Four years after launching United Artists with Douglas Fairbanks, Mary Pickford, and D.W. Griffiths, Charlie Chaplin distributed his first film through the company. It was a dream project that defied expectations. After making over 50 comic shorts, all of which he starred in, Chaplin not only released a straight romantic drama with A Woman of Paris, but—as he only appeared in it in a brief cameo, and under heavy makeup—it was easy to miss him on screen.
This 1923 film delighted critics, and its narrative and visual sophistication and the highly natural performance style of the actors made it a watershed release during Hollywood’s silent era, influencing countless directors, most notably Ernst Lubitsch. But it was a commercial failure, as audiences only wanted more of the Little Tramp. Still, while neither that iconic character nor anyone like him appears in it, A Woman of Paris is distinctly Chaplinesque, particularly in its fixation on the intricacies of actors’ expressions, gestures, and interactions with objects.
A young woman, Marie St. Clair (Edna Purviance), from the French countryside takes off for Paris, leaving behind her loving fiancé, aspiring artist Jean Millet (Carl Miller), after a tragic misunderstanding, and takes up with a wealthy playboy, Pierre Revel (Adolphe Menjou). You could say, then, that the story is rather boilerplate, but there’s a patient, subdued quality to A Woman of Paris that makes its characters’ behaviors feel so organic and profoundly alive.
An early dinner scene between Marie and Pierre exemplifies this relaxed naturalism as they leisurely smoke while glancing around the room and occasionally engaging in conversation. Later, Marie tells Pierre that she’s still in love with Jean and he responds that he doesn’t believe her, after which he gives her a quick, unexpected peck on the chin. Such realistic, almost improvisatory moments are emblematic of a film that communicates so much about the characters’ psychological states and their relationships to one another with so little.
Aided by the way that he had his actors recite every word of the script verbatim to further heighten the authenticity of every exchange, Chaplin allows characters depth and complexity, never reducing their personalities to a single trait. And through the accrual of incidents that are alive to the characters’ emotionally rich inner lives, a sturdy foundation is set for a visually, thematically, and dramatically resonant climax—so resonant, in fact, that Chaplin couldn’t resist tapping into its bittersweetness for many of his subsequent features.
Image/Sound
The Criterion Collection’s Blu-ray release is sourced from a new 4K digital restoration of the “second-generation full-frame dupe negative” of the 1976 rerelease version of A Woman of Paris. Contrast is strong throughout, grain is consistent in depth and density, and the image detail is great. Meanwhile, the uncompressed mono audio is robust enough to handle even the biggest emotional swells in both Charlie Chaplin’s original score and Timothy Brock’s alternate one. (The disc gives you the option to watch the film with either score.)
Extras
Chaplin scholar David Robinson kicks things off with a brief introduction to the film, touching on Chaplin’s affair with Peggy Hopkins Joyce and how her stories of her relationships to several millionaires informed the character of Marie St. Clair. In an excellent new video essay, Chaplin biographer Jeffrey Vance discusses the filmmaker’s extraordinary attention to detail in A Woman of Paris, as well as shares interesting background facts about the start of United Artists.
The disc also includes a pair of short but illuminating documentaries. The first, from 2003, includes interviews with actor Liv Ullmann and director Michael Powell, who discuss the film’s sophistication, while the second, from 2022, focuses on Edna Purviance’s contributions to A Woman of Paris and her collaborations with Chaplin on over 30 shorts.
Also included on the disc are several deleted scenes, trailers, footage of Chaplin and his partners signing the documents to open United Artists, and a 1966 audio-only interview with Chaplin Studios cinematographer Roland Totheroh, who serves up some good behind-the-scenes stories. Lastly, there’s a foldout poster with notes from Brock on his score and an essay by critic Alissa Wilkinson, who delves into the innovations and influence of The Woman of Paris.
Overall
Criterion’s Blu-ray release of Charlie Chaplin’s first feature-length film comes with a gorgeous transfer and a slew of varied, well-researched extras.
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