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Stunning hand drawn old vintage original poster of the cult Charlie Chaplin classic, Modern Times (1936) for sale.
This is an actual surviving poster of Modern Times, which was released in India by the National Film Development Corporation of India (NFDC).
Modern Times is often hailed as one of Charlie Chaplin's greatest achievements, and it remains one of his most popular films till date, making this old hand drawn poster highly collectible.
Designed, printed and circulated in India somewhere in the 1970s/1980s during the film's release in India, this Charlie Chaplin movie poster was originally intended for publicity but never ended up being used.
This quirky, hand drawn original poster features an almost abstract painted avatar of Charlie Chaplin in his trademark Tramp character. A hand painted still from the most memorable scene in the film is seen at the bottom in yellow. The combination of color tones used in this poster, i.e. pink, red and yellow together with quirky hand painted artwork give this poster a very appealing vintage look.
Modern Times is a 1936 comedy film written and directed by Charlie Chaplin. Appearing in his iconic Little Tramp avatar, the film traces the daily struggles his character faces in the modern, industrialized world. Modern Times portrays Charlie Chaplin as a factory worker employed on an assembly line.
Modern Times was an oddity, as it was an almost completely silent film released in an era where the industry had long since moved on to sound (talkies). Charlie Chaplin began preparing the film in 1934 as his first sound film or “talkies”. Dialogues were reportedly scripted for the film but abandoned soon after. The film was reverted back to a silent format with synchronized sound effects. Charlie Chaplin is reported to believe that his iconic “Tramp” character would lose value if he ever spoke on screen, particularly in non-English speaking territories.
It is widely believed that Charlie Chaplin was inspired in part to make Modern Times after a chance conversation with Mahatma Gandhi, in which the Father of the Nation complained about the industrial age's ill effects in producing “machinery with only consideration of profit”.
The Library of Congress selected Modern Times in 1989 for preservation in the United States National Film Registry.
