National Board of Review Magazine (Jan 1939 - Jan 1942)

Exceptional Photoplays DEPARTMENT TJvi^ department seeks to inclhide all photoplays of outstanding merit in the artistic development of the screen, with the object of bringi-ng such pictures to the attention 0/ discriminating readers, under the headings of Exceptional and Honorable Mention, The opinions of a committee composed of trained students and critics of the screen are combined in rfn impartial review which aims to convey a comprehensive idea of the picture, covering both its excellmcies and defects. SECRETARY AND EDITOR, James Shelley Hamilton COMMITTEE J. K. Paulding, Chairman Otis Ferguson Richard Griffith John A. McAndrew Frances Taylor Patterson Frederic M. Thrasheb Robert Girodx Henry Hart Mary B. Miller Russell Potter Frank Ward The Great Dictator Produced, zvritteii and directed by Charles Chaplin. Photography, Karl Stiiss and Roland Totheroh, musical direction^ Meredith Wilson. Distributed by United Artists. The Cast People of the Palace Hynkel, Dictator of Tomania Charles Chaplin Napaloni, Dictator of Bacteria , Jack Oakie Schidtz Reginald Gardiner Garbitsch Henry Daniell Herring _ Billy Gilbert Madame Napaloni Grace Hayle Bacterian Ambassador Carter de Haven People of the Ghetto A Jeivish Barber Charles Chaplin Hannah Paulette Goddard Mr. Jaeekle Maurice Moskovitch Mrs. Jaeekle ..Emma Dunn Mr. Mann _ Bernard Grocey Mr. Agar Paul Weigel Also: Chester Conklin, Esther Michelson, Hank Mann, Florence Wright, Eddie Gribbon, Robert O. Daz'is, Eddie Dunn, Nita Pyke, Peter Lynn. A LOT happens in five years these days, and in that time you can learn a lot and forget a lot. That is why so many people who have been waiting for another Chaplin picture, made more and more impatient for it by delays and rumors, don't know quite what to think now that The Great Dictator is here. If it were just a newpicture, and not a New Chaplin, they would enjoy it and acclaim it, as thousands upon thousands will anyway. But if they are among those who are always solemn about Chaplin, expecting him to be not only a great comic but a great tragedian and social commentator as well, they won't be satisfied with just taking what they get and enjoying it : they will have to ponder and analyze about Art and Meanings and Social Satire, with all their preconceptions about such things, and the result of all this searching thought will perhaps puzzle them by not adding up to what they thought they were going to get in the Masterpiece they were all set for. This will 1)e because of what they have learned, and even more what they have forgotten, in the years of waiting. Movies have developed a good deal since Modem Times, and the world has changed even more, and unless you keep that pretty carefully in mind you don't realize the extent to which expectation of what a new Chaplin picture would be has subconsciously keyed itself up to a point that forgets what Chaplin has always been. Except for some of the two-reelers we don't get much chance to see Chaplin films after their season of newness is over, and so we have no chance to check our memory of them with all that was actually there. Chaplin — it's a temptation to say more than any other man in the world^ — is a figure that lives mostly in our memories, and what each remembers is shaped and colored by a personal reaction to him, all the more vivid for the personal feeling that infuses the memory. We remember him, and forget a great deal about his difi^erent pictures except as the frame in which he himself was so unforgettable. TJic Great Dictator is its own kind of film, a completely Chaplin kind, and no other kind in the world. It is not only the climax of Chaplin, so far, but a resume of Chaplin's whole growth, in his picture-makingand in the evolution of his social conscience — a statement that is practically a quotation from Terry Ramsaye, who so far as I know is the only commentator who has noted this fact, as well as the fact that you