The cinema is for us what the theater of entertainment was undoubtedly for the Romans: the most democratic of the arts.
Chorégies oblige, Orange combines it in a musical version.
So it's time for a cine-concert with the Orchester national Avignon-Provence and their musical director Débora Waldman with
Les Lumières de la ville
.
To discover
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Chaplin writes the screenplay, directs the film, plays the leading role and composes the music.
The film was released in 1931. He knew that he was delivering there, before
Modern Times
, an ultimate tribute to silent cinema.
City Lights
is moreover a sound film, with some dialogues integrated into the writing.
Chaplin writes the soundtrack.
In truth, he measures how much more with pantomime he can go in his social criticism much further than with words.
What could be more eloquent to translate the chaos left by the crisis of 1929 than the silhouette of the little man tottered mercilessly by the uncertainties of the weather and the city?
The drifter falls in love with a blind flower seller (Virginia Cherrill) and believes he's going to save her.
By chance, he saves an eccentric millionaire from suicide.
This one shows a crazy generosity when he is drunk...
Take care of the details
Charlot goes through situations without sparing himself, becomes a boxer or a street cleaner, bravely straddling the situations that chance presents to him.
The body takes all the hits, and bluntly denounces the conventions that govern American life.
Only love emerges unscathed.
With an innocence that the game does not tarnish, Virginia Cherrill begins here.
Chaplin takes care of every detail of this film which he will take two and a half years to write and six months to shoot.
A record in his filmography.
It takes 342 takes for the scene where the blind florist mistakes the tramp for a rich man.
How indeed to make wealth perceptible to the naked ear?
A car door slamming and voila.
The florist sending a vase of water to Chaplin will reveal that she is blind.
The writing is as fine as the gags can be agreed.
Les Lumières de la ville
also shines with the infinite palette of its registers.
July 30, at 9:30 p.m. at the Chorégies d'Orange
.