City Lights - ALL-TIME 100 movies

Return to index

Talkback

E-mail this to a friend

From the TIME Archive

Archive Collection:
Oscar Greats

TIME Magazine:
Best of the Archive

Browse:
Movies Covers

GREAT PERFORMANCES

Movie Magic
Great roles and the performers who brought them to life

GUILTY PLEASURES

Lowbrow, High Praise
Even critics have their secret favorites. Take a look at ours

Richard Corliss' picks
Richard Schickel's picks

TOP SHORT FILMS

Selected Short Subjects
Ten small movies with grand achievements

BEST SOUNDTRACKS

Top Scores
Music that makes these movies

TALKBACK

Your thoughts on our list:

The one movie I feel should have definitely made the list (of top 3 movies, let alone 100), is Seven Samurai. Maybe this was an oversight because you didn't want more than two Kurosawa films on the list? If this was the case, I feel Seven Samurai is a better movie than Yojimbo.

—John Ferrigno

Here are three of my top ten list that didn't make it: Lacombe, Lucien, Hard Times and Samurai Trilogy.

—Rick Ackerman

Send us your thoughts >>

AUDIO FROM AUDIBLE.COM

		Charlie Rose gets in depth with TIME'S film critics on the ALL-TIME 100 Movies list. Download it now on Audible.com
Listen to Corliss & Schickel talk about the list

ALL-TIME 100 BEST NOVELS

100 Best Novels
TIME's Richard Lacayo and Lev Grossman select the best novels since 1923

50 Coolest Websites »
Best and Worst of 2004 »

City Lights (1931)

Directed By: Charles Chaplin
Screenplay: Charles Chaplin
Cast: Charles Chaplin, Virginia Cherrill


Previous	Next: City of God


EVERETT COLLECTION

he immortal tramp falls in love with a blind flower seller, with results that are both poignant and deeply comic. Chaplin's sentimental side was never more delicately stated. But his funny side, as he desperately tries to earn money for the operation that will restore the girl's sight, was never more hilariously deployed than it was in this spare, curiously haunting film.—R.S.

From the TIME Archive:

Chaplin does not reject the sound-device because he does not think his voice will register. His objection is that cinema is essentially a pantomimic art

—TIME Magazine, Feb. 9, 1931 >>

Not a subscriber?
Get 6 Issues of TIME for $1.99 >>

Rate This Movie

Next: City of God

READER'S TOP FLICKS

1: Goodfellas
2: Farewell My Concubine
3: Taxi Driver
4: Bande à part
5: City of God

See the full list >>