8mm Forum: The Great Dictator - Chaplin RBC films Super 8 feature

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Topic: The Great Dictator - Chaplin RBC films Super 8 feature

Osi Osgood
Film God

Posts: 10204
From: Mountian Home, ID.
Registered: Jul 2005

posted April 06, 2018 11:09 AM

It is this author’s sadness that the great Charles Chaplin is not better known.

Even his great silent comedies aren’t nearly as well known or appreciated today as they were 30 or so years ago, where, at one time, his very name was synonymous with silent cinema.

As a general rule, his sound films are even lesser known.

Chaplin, having made such memorable films as “City lights” and “Modern Times” then made his absolute best fully sound feature film ever, (in this author’s opinion) … "The Great Dictator” (his earlier sound era features were part sound/part silent)

Although not generally considered one of his “little Tramp” films, this is the last time he would play on screen, his tramp character with just a slight alteration in that his character is portrayed as a “barber”, (though his “tramp” outfit is unmistakable). Chaplin, however, did the daring move of playing two roles in the same film, which was largely uncommon as of this time in film history.

He also played a thinly disguised Adoph Hitler. Though not called “Hitler” or “Adolph”, his “Adenoid Hynkel” character is Adolph, (in later years, Chaplin would state that if he had known what was actually going on in Germany with the Holocaust, he could have never played such a character).

The Jewish barber is injured during World War 1 and stricken with amnesia. He returns to his barbershop to find that he has actually been gone for many years, (shown by his barbershop being largely one big spiderweb).

In the meantime, a new regime has developed (the third Reich, though not specifically called such), that is anti-jewish, as Hynkel blames the jews for everything going wrong in his regime.

The jewish barber is falling in love with a neighbors daughter, (his real life wife, Paulette Goddard), but all this is put on hold as things get tougher for the barber and his people and they begin an underground movement of resistance to Hynkel and his regime. In the end the barber looks so much like Hynkel, that the barber is substituted for hynkel, (and Hynkel is commited to an asylum for acting like he is the leader), and, upon the "Toemainians" being ready to invade nearby Poland, the barber gets up to address his “followers” and gives one of the best speeches for democracy and human decency ever stated on screen.

THE END

What is related above is a mere microchasm of everything that takes place in this film. Chaplin does an incredible job of playing this meglo-maniac Adenoid Hynkel to the hilt and is ably helped along by an incredible cast, most notably by Jack Oakie as the leader of the nearby "Italian" state of “Bacteria” (who is as arrogant as Hynkel), Billy Gilbert plays the head of the “S.S’ and developer of inventions that don’t work and most especially the underrated Henry Daniell (who played "Professor Moriarity" most memorablyin the Sherlock Holmes films), who plays a very evil, smarmy “second in command” to Hynkel.

There are countless classic scenes, the barber doing a shave and a haircut to the Hungarian Rhapsody, the back and forth battle between the equally arrogant leaders of Toemania and Bacteria, escalating to grand finale in a dinner party, and a separate “suicide” dessert sequence with the barber and his patriot friends, (the one who gets the "coin' in his pudding will go on the suicide mission).

Only once in awhile does the film get slightly melodramatic or preachy, but there is so much incredible comedy and drama to this film, (especially given how closely it resembles Hitlers germany) that it is equally hilarious as well as chilling, a feat incredibly hard to achieve.

Now, onto this very neat print …

“RBC” films lucked into making a contract with the Chaplin estate to release a great number of Chaplins great sound films, AND from Chaplin’s own archives. These were never meant to be privately owned, but were part of a licensed library, which was to end either in October 1991 or when the actual prints were either worn out or destroyed, (as it states right before the countdown leader)

What this meant was an incredible image quality that was both quite sharp for a super 8 black and white print as well as not suffering from bad grey tones and grain from many dupes down from the first generation negatives. It is a real pleasure to watch.

I honestly do not know as to how this was able to enter into private film collectors hands, but I lucked out recently in buying a print of this off of ebay and I am quite pleased to have welcomed this rare print into my collection. If you happen to run across a print of tjhis, don’t wait too long to grab it!

… and, as always, LONG LIVE SUPER 8!!!!!

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"All these moments will be lost in time, just like ... tears, in the rain. "