The Kid (1921 film)

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The Kid
CC The Kid 1921.jpg
Theatrical release poster
Directed byCharlie Chaplin
Written byCharlie Chaplin
Produced byCharlie Chaplin
Starring
CinematographyR. H. Totheroh
Edited byCharlie Chaplin
Music byCharlie Chaplin (1972 re-release)
Production
company
Distributed byFirst National
Release date
  • January 21, 1921 (1921-01-21) (Premiere)
  • February 6, 1921 (1921-02-06)
Running time
  • 68 minutes[1](original cut)
  • 53 minutes[2] (1972 re-release)
CountryUnited States
Languages
Budget$250,000
Box office$5,450,000[3]

The Kid is a 1921 American silent comedy-drama film written, produced, directed by and starring Charlie Chaplin, and features Jackie Coogan[4] as his foundling baby, adopted son and sidekick. This was Chaplin's first full-length film as a director (he had been a co-star in 1914's Tillie's Punctured Romance). It was a huge success, and was the second-highest-grossing film in 1921, behind The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. In 2011, The Kid was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant."[5][6]

Plot[]

With much anguish an unwed Mother abandons her child, placing him in an expensive automobile with a handwritten note: "Please love and care for this orphan child". Two thieves steal the car and leave the baby in an alley, where he is found by The Tramp. After some attempts to hand off the child on to various passers-by, he finds the note and his heart melts. He takes the boy home, names him John and adjusts his household furniture for him. Meanwhile, the Mother has a change of heart and returns for her baby; when she learns that the car has been stolen she faints.

Five years pass. The Kid and the Tramp live in the same tiny room; they have little money but much love. They support themselves in a minor scheme: the Kid throws stones to break windows so that the Tramp, working as a glazier, can be paid to repair them. Meanwhile, the Mother has become a wealthy actress and does charity by giving presents to poor children. By chance, as she does so, the Mother and the Kid unknowingly cross paths.

The Kid later gets into a fight with another local boy as people in the area gather to watch the spectacle. The Kid wins, drawing the ire of the other boy's older brother, who attacks the Tramp as a result. The Mother breaks up the fight, but it starts again after she leaves and the Tramp keeps beating the "Big Brother" over the head with a brick between swings until he totters away.

Shortly afterward, the Mother advises the Tramp to call a doctor after the Kid falls ill. The doctor discovers that the Tramp is not the Kid's father and notifies authorities. Two men come to take the boy to an orphanage, but after a fight and a chase, the Tramp and the boy remain side by side. When the Mother comes back to see how the boy is doing she encounters the doctor, who shows her the note (which he had taken from the Tramp); she recognizes it as the one she left with her baby years ago.

Now fugitives, the Tramp and the boy spend the night in a flophouse. Its proprietor learns of a $1,000 reward offered by the authorities and takes the Kid to the police station, while the Tramp is asleep. As the tearful Mother is reunited with her long-lost child, the Tramp searches frantically for the missing boy. Unsuccessful, he returns to the doorway of their humble lodgings, where he falls asleep, entering a "Dreamland" where his neighbors have turned into angels and devils. A policeman awakes him and drives him off to a mansion. There the door is opened by the Mother and the Kid, who jumps into the Tramp's arms, and he is welcomed in.

Cast[]

Chaplin and Jackie Coogan in a publicity photo for The Kid
Uncredited
  • Tom Wilson as the Policeman
  • Henry Bergman as night shelter keeper/Professor Guido/fat neighborhood man/apostle Peter
  • Charles Reisner as neighborhood bully
  • Raymond Lee as bully's little brother
  • Lita Grey as flirtatious angel in Dreamland scene
  • Jules Hanft as the country doctor
  • Frank Campeau as welfare officer[7]
  • F. Blinn as welfare officer's assistant
  • Jack H. Coogan Jr.[8] (father of Jackie Coogan) as Pickpocket/Guest/Devil
  • Granville Redmond as the Man's friend
  • May White as the Woman's maid/apartment owner with broken window
  • Silas Hathaway as the infant Kid. At the time of his death in 2017 at age 98, Hathaway was the last surviving actor of the film.[9]
  • Albert Austin as man in shelter/the car thief
  • Esther Ralston as angel in the heaven scene

Production[]

Business partners on the street

Chaplin wrote, produced, directed, edited, and starred in The Kid, and later composed a score. Innovative in its combination of comedic and dramatic elements,[10] The Kid is widely considered one of the greatest films of the silent era.[11] Chaplin biographer Jeffrey Vance maintains, “The film is a perfect blend of comedy and drama and is arguably Chaplin’s most personal and autobiographical work.”[12]

The film made Coogan, then a vaudeville performer, into the first major child star of the movies. It has been speculated that the depth of the relationship portrayed in the film may have been connected with the death of Chaplin's firstborn infant son just ten days before the production began.[13]

"The Kid" pleading to be left with his "father", Chaplin

After production was completed in 1920, the film was caught up in the divorce actions of Chaplin's first wife Mildred Harris, who sought to attach Chaplin's assets. Chaplin and his associates smuggled the raw negative to Salt Lake City (reportedly packed in coffee cans) and edited the film in a room at the Hotel Utah.[14] Before releasing the film Chaplin negotiated for and received an enhanced financial deal for the film with his distributor, First National Corporation, based on the success of the final film.[further explanation needed]

Chaplin eventually removed scenes he believed too sentimental for modern audiences and composed and recorded a new musical score for the film’s theatrical reissue. This re-edited version of The Kid had its world premiere as the Film Society of Lincoln Center gala tribute to Chaplin held on April 4, 1972 at Philharmonic Hall, New York City, with Chaplin in attendance.[citation needed]

Reception[]

The Kid premiered on January 21, 1921 at Carnegie Hall in New York City as a benefit for the Children’s Fund of the National Board of Review of Motion Pictures.[15]

The Kid was acclaimed by film critics upon its release.[16]

A reviewer from Theatre Magazine glowingly wrote, "[Chaplin's] new picture, The Kid, certainly outdoes in humor and the special brand of Chaplin pathos anything this popular film star has yet produced. There are almost as many tears as laughs in the new First National release--which proves the contention that Chaplin as almost as good a tragedian as he is a comedian. The Kid may be counted as a screen masterpiece."

Legacy[]

Chaplin biographer Jeffrey Vance writes of the legacy of Chaplin's The Kid: "The Kid remains an important contribution to the art of film, not only because of Chaplin’s innovative use of dramatic sequences within a feature-length comedy, but also because of the revelations The Kid provides about its creator. Undoubtedly, when Chaplin penned the preface to The Kid, “A picture with a smile--and perhaps, a tear,” he had his own artistic credo—and life—in mind."[17] Mary Pickford said of the film, "The Kid is one of the finest examples of the screen language, depending upon its actions rather than upon subtitles".[18]

The Kid

In December 2011, The Kid was chosen to be preserved in the Library of Congress' National Film Registry.[19] The registry stated that the film is "an artful melding of touching drama, social commentary and inventive comedy" and praised Chaplin's ability to "sustain his artistry beyond the length of his usual short subjects and could deftly elicit a variety of emotions from his audiences by skillfully blending slapstick and pathos."[19]

As of January 2021, The Kid has earned a rare 100% perfect rating on Rotten Tomatoes, based on 44 reviews, with a weighted average of 8.6/10,[20] the website’s critical consensus says: “Charles Chaplin' irascible Tramp is given able support from Jackie Coogan as The Kid in this slapstick masterpiece, balancing the guffaws with moments of disarming poignancy”. The film also has a 8.3 user rating on the Internet Movie Database and is included in the site's Top 250 list, in which it is the oldest title.[21]

See also[]

References[]

  1. ^ "THE KID (U) (CUT)". British Board of Film Classification. January 5, 1922. Retrieved December 23, 2015.
  2. ^ "THE KID (U)". British Board of Film Classification. October 15, 1957. Retrieved December 23, 2015.
  3. ^ Box office at IMDB accessed January 27, 2017
  4. ^ "Today in Media History: Thumbs Up? In 1921 newspapers reviewed Charlie Chaplin's movie, 'The Kid'". Poynter. Archived from the original on December 24, 2015. Retrieved March 14, 2016.
  5. ^ "Complete National Film Registry Listing | Film Registry | National Film Preservation Board | Programs at the Library of Congress | Library of Congress". Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. 20540 USA. Retrieved May 1, 2020.
  6. ^ "2011 National Film Registry More Than a Box of Chocolates". Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. 20540 USA. Retrieved July 2, 2020.
  7. ^ Lochner, Jim (2018). The Music of Charlie Chaplin. Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland & Company, pg. 327. ISBN 978-0-7864-9611-2.
  8. ^ "Research into genealogy of Jackie Coogan". Coogan Research Group. October 26, 2013. Retrieved February 11, 2018.
  9. ^ Silas Hathaway at the Internet Movie Database
  10. ^ Chaplin, pp. 233–234.
  11. ^ 300 Greatest Films by Decade - AMC Filmsite Retrieved February 8, 2015
  12. ^ https://www.loc.gov/static/programs/national-film-preservation-board/documents/the_kid.pdf
  13. ^ Kamin, Dan (September 5, 2008). The Comedy of Charlie Chaplin: Artistry in Motion. Scarecrow Press. p. 92. ISBN 9780810877818.
  14. ^ "Charlie Chaplin Can't Dodge Newspaper Men". Deseret News. August 9, 1920. Retrieved August 18, 2014.
  15. ^ https://www.loc.gov/static/programs/national-film-preservation-board/documents/the_kid.pdf
  16. ^ Passafiume, Andrea. "The Kid (1921)". Turner Classic Movies, Inc. Retrieved January 10, 2017.
  17. ^ Vance, Jeffrey (2003). Chaplin: Genius of the Cinema. New York: Harry N. Abrams, pg. 117. ISBN 0-8109-4532-0.
  18. ^ Howe, Herbert (January 1924). "Mary Pickford's Favorite Stars and Films". Photoplay. New York: Photoplay Publishing Company. Retrieved September 4, 2015.
  19. ^ Jump up to: a b "2011 National Film Registry More Than a Box of Chocolates" (Press release). Library of Congress. December 28, 2011. Retrieved August 18, 2014.
  20. ^ "The Kid (1921)". Rotten Tomatoes. Retrieved October 23, 2020.
  21. ^ "IMDb Top 250". IMDb. Retrieved October 23, 2020.

External links[]

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