Color footage from DICTATOR set discovered

In case anyone didn't read this at alt.movies.silent:

Sunday 13 January 2002

Telegraph Network

Lost Chaplin footage reveals Dictator's colour By Chris Hastings (Filed: 13/01/2002)

A HOME movie containing unseen colour footage of Charlie Chaplin filming his 1940 black-and-white classic The Great Dictator has been found in a suitcase at his former Swiss home.

The film, hailed as one of the most significant finds in recent cinematic history, reveals that Chaplin planned a completely different ending to his satire on Nazi Germany.

The famous last reel of The Great Dictator, in which Chaplin looks into the=

camera and makes a heartfelt plea for world peace, was actually an 11th-hour innovation to resolve technical problems.

His original ending was to be a montage that included two opposing armies coming together in a dance. It proved too difficult, however, and a clearly=

exasperated Chaplin is shown trying to come to grips with the complexities of the scene.

The footage, shot by Chaplin's elder brother Sydney, also challenges the idea that the Oscar-winner was a mild-mannered professional who always kept=

his cool.=20

At one stage, he is shown berating an assistant director who failed to complete a scene on time.

It also highlights his obsessive side. Crowds of extras are forced to stand=

idle while he repeatedly practises his Nazi salute.

Chaplin also seems to have had second thoughts about a Russian character, who was not included in the final cut.

The amateur film, the only colour footage of Chaplin at work, was found by Chaplin's youngest son, Christopher, and his sister, Victoria, in a cellar at the family's home in Vevey, by Lake Geneva, during restoration work.=20

It had apparently been left there by Sydney Chaplin in a suitcase and forgotten about. The footage, shot on 16mm Kodachrome film and lasting more=

than 25 minutes, is in very good condition.

Kevin Brownlow, the historian who made the acclaimed television series The Unknown Chaplin, has included it in a new documentary about Chaplin and Hitler, called The Tramp and the Dictator.

'This is an amazing find and we are so grateful to Chaplin's family for giving us access to the footage. It includes shots of scenes which never made it into the final film, as well as footage of Chaplin at work,' he said.

Mr Brownlow said that Chaplin's alternative end to The Great Dictator must have been lost on the cutting room floor.

'The fact that something like this can be found after remaining hidden for 60 years is amazing,' he said. 'It provides a unique insight into one of the world's greatest films and the man who made it'.

The Great Dictator is regarded as Chaplin's finest achievement. He plays a Jewish barber and Adenoid Hynkel, the fascist dictator of Tomania, who are so alike that they could be mistaken for each other.

The barber and his family are terrorised by Hynkel's soldiers, but in the end, a case of mistaken identity provides a chance of revenge. He takes Hynkel's place at a Nazi rally and gives a speech in favour of world peace and tolerance.

Chaplin worked on the film for more than a year and financed it himself. At=

the time of its release, America was not in the war and many Americans were=

still in favour of isolationism.

The film was refused screenings in Nazi-occupied Europe, but went on to become the biggest money-spinner of 1940, breaking box office records in the United States and Britain.

Sydney Chaplin's footage records key scenes in colour, including the barber's first confrontation with the black shirts.

It had been assumed that Hitler had never seen The Great Dictator. Brownlow=

and his team have found evidence, however, suggesting that the Nazi leader attended two private screenings.

Reinhard Spitzy, a member of Hitler's inner circle who is also in the documentary, said: 'Hitler would have found the film funny. He had a good sense of humour. He was a man who would have been able to see the funny side of Chaplin's portrayal.'

The Tramp and the Dictator, a co-production between Brownlow's Photoplay Productions and Germany's Spiegel Television and narrated by Kenneth Branagh, will be shown at the Berlin Film Festival this year along with a restored version of The Great Dictator.

Charlie Chaplin died on Christmas Day 1977, aged 88. Sydney Chaplin died in=

Oh? According to WHO? Too bad they didn't get one of US to write the news report - at least we KNOW something about Chaplin.

THE GREAT DICTATOR was nominated for Academy Awards for Best Picture, Best Actor, Best Supporting Actor, Best Original Screenplay, and Best Original Score. CC won the New York Film Critics Award for Best Actor for 1940. Leonard Maltin gives the film 3 1/2 stars and calls it a 'unique, surprisingly effective film' (which is the prevailing view of TGD today).

Richard Carnahan

I repeat ... 'The Great Dictator is regarded as Chaplin's finest achievement' ... According to WHO?

Still, it's nice to be able to find a way to enjoy this film at all - and Jackie Oakie literally steals the movie from Charlie, and I can't think of any film ('The Kid' included) where someone manages to do THAT!

Well, at least for some part of his life, your friend George...if we can believe what he told us.

Forgive me for sidling in on this thread, but I think this post raises a good point. My impression generally has been that most Chaplin devotees would not select The Great Dictator as his 'finest film.' At any rate, I certainly wouldn't. And the reason for this lies

Unless we view the Final Speech as the product of the thinking of the Barber and not of Chaplin himself. The Barber would very likely have spoken in platitudes, but they would have been heartfelt, as they are in the film.

As I've said before, this is the first Chaplin film I saw theatrically (at the 1964 Plaza Theatre revival in NYC), and it is a film I have shown to people who hold a simplistic, slapsticky view of CC. They have always 'converted' after viewing it.

(I said)

No. Let's try a third time. Chris Hastings does not say that HE regards GD as CC's 'finest achievement' - but says, clearly, that it is 'regarded as Chaplin's finest achievement' - clearly implying that this is critical and/or public opinion - which I believe is just nonsense.

I have no idea why you're unable to address a simple point - the guy made a really stupid, misinformed statement. Period.

(quote, snipped)

Well, thanks for repeating my post. It's always good to read again. And thank you also for your enlightened rebuttal to it ... how did that go again? Oh, yeah. It makes no sense (chortle).

But even if he does, it bears no relation to the original question - because I doubt that even you could argue that critical and/or public opinion holds this view.