A KING IN NEW YORK is a curious film in the Chaplin-canon. It was his first film to be produced outside of Hollywood. It was the last film in which he had a starring role. It was his second to last completed film altogether. It is also by many regarded as his worst film, but while it is hard not to recognize that KING is uneven in places, I find it equally hard not to recognize its better qualities.
By the time he embarked upon the screen-play, Chaplin had been seeking for a story for his next film since his exile out of the United States in 1952. For a while he considered getting his beloved Tramp character back in the limelight, but abandoned this idea as he was getting too old for doing the sort of physical playfulness that was required from the character. He finally landed on the story of King Shadhov, who has eloped to New York as a revolution has taken place in his country. Nearly broke, the king is forced into making money in ways which might disturb his royal image. He acquaints a super-intelligent, albeit precocious kid named Rupert (Michael Chaplin), whose parents are suspected of being communist sympathizers during the prime of the McCarthy-era. Chaplin ridicules several aspects of contemporary American culture, including predictable movies, commercials, rock'n'roll, how plastic surgery is increasingly being used out of a obsessive desire to prevent age to be recognized, and Television; one sequence probably stands even more relevant today, when King Shadhov is invited to a gathering in which he, unbeknownst to him, is being filmed through hidden cameras and shown directly on TV this was ages before reality-TV, folks.
What is usually criticized about the film is how Chaplin's personal bitterness over his exile is made too evident, and that he seems to be dealing with more problems than he can chew. In my eyes, these are not big problems; the satire may rarely be subtle, and it is obvious that the film is based on personal opinions of the creator, but such it had always been with Chaplin. Ever since the first films he made in which a conscious move to leave comment on the society can be traced, Chaplin's motive had not been as much to put the society to question as to let the society be the target of his comedy simply because he found lots of comic potential in it. I don't believe Chaplin would have made MODERN TIMES had he not seen the possibilities of making comedy out of the serious theme it covers. In the same way, he hardly made KING in a desire to let out his opinions, at least not solely so; rather, I believe that in search of new comedy material, he decided to use themes which had obsessed him much in the last few years, making the McCarthy-era and American culture obvious choices.
Chaplin tries to chew a lot, but I think he succeeds most of the time, as his covering of nearly every theme in the film somehow relate to one another. More importantly, I think much of the comedy is breathtakingly funny; when King Shadhov arrives at the airport, exclaiming to his ambassador that "We fooled them!", not realizing that a reporter has placed a microphone beneath his mouth, I laughed out loud, and it went louder pretty much throughout. One part which always makes me nearly roll on the floor in laughter is when Shadhov and his ambassador are having lunch right after Rupert has admitted to them that his parents have been members of the Communist party, making the two men so nervous they can't drink their coffee. It then knocks on the door, resulting in the ambassador getting his tongue paralyzed and being only able to shiver a series of "C-c-c-c-c-c-c 's" until the person who knocked, a room service man, has left, whereupon the ambassador THEN exclaims totally exhausted, " Come in!" The timing is perfect from both Chaplin and Oliver Johnston, who in fact overshadows Chaplin's performance a few times in the film.
Yet, despite my conviction that A KING IN NEW YORK is a far cry better than its reputation claims, it suffers from inevitable short-comings. Some of the parts in which the comedy is not present are rather dull. I don't get what purpose the queen in the film fulfills, other than making way for an obvious conclusion to the story; the king and the queen has decided to divorce on the king's insistence, but they part on friendly terms. A scene follows in which the two of them chat about how the king once thought the queen was too young to know her best, but it turned out that she weren't, and so on, and the queen is then not granted a mention again until the very end, when it turns out she won't get a divorce after all; it's remarkable how these news fail to affect me each time I view the film. Also, here and there the dialogue feels rather superfluous. It has been pointed out that Chaplin here was working without his own studio and employees, for the first time in forty years, which possibly made him less open for criticism from others while making the film, or he may not even have been offered it. One should also note that Chaplin didn't remain blind to KING's lesser qualities; several years later, he wrote that he felt "rather uneasy about the whole film." Chaplin went too far. A KING IN NEW YORK is by no means his best film, but it must rank among his funniest, and is quite thought-provoking every once in a while.
By the time he embarked upon the screen-play, Chaplin had been seeking for a story for his next film since his exile out of the United States in 1952. For a while he considered getting his beloved Tramp character back in the limelight, but abandoned this idea as he was getting too old for doing the sort of physical playfulness that was required from the character. He finally landed on the story of King Shadhov, who has eloped to New York as a revolution has taken place in his country. Nearly broke, the king is forced into making money in ways which might disturb his royal image. He acquaints a super-intelligent, albeit precocious kid named Rupert (Michael Chaplin), whose parents are suspected of being communist sympathizers during the prime of the McCarthy-era. Chaplin ridicules several aspects of contemporary American culture, including predictable movies, commercials, rock'n'roll, how plastic surgery is increasingly being used out of a obsessive desire to prevent age to be recognized, and Television; one sequence probably stands even more relevant today, when King Shadhov is invited to a gathering in which he, unbeknownst to him, is being filmed through hidden cameras and shown directly on TV this was ages before reality-TV, folks.
What is usually criticized about the film is how Chaplin's personal bitterness over his exile is made too evident, and that he seems to be dealing with more problems than he can chew. In my eyes, these are not big problems; the satire may rarely be subtle, and it is obvious that the film is based on personal opinions of the creator, but such it had always been with Chaplin. Ever since the first films he made in which a conscious move to leave comment on the society can be traced, Chaplin's motive had not been as much to put the society to question as to let the society be the target of his comedy simply because he found lots of comic potential in it. I don't believe Chaplin would have made MODERN TIMES had he not seen the possibilities of making comedy out of the serious theme it covers. In the same way, he hardly made KING in a desire to let out his opinions, at least not solely so; rather, I believe that in search of new comedy material, he decided to use themes which had obsessed him much in the last few years, making the McCarthy-era and American culture obvious choices.
Chaplin tries to chew a lot, but I think he succeeds most of the time, as his covering of nearly every theme in the film somehow relate to one another. More importantly, I think much of the comedy is breathtakingly funny; when King Shadhov arrives at the airport, exclaiming to his ambassador that "We fooled them!", not realizing that a reporter has placed a microphone beneath his mouth, I laughed out loud, and it went louder pretty much throughout. One part which always makes me nearly roll on the floor in laughter is when Shadhov and his ambassador are having lunch right after Rupert has admitted to them that his parents have been members of the Communist party, making the two men so nervous they can't drink their coffee. It then knocks on the door, resulting in the ambassador getting his tongue paralyzed and being only able to shiver a series of "C-c-c-c-c-c-c 's" until the person who knocked, a room service man, has left, whereupon the ambassador THEN exclaims totally exhausted, " Come in!" The timing is perfect from both Chaplin and Oliver Johnston, who in fact overshadows Chaplin's performance a few times in the film.
Yet, despite my conviction that A KING IN NEW YORK is a far cry better than its reputation claims, it suffers from inevitable short-comings. Some of the parts in which the comedy is not present are rather dull. I don't get what purpose the queen in the film fulfills, other than making way for an obvious conclusion to the story; the king and the queen has decided to divorce on the king's insistence, but they part on friendly terms. A scene follows in which the two of them chat about how the king once thought the queen was too young to know her best, but it turned out that she weren't, and so on, and the queen is then not granted a mention again until the very end, when it turns out she won't get a divorce after all; it's remarkable how these news fail to affect me each time I view the film. Also, here and there the dialogue feels rather superfluous. It has been pointed out that Chaplin here was working without his own studio and employees, for the first time in forty years, which possibly made him less open for criticism from others while making the film, or he may not even have been offered it. One should also note that Chaplin didn't remain blind to KING's lesser qualities; several years later, he wrote that he felt "rather uneasy about the whole film." Chaplin went too far. A KING IN NEW YORK is by no means his best film, but it must rank among his funniest, and is quite thought-provoking every once in a while.