The Great Dictator

1940 social comedy

Rating: 16/20 (Dylan: 11/20)

Plot: Following a crash landing during World War I, a Jewish barber loses his memory. He doesn't leave the hospital to return to his normal life for years, and things have changed. Adenoid Hynkel, who looks surprisingly a lot like the barber, has taken control of Tomania, and is planning to take over the world and persecute the Jews. The barber falls in love with the neighbor girl, Hynkel falls in love with a giant beach ball, the barber does his best to avoid capture by the stormtroopers, and Hynkel threatens Benzino Napaloni with salami (a phallic symbol). Meanwhile, the man whose life was saved during WWI by the barber stumbles onto the scene and is sympathetic to the Jews' cause.

Jimmy Stewart won the Oscar, but Chaplin was pretty damn good playing dual roles in this. There's a strange dichotomy here. There's the typical physical comedy you'd expect to see from Chaplin's silent movies combined with some surprisingly natural funny dialogue. This was Chaplin's first talkie, and the humor comes a lot more naturally than a lot of late 30's comedy. The improvised faux-German stuff is absolutely hilarious. Not all the comedy works, and some of it that takes place in the ghetto isn't entirely comfortable, but there are definitely some classic scenes--most of the WWI slapstick and sight gags, the scene with Hynkel dancing with the inflatable globe, a fantastic shave-to-the-music scene, the coin-in-the-pudding scene. On the other side of the coin, you've got a lot of melodramatic stuff (probably worse than many late 30's dramas) and the more serious stuff, the best example being Chaplin's passionate speech at the very end of the movie. It's a long speech, and I'm not sure Chaplin blinks during it. I'd always stayed away from this one for some reason (I believe this leaves only one more Chaplin feature-length film I need to see--oddly enough the one with Buster Keaton in it), but it was a lot more enjoyable than I had anticipated. You've at least got to appreciate Chaplin's ballsiness in making this thing. Hitler reportedly watched it twice; I wonder whether or not he liked it. He was known for having a great sense of humor.