Tag Archives: Charlie Chaplin

393. City Lights

Four years after the advent of sound in cinema, Charlie Chaplin insisted on making a silent movie the entire plot for which hinged on not being able to see.

370. Cinema Paradiso

Nostalgia originally had nothing to do with the past but rather a desire to return home. Cinema Paradiso resonates with the feeling that cinema is your home.

352. Roma

Alfonso Cuarón has long flirted with the neorealist style. His latest masterpiece, Roma illustrates cinema is not about what you show, but how you show it.

346. Au revoir les enfants

Most films about childhood are often nostalgic. Louis Malle’s masterful auto-biopic is about loss of an unfathomable kind.

344. The Double Life of Veronique

Krzysztof Kieślowski avoids all the clichés of doppelgängers, doubles and lookalikes to deliver a meditation on freedom.

340. Mon Oncle

Writing, producing, directing and starring in his own films Jacques Tati was a true auteur, influencing the likes of David Lynch, Tim Burton and Wes Anderson.

254. Amélie

5 Oscar nominations, 4 Cesar wins, 2 BAFTAs and over $170m at the global box office. So why does Amélie still manage to polarise audiences?

223. Pan’s Labyrinth

Guillermo del Toro says he is “in love with monsters.” In Pan’s Labyrinth, set in the Spanish Civil War, he uses them to navigate history and the world.

215. Great Scenes – Part One

What makes for a great scene? Performance? Conflict? Dialogue? Visuals? Music? Combine them and you have atomic weight.

119. Annie Hall

You can divide Hollywood rom-coms into two eras; before and after Annie Hall. The film also marked the arrival of one of America’s most individual artists.

70. Casablanca

“Here’s looking at you, kid.” Casablanca has more quotable lines than any other movie, but it’s the visual design that gives the film its thematic resonance.

69. Money, Money, Money

All industries need profits to survive. So why do so many Hollywood films castigate wealth and capitalism?

15. Silent Cinema

Synchronized sound arrived in 1927. But the theaters were far from silent before that and perhaps something was lost with the coming of the new technology.


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