I can imagine this film was very controversial in its time, especially since it was conceived in the late 30’s. It still has some brilliant moments, and should be mandatory watching for everyone.
Here’s some fun trivia from IMDB (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0032553/trivia):
- Production on the film started in 1937, when not nearly as many people believed Nazism was a menace as was the case when it was released in 1940.
- When this film was released, Adolf Hitler banned it in Germany and in all countries occupied by the Nazis. Curiosity eventually got the best of him and he had a print brought in through Portugal. He screened it not once but twice. Unfortunately, history did not record his reaction to the film. When told of this, Charles Chaplin said, “I’d give anything to know what he thought of it.”
- Although this movie was banned in all occupied countries by the Nazis, it was screened once to a German audience. In the occupied Balkans, members of a resistance group switched the reels in a military cinema and replaced a comedic opera with a copy of this film, which they had smuggled in from Greece. So a group of German soldiers enjoyed a screening of this film until they realized what it was. Some left the cinema and some were reported to have fired shots at the screen.
- Released 13 years after the end of the silent era, this was Charles Chaplin’s first all-talking, all-sound film.
- The scene where Charles Chaplin dances with a globe had its origins in a 1928 home movie in which Chaplin also toyed with a globe in similar fashion.
- In Spain, the film was banned until dictator Francisco Franco died, in 1975.
- Charles Chaplin wrote the entire script in script form, except for the fake German, which was improvised. In addition, he also scripted every movement in the globe dance sequence.
- In Italy, all the scenes that involved Napaloni’s wife were cut from the movie to respect Benito Mussolini’s widow, Rachele. The complete version wasn’t seen until 2002.
- During Hinkel’s speech, there are several recognizable German words used. Most popular are “Wienerschnitzel” (a Viennese style breaded veal cutlet), and “Sauerkraut” (a kind of sour preserved cabbage). Others are “Leberwurst” and “Blitzkrieg”. Even a complete phrase is in formally correct German (but nonsense) ”...und der Ullstein mit der Wurst!” means: ”...and “Ullstein” (a well known publishing house in Germany) with the sausage! Though some other utterances vaguely resemble words in German, the speech is actually gibberish.
- When Charles Chaplin first announced that he was going to make this film, the British government – whose policy at the time was one of appeasement towards Nazi Germany – announced that they would ban it. By the time of the film’s release, though, Britain was at war with Germany and in the midst of the blitz, so the government’s attitude towards the film had completely changed.
- Chaplin blinks fewer than ten times during the entire final speech, which lasts over five minutes.
- The language in which the shop signs, posters, etc in the “Jewish” quarter are written is Esperanto, a language created in 1887 by Dr L.L. Zamenhof, a Polish Jew.
