Other Titles • Monsieur Verdoux • A Comedy of Murders (1947) • Der Frauenmörder von Paris (1952) • Der Heiratsschwindler von Paris (1952) • The Ladykiller (1947) • Monsieur Verdoux - Der Frauenmörder von Paris (1952)
Synopses for Monsieur Verdoux (1947)
1.
This blistering little black comedy was well ahead of its time when released in 1947. Originally, Orson Welles had wanted Chaplin to star in his drama about a French mass murderer named Landru, but Chaplin was hesitant to act for another director, and used the idea himself. He plays a dapper gent named Henri Verdoux (who assumes a number of identities), a civilized monster who marries wealthy women, then murders them (as we meet him, he's gathering roses as an incinerator ominously bellows smoke in the background) and collects their money to support his real family. The Little Tramp is now a distant memory, though this was the first film not to feature Chaplin's beloved creation. Verdoux is largely viciously clever until it gets too heavy-handed, as evidenced when a woman he spares returns years later as the mistress of a munitions manufacturer. Ultimately, Chaplin breaks character (much as he did in The Great Dictator) to preach to the masses, declaring that against the machines of war that grip the planet, humble killer Verdoux is "an amateur by comparison." --David Kronke
2.
Charlie Chaplin abandoned his "Little Tramp" persona for this dark comedy about a man driven to murder.
Like so many others, bank clerk Monsieur Verdoux loses his job during the Great Depression -- and can't find another. Because he has an invalid wife and child to support, the desperate Verdoux hits upon a novel way of making a living: he marries wealthy women, one after another, and kills them. Then he returns home to his beloved family, who remain in blissful ignorance of his extracurricular activities.
But when an unexpected tragedy occurs, he finds it impossible to continue the charade...
Martha Raye, as a woman who continually frustrates Verdoux's murderous plans, provides one of the film's comic highlights.
3.
On one level, Monsieur Verdoux is the story of a fired French bank clerk who goes into business for himself - marrying and murdering women for their money. On another level, the film is an indictment of war, in which according to Verdoux, mass murder is legalized, celebrated and paraded. "Killing is the enterprise by which your system prospers," Verdoux says. "As a mass killer, I am an amateur by comparison."
This evaluation was particularly apt in the case of the wife, played by the irrepressible Martha Raye. As Anabella, Raye is one spouse who simply refuses to be murdered, comically evading the deadly traps that Verdoux sets for her. Another potential wife escapes her fate when Verdoux leaves her at the alter. Others were not so fortunate, however, and in the end, the family of one missing wife gets its revenge when Verdoux is sent to the guillotine.
4.
Monsieur Verdoux is a bluebeard - he marries women and kills them after the marriage to get the money he needs for his family. But with two ladies he has bad luck.
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