Review of Monsieur Verdoux (1947) by Nannina G — 12 Mar 2008

An amusing dark comedy from Charlie Chaplin, with some sparkling moments (especially the opening monologue), but it lacks the light touch of his silent work (or perhaps the dialogue just draws attention to the negative aspects that were always there). In fact most of what's good in the movie is a result of physical comedy and the ridiculous. Chaplin's performance is deliciously dapper to the last twitch of his mustache, and the conflicts in his character (a vegetarian, doting father and husband, who without a thought marries and murders wealthy widows) are amusingly ironic.

But the message of the film is laid on quite thick - that murder is just a standard part of business, and is only condemned when the perpetrator works outside of the accepted system. The fact is that in the end I resent being told that business is murder by a man whose only experience in the subject was in show business. Artists so often feel the need to expose the evils of conventional business, that they ignore the fact that business is in its own way an art and a creative enterprise, and art has since its beginnings been in many ways a business. The message at the time was radical to be put so frankly in a Hollywood film, but today I've heard it so many times that I'm bored of it. It isn't radical anymore, and it is disgustingly self-congratulatory.

That aside I would place it as an entertaining lesser work by Chaplin.