Hitler gets burned, so to speak

Rating: 9/10 (22 February 2009)

This satire is just really, really dead-on, and nobody is spared. But even though this movie has plenty of laughs within the silly story and the grotesque imitation of Hitler (here cleverly renamed as "Hynkel", and speaking in a hilarious kind of pseudo-German), the general tone is pretty sad, maybe because of the movie's place in history. And the actors aren't even exaggerating that much I suppose. One of the greatest movie moments of all time must be the Jewish barber's ending speech, if only things could have ended in that way. It's not even really the character talking anymore, it's Chaplin saying something he really wanted to say. If you ignore the technical aspects, the movie doesn't feel dated or old, it actually moves at a pretty nice pace. And the sharp humor we find everywhere in this work will never die, the only thing I don't care for is the slapstick, but that just comes with the era I suppose. This is an incredibly daring, harsh take on fascism, it's so hard-hitting still after all these years.