Charlie+Chaplin+A+park,+A+policeman,+and+a+pretty+girl

A Park, A Policeman, And A Pretty Girl

[|John Steinbeck], [|John Lennon], [|Truman Capote], [|Dalton Trumbo], and Charlie Chaplin. How were these men related? One was a musician the rest writers or actors, but besides that they were all in the publics eye. As well as in the eye of a much larger people, the government. All five of these men have been condemned by the government because of the fear of change and communism. This was not limited to these five men, in fact it was happening all across America. However this is not my point, my point is that out of all of the men listed here Charlie Chaplin was the most prosecuted and from almost every angle imaginable. Wall he may have been the biggest and most important thing to happen to our country and cinema all over the world the U.S. government saw a man who was questioning there authority and bringing in new ideas to people that differed from what the government believed. The government got even angrier when Chaplin did nothing to try to cover up the fact that went to parties for well-known communists and spoke out ageist the censorship of films. What really bothered Chaplin were the taxes. He saw the 7,500 pages of [|tax code]as a waste of time and effort and just decided not to pay the taxes. That alone caused him problems with the government for over thirty years. For Charlie Chaplin the United States was a place of refuge form his old life that destined him for the life of a bum, the United States also took away that refuge because one man voiced his views and did so with so much affection that it scared the most powerful government in the world to exile him and take away his dream. Is it my imagination or are all men entitled to the pursuit of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, As well as the right of free speech. **//

"I'm sorry, but I don't want to be an emperor. That's not my business. I don't want to rule or conquer anyone. I should like to help everyone if possible - Jew, Gentile - black man - white.” //**  April 16th 1889, London, Charles Spencer Chaplin was born to a drunken actor father, and a clincliny insane mother. Born in the slums of London what would you make of him, probly just like everyone else he would becaome an other drunken dead-beat. There was only one thing that stopped him from going down that dark road, and that was his love of acting. After his father left before he was three things turned for the worst. Only a few years later his mother was committed to a sanitarium there was only Chaplin, his brother and acting. Even today being born in to poverty is hard enough. But in the 1890’s it was even harder. Well this is the same Chaplin we all affectingly know as the tramp. The character loved by millions and the one thing that really defines not only the cinema of the 20th century but also the life of the common man. His story is one of rags to riches. He went from a nothing destute living in the slums to in the height of his career making 70 films and making $10,000 a week- making him the richest man in the world. ([|Time 100]) It looks like you can’t judge a book by its cover. **//

“Soldiers! Don't fight for slavery! Fight for liberty! In the seventeenth chapter of St Luke, it is written the kingdom of God is within man not one man nor a group of men, but in all men! In you! You, the people, have the power - the power to create machines. The power to create happiness! You, the people, have the power to make this life free and beautiful - to make this life a wonderful adventure. Then in the name of democracy - let us use that power - let us all unite. Let us fight for a new world - a decent world that will give men a chance to work - that will give youth a future and old age a security.” //** Chaplin lived on both sides of the spectrum, poor and useless, and rich. He knew the hardships of life and people look up to him because he had so much experience and managed to stay positive about the whole thing. [|Walt Disney] and [|Adolf Hitler], what do they have in common with each other. They both loved Charlie Chaplin and took inspiration from him in to there own life. It is said that Chaplin helped Walt Disney think up [|Mickey Mouse], and that it was Chaplin’s moustache that made Hitler cut his to match it. ([|ClassicMovies.com]) These are just two examples of millions of people loved him and wet to see his movies to get away from there lives and to laugh. Charlie was the most lived man in the world and everyone agreed. He was even the highest paid man in the world by making an astounding $ 10,000 a week. Even by todays standard that is very good. ([|Time100]) If you were to compare Chaplin to today in any way he would best even the greatest actors today. He made 70 films in 8 years and because of what people called a crazed love of perfection they all had amazing quality.([|Time 100]) Every few weeks a new movie would come out and everyone would come out to see it This was a very hard time in America and people needed something to get their minds of their troubles. They figured that Chaplin went through their lives and succeed and he could relate to them and help them. Which he did brilliantly time and time again. Charlie gave people an escape in laughter, which is the best medicine. He made people feel good and that is exactly the point of the films. This was not only in America but in other countries as well. In Russia he had a planet named after him, 3623 Chaplin.([|Dictionary of Minor Planet Names]) How many people can say that, not many. Even [|IBM] used his logo “The Tramp” from 1981-1987. **//

“We all want to help one another. Human beings are like that. We want to live by each other's happiness - not by each other's misery. We don't want to hate and despise one another. In this world there's room for everyone and the good earth is rich and can provide for everyone.” //** Many people have won [|academy awards] including Chaplin. However he has the amazing distinction for the longest ovation in academy award history when he received The Honary Award for “the inculcuble effect he has made in making motion pictures the art form of the century” in 1972 with a full five minute ovation. ([|Bio.com]) If that isn’t enough proof that he was truly love by the people than this should. After nearly two decades Charles Spencer Chaplin received on of the most prestigious award know to the world today. [|The knighthood]. Chaplin will forever be known as Sir Charles Spencer Chaplin. So after everything he went through he finally got what many people thought he should have gotten years before. We know that people loved him but why, because he was he was the greatest actor to have ever lived and changed the face of cinema forever. Being an actor was hard enough but imagine if you will having to control every aspect of the movie. That includes acting, writing, producing, directing, and every other thing that goes in to making a movie.(Great Lives From History) Hard right. Well that was the way Chaplin liked it. That was the only way Chaplin would have had it. He was a brutal director but if he wanted something done he could do it. He was one of an elite group of men who hold every aspect of cinema in their hands at one time and he was one of the greatest. At the same time as his rigorous schedule he had great films in a short amount of time with an unheard of amount of quality. Many people attribute this to his non-stop work ethic that today would get him in a lot of trouble. Some of the best proof of this is when a fire destroyed his sets and a devorce suit was being settled in court with his second wife shut down production for eight months.([|Chaplin: a look back]) But he got right back on the wagon and made what many consider one of his best films. When he started his own production company he even started to finance his own films so he could control the entire movie. Some times he would sometimes shot a scene sixty or seventy times to get it just right. ([|Chaplin A look back]) **//

“The aeroplane and the radio have brought us closer together. The very nature of these inventions cries out for the goodness in man - cries for universal brotherhood - for the unity of us all. Even now my voice is reaching millions throughout the world - millions of despairing men, women, and little children - victims of a system that makes men torture and imprison innocent people. To those who can hear me, I say: 'Do not despair.' The misery that is now upon us is but the passing of greed - the bitterness of men who fear the way of human progress. The hate of men will pass, and dictators die, and the power they took from the people will return to the people. And so long as men die, liberty will never perish.” //** The public loved Chaplin that is clear but why did the government hate him. Was it fear, was it a to make a point, was it his wealth? The Internal Revenue Service ([|IRS]) for one had a problem with the fact that Charlie did not believe in taxes and being the independent man he is decided to not pay them. Which as would expect that didn’t go over well and didn’t help his cause when other problems down the road. However he was also in a bad place at a bad time. You see this is the time when the IRS decided to start cracking down on famous people with money as an example for everyone else. The IRS even took down [|Al Capone]. ([|Going after the big ones]) Chaplin never got arrested but was in trouble on and off for thirty years with the IRS and in the end had a total of one million dollars in back taxes due when he left the United States. However when he settled down in Switzerland he paid $425,000 to settle the remaining $700,000 claim.([|Going after the big ones]) This was just the start of his many problems. **//

“The way of life can be free and beautiful, but we have lost the way. Greed has poisoned men's souls - has barricaded the world with hate - has goose-stepped us into misery and bloodshed. We have developed speed, but we have shut ourselves in. Machinery that gives abundance has left us in want. Our knowledge has made us cynical; our cleverness, hard and unkind. We think too much and feel too little. More than machinery we need humanity. More than cleverness, we need kindness and gentleness. Without these qualities, life will be violent and all will be lost.” //** In the large image of things I would consider the IRS a little thorn compared to the next group who came after him. The Federal Bureau of Investigations ([|FBI]) under the “expert” guidance of [|J. Edgar Hoover], Chaplin got a two thousand-page dossier on his every movement from 1922 until two years after his death. He was considered a communist by many including the [|McCarthyism] based [|House Committee on Un-American Activities]. Which later in life he was brought forward to testify to but was never called. He did still have many leftist views and friends. In fact the first report in the dossier is a party for a well-known American communist [|William Z. Foster]where he talked out ageist the censorship of films.(FBI can it Happen Again) it didn’t stop there though, he went to dinner with china's [|prime minister] [|Chou En-Lai], and soviet prime minister [|Nikolai Bulganin]. ([|Us blocked knight hood for Chaplin]) He became so enraged when he was not allowed re-entry in to the United States when he left to promote a film that he said two things that really let you see what he felt. The first really sums up what American was going through at that point. “I have been the object of lies and vicious propaganda by powerful reactionary groups, who by there influence and the aid of Americas [|yellow press]have created an unhealthy atmosphere in which liberal minded individuals can be singled out and prosecuted.” The second was a bit more comical but still as strong. “I have no further use for America, I wouldn’t come back if [|Jesus Christ]was president” and he lived up to that and only came back for a short time to receive an award shortly before his death. For most men this would be enough for them to change their ways but that was not chaplain’s way. One of his problems that plagued him always was his love life. Like everyone he had his problems, no one is perfect now are they. His problem was one of not just legal problems but of social problems. It was that he loved young women. We are not talking about twenty’s young, no what fun is that, we are talking sixteen young. Today he would be considered a [|pedophile], and not allowed out of his house. In the FBI’s file there seemed to be an almost complete fasciations with his sex life. They even started to bug his hotel rooms and talk to gossip columnists.(FBI could it happen Again) One of the worst things to happen to him because of his love of young women was when he got into a pertanty suit with Joan Berry. Chaplin was innocent of the pertanty suit but still had to pay for the child. However he was charged with the [|Mann Act]but it never materialized. (The Mann Act is what they are using to prosecute the [|ex-governor of New York] .)([|Mann Act Cornell]) What made chaplains situation worse was that the social norm at the time was to have one wife not many so the government closed in as did so did the people. **//

“Soldiers! Don't give yourselves to brutes - men who despise you and enslave you - who regiment your lives - tell you what to do - what to think and what to feel! Who drill you - diet you - treat you like cattle, use you as cannon fodder. Don't give yourselves to these unnatural men - machine men with machine minds and machine hearts! You are not machines! You are not cattle! You are men! You have the love of humanity in your hearts. You don't hate, only the unloved hate - the unloved and the unnatural!” //** One of the largest social reasons the government had a problem with Sir Charles was that he did not like to go with the norm. In a country in witch patriotism is key to survival and that it runs our country. Chaplin thought of it as “the greatest insanity that the world has ever suffered.” He also was considered a [|communist] by most government agencies and that just couldn’t be. Even though the FBI found no evidence of that they kept with it until the end.(FBI could it happen Again) Also he was in trouble for supporting the [|soviet army]and [|Stalin]’s ideas. As well as many of his later films started to push the envelope of “normality”. He him self was not normal and didn’t care. He did things his way and if people didn’t like it they would have to deal with it and that got him in trouble. Like all men Sir Charles Chaplin had flaws but he lived during a time when ideas were being challenged in favor of normality. And conformity was key. In his nature Sir Charles Chaplin was not conformities. However the barring of re-entry of Chaplin was and unneeded act done out of fear and caused the greatest thing to happen to cinema to leave Hollywood and never come back. **//

“By the promise of these things, brutes have risen to power. But they lie! They do not fulfill that promise. They never will! Dictators free themselves but they enslave the people. Now let us fight to fulfill that promise! Let us fight to free the world - to do away with national barriers - to do away with greed, with hate and intolerance. Let us fight for a world of reason - a world where science and progress will lead to all men's happiness. Soldiers, in the name of democracy, let us unite!” //** A man who saw his dream in America came here because he had no were to turn and no one to go to. He came to America and fulfilled his vision of acting. yet he went so far above that, he went on to change the face of cinema forever. More importantly he changed millions of lives and to this day still is. The government just couldn’t deal with someone who had more influence over the people than them and they were scared. Maybe we could have stopped this entire thing by having the government watch more films. In the last scene of one of his greatest films and his first “talkie” The Great Dictator something you don’t see much from anyone none the less a “leftist Actor”. Is one of the most famous and controversial of all of his quotes. it clearly shows that his love for peace is greater than any other thing for him, and that he wants freedom and peace in the world. **//

“Hannah, can you hear me? Wherever you are, look up Hannah. The clouds are lifting! The sun is breaking through! We are coming out of the darkness into the light. We are coming into a new world - a kindlier world, where men will rise above their hate, their greed and their brutality. Look up, Hannah! The soul of man has been given wings and at last he is beginning to fly. He is flying into the rainbow - into the light of hope, into the future, the glorious future that belongs to you, to me, and to all of us. Look up, Hannah... look up!" //**    **//([|The Great Dictator])//** media type="custom" key="814893"

Annotated Bibliography

Law. Dept. home page. Cornell University Law School. 14 Mar. 2008 .

This was an unbiased source that just states the United States code in an easy to understand and read format. It states the real code and is very easy to read. I would recommend it to anyone.

"Going After the Big Ones." __Time__ 28 Mar. 1983. 18 Mar. 2008 .

This is a very informative source about the history of the IRS’ arrests of famous people. Although it didn’t say much about each person it did have information as a whole. I would reckoned it if the person you are interested in is on this list.

Molotsky, Irvin. "F.B.I.; The Chaplin Flies: Can It Happen Again." __New York Times__ 22 Jan. 1986, Late, East Coast ed.: A.20. 14 Mar. 2008 <[|http://proquest.com>.]

This is a source about the FBI records concerning mr. Chaplin. They were very informative because they gave a second point of view on the issue on hand from someone writing a published book on the subject. The source also paraphrases the controversial points of the dossier into succinct points.

Douglas, Ann. "Time’s 100." __Time__ 8 June 1998. Abstract. 20 Mar. 2008 .

This is a annual report by time magazine that says its top 100 greatest people to have ever lived and separates them by field. The article in question is about Charlie Chaplin and is very good because it says him history as well as important facts but does not overload you with information Bright, Martin. "US blocked knighthood for Chaplin: Controversies that blackened Charlie's name." __Observer News Pages__ [London (UK)] 21 July 2002: 10. 14 Mar. 2008 .

This is an informative source that explains some of the big reasons why the government was so angered with Chaplin and it shows the ideas of a scholar. Written by a native brit it also shows a different countries view on the same topic.

"Charlie Chaplin." __Great lives from history__. Ed. Frank N Magill. Vol. 1. A-Cod. Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Salem Press, 1987. 453-457.

This source is the first one I got and it helped set up the background for my paper. It helped me paint a picture of who Mr. Chaplin really was without any bias. This is a very helpful source because it lets come to your own conclusions and doesn’t force the authors on to you.

"Oscar Record Breakers." __Biography.com__. 2007. 3 Apr. 2008 .

This source is very fact driven. Is just a list of interesting achievements made by people over the history of the Oscars. It is very helpful if you need an interesting fact fast and don’t want to look in a lot of different places.

"Charlie Chaplin: A Look Back." __CBS news__ 4 Jan. 2004. 28 Mar. 2008 .

This is a look back on the history of Charlie Chaplin and explains all of his films in some detail. This also said what the public said about the movies with is very helpful. It also explained some of his troubles and problems. This is an overall compilation of Chaplin’s life.

"A Tribute To Charlie Chaplin." __Classic Movies__. 11 May 2008 .

This website explains why Charlie was such a good actor and said some very interesting facts. It also helps to see viewpoints from a film person.

"(3623) Chaplin." __Dictionary of Minor Plant Names__. Ed. Schmadel D Lutz. 5th ed. New York: Springer, 2006.

This is a dictionary of minor planet names and is quite interesting. However if you don’t know exactly what you are looking for it can be entirely useless. Except fo that it is like any other type of book like it.