in
• 46:46
  Track 1: this are like kind of surprisingly allowed.
• 46:50
  Track 1: Oh, I remember you mentioned before, I know you mentioned Upton Sinclair and
• 46:55
  Track 1: his support from Charlie Chaplin when he was running for us.
• 47:00
  Track 1: But I think you mentioned also you were going to mention the jungle.
• 47:03
  Track 1: I don't know if that, if you already got past that part.
• 47:07
  Track 2: Yeah, the jungle, of course, well, changed everything, which is interesting.
• 47:11
  Track 2: Well, it changed everything, but not in the way Upton Sinclair suspected,
• 47:14
  Track 2: because he wanted it to promote a socialist cause to bring up that alienation,
• 47:21
  Track 2: how capitalism dehumanizes the worker.
• 47:23
  Track 2: But he described the factory floors and all the non-safety precautions so accurately
• 47:31
  Track 2: that everybody became disgusted.
• 47:33
  Track 2: So and that led to the Food and Drug Administration so that all of all the food
• 47:40
  Track 2: and everything was tested because they were just so gross and disgusting, those factories.
• 47:45
  Track 2: And I think Upton Sinclair even said said I I was hoping to hit the hit the
• 47:51
  Track 2: audience's heart, but instead I hit their stomach.
• 47:55
  Track 1: So well i mean i guess i guess the idea is that instead
• 47:58
  Track 1: of it the it doesn't actually the because these big corporations and places
• 48:03
  Track 1: that were probably the ones doing all of the uh the the had the horrible business
• 48:08
  Track 1: practices probably paid the least amount of taxes and it probably went to all
• 48:12
  Track 1: the working people who were getting like sick and ill from it and dying yeah.
• 48:16
  Track 2: And if people like ford they hated fdr because fdr had to sign in the new deal
• 48:21
  Track 2: deal and that brought in a lot of government regulation on a lot of these factories
• 48:26
  Track 2: and corporations to make sure they hired people, that they paid them enough,
• 48:31
  Track 2: all this stuff that they, that work that capitalists got away with and they
• 48:36
  Track 2: would union bust against because they didn't want those concessions to people.
• 48:41
  Track 2: They wanted to take as much value from the worker as possible while giving them
• 48:45
  Track 2: the least amount of money for it and that's what we're still doing today today
• 48:52
  Track 2: it's just it gotten worse because ceo pay has gone even higher yeah and minimum.
• 48:58
  Track 1: Wages have remained.
• 49:00
  Track 2: Stagnant and the price of everything.
• 49:02
  Track 1: Is uh is magnified yeah and it's yeah the the there i mean i guess you could say,
• 49:09
  Track 1: I don't know, maybe going to the kind of like the one of the maybe the one of
• 49:13
  Track 1: the last scenes of the film is when that can mean gets a job singing and dancing
• 49:18
  Track 1: at like, I guess it's like a club,
• 49:20
  Track 1: club restaurant type of place and eventually gets a job for the tramp to have
• 49:27
  Track 1: also be a waiter and then a singer,
• 49:29
  Track 1: which is also one of the most hysterical scenes like the bringing the food out and the.
• 49:34
  Track 2: He said, I forgot the words. I forgot the words. He's just like,
• 49:38
  Track 2: I'll write them on your cuff.
• 49:39
  Track 2: And of course, that has to go wrong because he immediately starts dancing and he's like, whew!
• 49:45
  Track 2: And the cuffs just like fly out. He's like, oh.
• 49:50
  Track 2: And he's just like, doot, doot, doot, doot. And he's looking for the lyrics like, nope, not there.
• 49:55
  Track 2: He's just like, make something up.
• 49:58
  Track 2: So he does. And it's this made up language that no one's that has no that is just great.
• 50:06
  Track 2: And so it keeps that universality with the tramp tramp, because he's not American.
• 50:12
  Track 2: He's not European. He's not blah, blah, blah.
• 50:15
  Track 2: So and that's why that works well and still is really funny.
• 50:19
  Track 2: And we still connect with him. We don't feel distant from him.
• 50:23
  Track 1: Yeah. Yeah. I mean, he's he's still like, yeah, he's entertaining and he's giving,
• 50:28
  Track 1: you know, the people uh you know it's not i mean it isn't
• 50:32
  Track 1: maybe a fancy place i mean i guess the guy is ordering like a nice bottle of
• 50:36
  Track 1: liquor and a big duck and everything but yeah he's still like uh you know he's
• 50:41
  Track 1: he needs this job to survive like and then eventually when the gamine gets uh
• 50:45
  Track 1: is going to be arrested for being what like a vagrant is that what they say
• 50:49
  Track 1: they're going to arrest i don't.
• 50:50
  Track 2: Oh oh yeah like a vagrant see gummy and also because she's i'm not sure if a lot of people,
• 50:56
  Track 2: Well, the resources I talk about do not really bring this up,
• 50:58
  Track 2: that the gamine is technically underage, and she's with this adult man.
• 51:04
  Track 2: And I think there are some, it is definitely related to Chaplin's real life,
• 51:11
  Track 2: because as many people know, he did date women who were much younger than him and his final wife.
• 51:17
  Track 2: It was interesting because he was afraid to marry Paulette for a long time because
• 51:21
  Track 2: apparently a Romani woman did his fortune. He said he would have three divorces,
• 51:27
  Track 2: but his fourth marriage would last. And Paulette was his third marriage.
• 51:33
  Track 2: And then later on, he married Una Chaplin when she was a teenager,
• 51:37
  Track 2: even though I think she was 18, 19, against her father's wishes.
• 51:43
  Track 2: And she was disowned because of that. Well, Una O'Neill.
• 51:48
  Track 2: So, and the part of the O'Neill clan.
• 51:51
  Track 2: So so yeah so i think that was a part of that that not only was it a plot relevancy
• 51:59
  Track 2: thing because she can't really be emancipated because she's awards of the state.
• 52:03
  Track 1: But also.
• 52:04
  Track 2: Because chaplain did date teenagers very problematic it's it's very problematic
• 52:13
  Track 2: but i feel like if we didn't bring it up somebody would say hey you're ignoring
• 52:18
  Track 2: this issue and it's just yes.
• 52:21
  Track 1: I agree.
• 52:21
  Track 2: It is very problematic it is it's wrong then it was wrong now but but yeah.
• 52:28
  Track 1: Yeah i don't think yeah i don't think by having
• 52:31
  Track 1: not said it and mentioning it doesn't say where
• 52:34
  Track 1: yeah we're not neither of us we're not condoning these kind of things and
• 52:37
  Track 1: it's no separate from the film i think you can separate
• 52:40
  Track 1: those things and still say that he had some questionable behavior
• 52:44
  Track 1: as probably 75 of the people
• 52:47
  Track 1: you know in directors and all these people
• 52:50
  Track 1: you're gonna do not just from that period from any period
• 52:53
  Track 1: of time there's gonna have some very true you know i've
• 52:56
  Track 1: done films with i don't know um you know
• 52:59
  Track 1: with kevin's like a kevin spacey movie like you know he's
• 53:02
  Track 1: not not a good person but uh but anyway
• 53:05
  Track 1: the uh the yeah but then so i guess i think
• 53:08
  Track 1: i was just leading to the final moment where they kind of have to
• 53:11
  Track 1: make their escape and they you know just uh you know and this is kind of the
• 53:15
  Track 1: typical at the end like the tramp is kind of walking away alone but in this
• 53:19
  Track 1: like he finally has like a a companion and then he's also now kind of retiring
• 53:24
  Track 1: this uh this persona the the tramp and so it's,
• 53:29
  Track 1: it i don't know it feels like the most perfect way to end his silent you know
• 53:34
  Track 1: silent air for him Yeah. The character.
• 53:37
  Track 1: I don't know. It's just like a perfect bow. I don't know.
• 53:40
  Track 2: Going into the sunset that there is hope. Fuck up. We'll make through.
• 53:44
  Track 2: Which is why I think he did still have hope for Pony.
• 53:49
  Track 2: The american dream even if he had a
• 53:52
  Track 2: lot of issues with it and it's fascinating because originally
• 53:55
  Track 2: the ending there was a different ending where the gamine does
• 53:59
  Track 2: get caught but she joins and she joins a convent and she becomes a nun yeah
• 54:04
  Track 2: and he visits her and she wishes him well but she wants to stay stay there and
• 54:10
  Track 2: so he wanders off alone again which is usually the ending for the tramp But this time he changed,
• 54:16
  Track 2: but he changed it and they did this instead, which I feel actually really does well.
• 54:21
  Track 2: And he has a companion with him and they can make it.
• 54:25
  Track 2: And you kind of, and you do believe in the helpful with the song Smile playing
• 54:29
  Track 2: that he co-composed and also became famous through Michael Jackson.
• 54:35
  Track 2: Adding with added lyrics that Michael Jackson sang, which Janelle Monae also covered.
• 54:41
  Track 2: So you see Charlie Chaplin's influence in a lot of places, and he is the universal
• 54:48
  Track 2: man. It is very universal.
• 54:50
  Track 2: There's a famous actor, Raj Kapoor, from India, who actually created his own
• 54:56
  Track 2: version of the Tramp character for two famous films,
• 55:00
  Track 2: Avara and Shree 420, that also talked a lot about social issues with Indian society over there.
• 55:06
  Track 2: And I recommend them. Please watch them.
• 55:09
  Track 2: Watch them. But so, yeah, and you could and just perfect ending. I'm rambling.
• 55:15
  Track 1: No no you're and it's funny this when i was thinking about the ending i actually
• 55:19
  Track 1: i haven't i did this movie a while back but i hadn't considered like i'm thinking
• 55:24
  Track 1: of all now all the influences of like scenes in this i think i just saw some
• 55:28
  Track 1: video where they were comparing a scene from this and a scene from like a modern
• 55:32
  Track 1: movie but i think of like the ending of um,
• 55:35
  Track 1: god now i can't remember uh is it dogma where they
• 55:38
  Track 1: like stand silent bob walk away with like the monkey like down
• 55:41
  Track 1: the street it's like it's the same ending in this in the same sense
• 55:44
  Track 1: it's like the walking off into the sunset and uh you
• 55:47
  Track 1: know definitely uh you know kevin smith not the
• 55:49
  Track 1: same caliber necessarily as i mean
• 55:53
  Track 1: i don't think anyone would say that as uh as uh charlie chaplin but it's like
• 55:58
  Track 1: the everything about this film and so many of his is like the influences are
• 56:03
  Track 1: just uh you know too many to count yeah yeah i mean so i guess that's i guess
• 56:08
  Track 1: that's it was there any um,
• 56:11
  Track 1: notes you had on the film or anything we left out that you wanted to add in before we finish up?
• 56:19
  Track 2: I think I just got about mostly everything. I didn't want to get too complex
• 56:24
  Track 2: for what we were discussing because I was just like, oh, we're not in a grad
• 56:27
  Track 2: school lecture. Let's go that far.
• 56:29
  Track 2: Let's not alienate the audience too much.
• 56:33
  Track 1: Yes yeah or yeah i i might have alienated me
• 56:36
  Track 1: here no no i i think it's uh it's it's um i think we hit all of like the main
• 56:43
  Track 1: points that i was thinking of and kind of the the ones that i had read and everything
• 56:48
  Track 1: like that but i don't know uh any again anyone who hasn't um you know seen any uh
• 56:56
  Track 1: chaplain movies i don't know maybe this is the best first one to watch i don't
• 57:02
  Track 1: know uh what would you say if you're like it's telling so like they wanted to
• 57:05
  Track 1: get into watching some of these era films what would you recommend to them i.
• 57:10
  Track 2: Think this is a this is a good first watch but i think if you want something
• 57:15
  Track 2: a little more tender just to just to kind of sink your feet into,
• 57:19
  Track 2: either the kid or city lights i think would be best what best ones to go with for first chaplain.
• 57:26
  Track 1: I think that the first one I ever saw was The Great Dictator,
• 57:31
  Track 1: which I actually don't think was maybe the best first one because it's a talky
• 57:37
  Track 1: film, so it's not kind of like your typical...
• 57:40
  Track 1: Tramp uh kind of charlotte chaplin movie so i would say yeah this one would
• 57:45
  Track 1: be uh could be one of those first ones but um i know we did so we so i skipped
• 57:51
  Track 1: it over at the beginning i was going to ask you your favorite film of 2024 but
• 57:56
  Track 1: i'm going to change it since we've already well maybe i'll still ask you that or or if you.
• 58:00
  Track 2: Don't want to say.
• 58:01
  Track 1: Your favorite 2024 film i'm curious if you have any just a film you might recommend
• 58:06
  Track 1: to someone outside of the the chaplin universe just uh you know something you've
• 58:11
  Track 1: seen you could you can dealer's choice on what what you'd want to.
• 58:14
  Track 2: Recommend or share well i think my faith my favorite
• 58:17
  Track 2: film in 2024 which kind of sort of
• 58:20
  Track 2: is related in a sense is the beast by
• 58:24
  Track 2: bernard bonello with leah sadow and
• 58:27
  Track 2: george mckay because it actually is about
• 58:31
  Track 2: this woman who is going through this procedure through this company
• 58:34
  Track 2: to erase her past lives so that she
• 58:37
  Track 2: won't feel any emotions so she can function better in
• 58:39
  Track 2: the society society she is so basically becoming
• 58:43
  Track 2: sort of a robot to actually fit in with everyone else
• 58:47
  Track 2: and to fit the masses masses and
• 58:50
  Track 2: it goes back in time to her
• 58:53
  Track 2: past lives with this man that she was in love with and and
• 58:57
  Track 2: this man exists still in her present time
• 59:00
  Track 2: present time and they are starting to
• 59:03
  Track 2: reconnect and it's fascinating that she's trying to be trying
• 59:06
  Track 2: to say should i still go through this procedure to remove
• 59:09
  Track 2: these emotions so i basically will become a robot and to
• 59:14
  Track 2: fit into the society to function to work work
• 59:18
  Track 2: and and it's fascinating how we still have these films that will bring up these
• 59:23
  Track 2: ideas that people have to become automatons to function that they have to be
• 59:29
  Track 2: not individuals but instead part of the masses to make the society function
• 59:34
  Track 2: as it's supposed to be, this capitalist world.
• 59:37
  Track 2: And I love...
• 59:39
  Track 2: Love The Beast for that. I love how it goes into that.
• 59:42
  Track 2: I love how it adapts to Henry James short novelette, even though it adds a sci-fi element.
• 59:49
  Track 2: And I think it does relate to modern times. It's got very similar themes about
• 59:53
  Track 2: that and keeping your own individuality when the world around you is trying
• 59:59
  Track 2: to crush it out to make you fit into this tiny socket, this part of the machine.
• 1:00:05
  Track 1: Yeah this has been on my watch as i need to i'm like
• 1:00:08
  Track 1: catching up on some of the ones from the i haven't seen and
• 1:00:11
  Track 1: that's been sitting on my criterion uh like watches
• 1:00:14
  Track 1: i need to to watch that um i
• 1:00:17
  Track 1: think the last time i think i shared in my in a previous
• 1:00:20
  Track 1: episode recently that i think my favorite film
• 1:00:23
  Track 1: for 2024 at least on my current ranking i'm
• 1:00:26
  Track 1: gonna do like a like a episode on just with a couple other people we just go
• 1:00:31
  Track 1: through our top 10 but i think it was kneecap but because i've already said
• 1:00:34
  Track 1: that i'm gonna say one of my other favorite films from the year which i think
• 1:00:39
  Track 1: i think it technically came out in 2023 but it was released in the u.s in 2024 was red rooms,
• 1:00:46
  Track 1: which was a which is really an incredible film i mean i think some other content warning.
• 1:00:52
  Track 2: It's french it's french canadian though for people who are scared of that.
• 1:00:56
  Track 1: Yes it's it's definitely yeah it's um it's
• 1:00:59
  Track 1: not a film that's maybe for the faint of
• 1:01:01
  Track 1: heart it's it's it's weird i i actually recently explained
• 1:01:05
  Track 1: it to someone as it's um uh oh
• 1:01:08
  Track 1: gosh the non-flanking on the film the oliver stone movie from
• 1:01:11
  Track 1: like the 90s that was uh natural i think of it as that but like good and i always
• 1:01:17
  Track 1: say that because like that movie kind of had like the over-the-top attempt to
• 1:01:21
  Track 1: like show you the evils of like uh you know violence and and the and all of
• 1:01:26
  Track 1: these things and this is like a much more restrained version of that, but like,
• 1:01:31
  Track 1: very very good and i know maybe that's a terrible comparison for someone uh listening but i.
• 1:01:37
  Track 2: Mean i just compared modern times and the beast.
• 1:01:39
  Track 1: Okay so yeah so there's nothing is off limits but i think it's a it's a really
• 1:01:43
  Track 1: good uh a good film i don't know if you can watch it anywhere i.
• 1:01:48
  Track 2: Know that you can rent it for about four dollars on amazon.
• 1:01:53
  Track 1: And i.
• 1:01:53
  Track 2: Think it's well worth the rental.
• 1:01:55
  Track 1: It is yes i.
• 1:01:56
  Track 2: I paid $4.
• 1:01:58
  Track 1: So I saw it in the theater when it was like, they were doing like a screening
• 1:02:03
  Track 1: of, and I think I just actually bought the, the Blu-ray, which was maybe a gutsy
• 1:02:08
  Track 1: decision of, of that film.
• 1:02:10
  Track 1: But I thought, you know what? I think I want to, but yeah, that would,
• 1:02:14
  Track 1: that would be one of my top films to watch for anyone.
• 1:02:17
  Track 1: I don't think I've recommended on this show, but yeah.
• 1:02:21
  Track 1: So Molly, thank you so much for coming on
• 1:02:24
  Track 1: and talking about modern times and uh i
• 1:02:27
  Track 1: guess comparing it to the beast we've uh almost 100
• 1:02:31
  Track 1: years apart so that's that's yeah yes and
• 1:02:35
  Track 1: um yeah and so you can i guess i'll i'll share where you can people can follow
• 1:02:39
  Track 1: you on on the internet and you can listen to this podcast wherever you listen
• 1:02:45
  Track 1: to it actually right now since you're listening to it you can just follow uh
• 1:02:49
  Track 1: there or at left of the projector dot com. And so thank you again, Molly.
• 1:02:53
  Track 2: Thanks for having me again.
• 1:02:55
  Track 1: Of course. And we will catch you all next time.