Gov 490 Movie Review

Poverty and unemployment. These words bring to mind unpleasant and bleak pictures. Anxious and hungry faces and dirty and ratty clothes are some of the images we associate with these words. In movies today, the effects of poverty and unemployment are represented in graphic relief to shock and impress upon viewers the terrible consequences of being jobless and homeless. In Modern Times, Charlie Chaplin performance as an unfortunate factory worker gives an entirely different, positive outlook on what it is like to be in need.
Chaplin’s character starts the film as an assembly line worker in a factory. As the film progresses, you see how his repetitive job is beginning to affect him physically and mentally. During his breaks, he walks rigidly and his arms continue to move as if he were still working on the assembly line. Eventually he has a mental breakdown that results in the loss of his job. From there he has several run-ins with the law, meets a young woman who is also unemployed and unsuccessfully occupies a few jobs. The writers of Modern Times use slapstick comedy to portray these unfortunate events, not grimly, as is expected, but as humorous and light. The attitudes and actions of Chaplin and the young woman are not desperate, but hopeful.
The visual presentation of the woman exhibits a subtle optimistic attitude towards hardships. Though she is dirty and her clothes are torn, she is beautiful, youthful and healthy. This coupled with Chaplin’s constant buoyant and cheerful disposition, despite their deprived situations, makes clear the filmmakers intent to look at unemployment and poverty not as hopeless and desolate, but as an opportunity that should be approached with a can-do and upbeat attitude.