Modern Times 1935 1936 1937 next previous
Modern Times Clippings 351/382
Motion Picture Herald, New York, April 18, 1936.
Soviet City Lights Poster, 1936, justinreynoldswriter.com, detail
& CHAPLIN IN RUSSIA
United Artists announces that the distribution rights
to Chaplin‘s „Modern Times“ for the Soviet Union
have been sold through the Amkino Corporation, their
American agents, to the Soviet motion picture
industry. The deal also includes Chaplin‘s „City Lights,“ and
represents the first time that any of Chaplin‘s sound
films are to be shown in the Soviet Union.
It is stated that the public interest in „Modern Times“ has
been running high in the U. S. S. R. ever since a Soviet
film delegation, headed by Boris Shumiatsky, returned from
Hollywood with enthusiastic reports of the picture,
which they had previewed in its unfinished form as the guests
of Chaplin. All of which poses the question whether
the prints provided the Soviet Union by United Artists will
contain those scenes, which, it is said, were ordered
eliminated from the American version by „Czar“ Will H. Hays,
as too strong for the delicate constitutions of American
movie audiences.
Mr. Hays, as indicated by his ruling on Sinclair Lewis‘s
„It Can‘t Happen Here“ and other recent films that
tended to disclose that all was not quite as well as it might be
in this „best of all possible worlds,“ shies away in holy
horror from any attempt at satire of the current social scene.
He seems to believe that the „revolution“ is just
around the corner.
As everyone who has seen „Modern Times“ knows,
its social content, as it has been screened for
American audiences, is quite innocuous. Its significance,
if any, is solely for those sophisticated folk, who
do not see eye to eye with Mr. Hays as to the merits of our
present social and industrial system. For the others,
„Modern Times“ is just good, old-fashioned Chaplin slapstick
comedy.
So it may be that the Russians will be disappointed,
if they find that the scenes, which the Soviet film
delegation saw and which greatly enthused them, have been
eliminated by the American movie „Czar.“
In the same announcement from United Artists, it is stated,
that an invitation to Chaplin to attend the opening
of „Modern Times“ in Moscow, will be sent to him shortly
on his trip around the world. If he accepts, perhaps
the Soviet film industry might persuade him to stay awhile
in Russia and make a movie there, which would not
have to be edited by the Hays office.
(...) Merritt Crawford, Observing the Motion Picture Industry,
Independent Exhibitors Film Bulletin, April 8, 1936
„There would be no changes“
Editorial content. „FIGHT OVER PROPAGANDA IN SOVIET
FILMS HEADED FOR SUPREME COURT“ (...)
„Meanwhile Charles Chaplin‘s films are finding great favor
in the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. Mr. Verlinsky
announced this week that negatives of City Lights, produced
in 1931, and Modern Times, Chaplin‘s latest, have been
shipped for exhibition in that far-flung country.
Mr. Verlinsky, who closed the deal with United Artists
on instructions from the central Soviet film industry,
said that while Russia exercises censorship over films, both
Chaplin pictures were considered suitable and there
would be no changes. The Russian masses as well as the
industry executives consider Chaplin a great artist,
he said.“ (...)
Redaktioneller Inhalt
Modern Times 1935 1936 1937 next previous