Synopsis
Charlie, a wandering tramp, becomes a circus handyman - soon the star of the show - and falls in love with the circus owner's stepdaughter.
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Cast
- Charlie ChaplinA Tramp
- Al Ernest GarciaThe Circus Proprietor and Ring Master
- Merna KennedyCircus Proprietor's Stepdaughter, a Circus Rider
- Harry CrockerRex, a Tight Rope Walker / Disgruntled Property Man / Clown
- George DavisA Magician
- Henry BergmanAn Old Clown
- Tiny SandfordThe Head Property Man
- John RandAn Assistant Property Man / Clown
- Steve MurphyA Pickpocket
- Chester A. BachmanCop (uncredited)
Recommendations
- 100
Slant Magazine
It is Chaplin’s great elegy to the lost art of music-hall pantomime and, for that matter, the soon-to-be lost art of silent-film comedy. - 100
Time Out
There’s an edge to The Circus that suggests a man gazing deep into the void, laughing at the darkness and urging us to do the same. - 100
Chicago Sun-Times
Charlie Chaplin was a perfectionist in his films and a calamity in his private life. These two traits clashed as he was making The Circus, one of his funniest films and certainly the most troubled. - 90
Salon
Mixing sweetness, darkness, violence and delirious gags, this 1928 must-see showcases film's greatest comic. - 88
LarsenOnFilm
Mostly the movie registers as a comedy flag being planted, a claim being made. Anything your average clown could do, Chaplin could do better. - 70
The New York Times
There are passages in The Circus that are undoubtedly too long and others that are too extravagant for even this blend of humor. But Chaplin's unfailing imagination helps even when the sequence is obviously slipping from grace. - 70
Variety
In clinging to a tale of logical sequence, without the expected interpolations or detached incidents, Chaplin's Circus for speed, gags and laughs has not been equalled on the sheet. But it's very broad, for Chaplin makes no attempt at subtlety in this one.
