Hello,
I am a person who really loves Chaplin, and own copies of almost every movie available from his Sennet days to "A King In New York". I usually play them from the earliest to the latest about once every year or two. My heart sinks as I approach "Limelight". I find it to be a trial to sit through. It seems to drone on and on, and be filled with bathos.
If I hear Claire Bloom say "Calvero" over again, and whine on and on about life, I will probably scream. Actually the best part of the movie by far is when Chaplin slaps her. This is what we wanted to do for the first 6 or 7 hours the movie appears to last. The only other highlight is of course Chaplin's encounters with Buster Keaton, although why we hear no one laughing during their music routine, I don't know. It really ruins it. I would say this movie is a sad comment on a star in decline, but "A King in New York" has a lot of funny pleasurable moments.

***** 1952. Written and directed by Charles Chaplin. Academy award in the Best Musical Score category in 1973 (LIMELIGHT wasn't shown in los Angeles until 1972) ! Sublime melodrama of the British genius with Buster Keaton as guest star. A young ballerina falls in love with an aging clown. Masterpiece.

Few feature films can boast this movie's depth and breadth of hot breath. Its first two hours have no action, little plot, less story and are nothing more than Chaplin pontificating about nearly everything, blah, blah, blah. You might find yourself fidgeting for, not just a moment here and there, but every minute of those first two hours. It's dreadful.

But wait, here's the shocker, it's all worth it. Suddenly, after talking at the audience for two hours, Chaplin ends the film with brilliance. Yet, this film's closing scene with Keaton only pays off if you sit through the first two hours leading up to it, so don't rob yourself. In short, there is no scene in any film ever made that betters this one. Being brought to tears of laughter and sadness simultaneously is a rare and luscious experience. And here it works on multiple levels with the scene all at once capping off the film's point while also documenting a very real truth about the lives of Chaplin and Keaton.

The talk about Keaton's best stuff being edited out of this scene is mostly frustrated affection for the brilliance of what the film has. All this wondering about what gems might have been discarded, for all time, is simply a loving embrace of the final scene's wonderful humor and sadness. It's so good that everyone wants more, please, just another few moments of these conflicted, exciting emotions.

Famous for the only on-screen pairing of Chaplin and Keaton, the all-time masters of physical comedy, Chaplin's self-directed, self-scored, and evidently semi-autobiographical "Limelight" is a bittersweet comedy. The ravishing Bloom is spirited playing opposite the maudlin, melancholy Chaplin, and Keaton certainly holds his own with his idol in that memorable final scene. Hilarious at times but also woebegone in its farewell tribute to a music-hall tradition the director no doubt misses, "Limelight" is the furthest thing from a clown show.

Charlie Chaplin's movies from very early on were not only funny, but always seemed to reveal some basic truths about humanity. Unlike most of his works, which were comedies with a little pathos, Limelight is pathos with a little comedy. Yes, Chaplin can still make you laugh, but in Limelight he will make you cry, he will make you think, he will make you understand the truths about life and love. The dialogue in this movie is not only filled with great, insightful lines, but has a distinct and mesmerizing rhythym. And the musical score has one of the most hauntingly beautiful melodies ever written. If you think that Limelight is nothing but sappy, overemotional melodrama, then either you haven't grown up or you're not paying attention to the important things in life.