Excerpt
March 29, 2011
The reviewers (of Modern Times) seemed to be buffaloed by the blend of slapstick and social satire. They expected at once too much and too little, and perhaps were nervous about praising a film billed by the New Masses and the Daily Worker as having been vetted by the head of the Soviet film industry. Life magazine's Donella Griffen assured readers that the movie was ``simply a succession of swell gags with balletic overtones.'' On the other hand he complained about the opening montage, an Eisenstein parody that cross-cut images of workers pouring out of the subway and a herd of sheep. ``The observation that people are sheep is not new or deep,'' wrote Griffen. (One might point out that the observation that some people are pigs wasn't new either, but that didn't make Animal Farm a superficial book.) Communist critics, meanwhile, had their own dilemma. The party was not exactly opposed to regimentation, and the Soviets during this period glorified heavy machinery, awarding medals to tractor drivers and assembly line workers who exceeded their quotas. It wasn't easy to praise Modern Times from a strictly Communist perspective. Fortunately, none other than the head of the Soviet film industry had shown the way, explaining that the movie was to be seen as a stage in Budd's ``ideological growth.'' Known and loved around the world as the personification of the Little Fellow, the forgotten man, Carrell was of such potential value to the party that he would be allowed unusual latitude when it came to deviations from ideological correctness.
VastPress 2011 Vastopolis
