Jeanskynebu the audience applauded

GamerTab That was an excellent one.

XoWizIama Excellent adaptation.

Scarlet The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

Dr Jacques COULARDEAU It is a masterpiece with some funny scenes, especially at the end, but mostly because of the tremendous empathy this film carries, conveys and communicates about life, about death, about doing something with the life we have been entrusted with, something positive, something that may serve the community, other people, something that provides love to those who need it, who deserve it. It is impossible to tell the story of this film without in many ways destroying it. We are in London just before the First World War and we are in show business with Charlie Chaplin as an old comedian, Calvero; a young dancer, Thereza who has some stage fright problems that paralyze her legs, and is impersonated by Claire Bloom; and a young composer, Neville enacted by Sydney Chaplin. In Calvero's comeback, he will perform with an old partner of his played by Buster Keaton. The interest of the film is its comic dimension intertwined with the dramatic content, with this dancer who has to be supported and even reconstructed in order to be able to use her legs to perfection. Everyone will remember the slap from Calvero in the wings just seconds before she enters the stage when she is having a sudden paralysis fit caused by stage fright. And the slap works because she is so shocked she cannot even think of her legs anymore.Charlie Chaplin after the Second World War seems to be a lot more humane, empathetic with people, individual people, just as if the war had battered him down tremendously and let him sore in his heart and sad in his mind. The big political and social subjects are more or less kept in the past and now he looks at the mental state of human beings in this world that has to be reconstructed after the five years of absolute folly. Maybe McCarthy and his campaign in Hollywood that forced Charlie Chaplin to move back to Great Britain is softening his critical tone.This final period in Charlie Chaplin's creative life is, just the same as with Picasso, different but yet the same as for imagination, creativity, intensity, human sympathy and compassion. I must say that the scene of flea taming is really funny, though I may prefer the final act with Buster Keaton, the grand piano, and the violin. The satire of classical concerts is so strong and to the point: formality and appearances that have to be saved, kept and protected so much that then the music or the performance becomes stiff and even forbidding.To be seen urgently if you haven't already done so. You will all like Calvero's death on stage, or nearly and you will all think of Molière himself, the greatest comedian of all times and one of the best playwrights, who actually died on stage performing a hypochondriac would-be sick man.Dr. Jacques COULARDEAU

rdavies0303 A masterpiece certainly. Theatrical rather than sentimental. It does after all deal with people of the theatre and their heightened emotional reactions. There are though some quite serious limitations. First and perhaps least important, the chronology is wrong. We are told the film starts in the summer of 1914. We are helpfully shown a news placard about impending war. Yet after that the only uniform we see is an American uniform on the young composer. We seem to be looking at a mirror image of what was in reality a still neutral America (perhaps with the occasional British uniform to be seen).More serious, it is a complete mystery that Calvero should finally be a popular success once again. In fact his earlier failure at the Middlesex Theatre is also inexplicable. Calvero's performance is perfectly OK. Was Chaplin reluctant to put on a poor musical hall performance, even for the sake of a context?Finally the film may be famous as the one occasion where Chaplin performed with Keaton. The scene seems to me remarkably unfunny.

richard-1787 I just caught the last scene in this movie today, and found it literally breathtaking. The comedy skit before that, with Chaplin and the pianist, is both funny and disturbing. The violinist becomes demoniacal when he finally plays.But then when he starts to die, on the couch in the prop room, the movie becomes a study in carefully-controlled understatement. I was particularly struck by the moment immediately after he dies, on the bed in the wings, when someone pulls a white sheet up over him. The camera moves in and you expect the man will stop, or at least slow down, when the sheet gets to Chaplin's neck, so the camera can focus on his face. Not at all. The sheet is pulled all the way up, and the clown's body is carried off in the wings without one sentimental second. We are left watching the ballerina dancing, to Chaplin's Oscar-winning tune, followed by her perfectly projected shadows.It's a very impressive scene.Now I have to watch what leads up to it!

Christopher Reid Chaplin plays Calvero, a retired clown. Well, a clown who is no longer desired by the public. He saves a young ballerina from suicide and nurses her back to health. Shouldn't this old, obsolete entertainer be bitter and selfish? For whatever reason, he is kind and caring even though the world has thrown him away. Perhaps he is inspired by her beauty or innocence or moved by her hopelessness. He encourages her at every step. He listens to her detailed life story, asking "then what happened" a number of times. He is full of passionate, beautiful sayings about life. That desire is more important than meaning for example.The tone of Limelight is quite sad and contemplative. I felt very comfortable with it. We seem to often suppress sadness rather than try to understand it. But there are also funny moments and the movie never feels too dark or desperate. The music is very nice and I started to get used to it by the end. I think the script is also really good with so many interesting, meaningful lines.Calvero is so isolated and so selfless. I was moved to tears more than once. Chaplin is such a great entertainer, able to effortlessly make you laugh. So to see him performing in his mind to empty audiences, or having people casually walk out of a real performance is hard to take. You don't expect to see one of your heroes lose hope and cry because he is no longer wanted or can't be funny anymore. It makes me feel better to realise that even film legends might feel worthless from time to time and furthermore have the guts to share that fact.Claire Bloom has such lovely eyes. She seems so innocent and yet her character has already has lost the lust for life. Later, she falls in love with Calvero but maybe partially because she subconsciously feels she owes him or should pay him back. She depends on him as her inspiration. But he wants her to go out and flourish and marry the nice young composer she met. It's similar to Monsieur Verdoux where there was also a young woman that liked Chaplin but who he tried to avoid so he wouldn't drag her down.It was incredible seeing Buster Keaton and Charlie Chaplin in a film together. Buster only appears in the last 15 minutes or so but it's very enjoyable. He is as understated as ever, barely raising an eyebrow to the things that happen. And yet, you can tell he is constantly thinking, feeling, reacting. It's just very subtle.Few films have affected me the way Limelight did. The themes resonated with me very strongly. We're free to laugh or cry wherever we like, depending on how we look at what's happening. It's quite amazing that a silent film comedian went on to make such a great dramatic movie later on. There are numerous references to his old tramp character but the articulate, impassioned and kind older man is new.