The Chaplin Collection: Essentials Box Set

Chaplin completists won't hesitate to pick up the hefty eighteen-disc Complete Collection box set, featuring his ten feature-length films along with Richard Schickel's outstanding feature-length documentary Charlie: The Life and Art of Charlie Chaplin on a bonus disc. But Chaplin fans with modest budgets or film lovers with a more limited interest in the master comic's career can also pick up the Chaplin Essentials Box, holding his four recognized masterpieces along with said documentary: The Gold Rush, City Lights, Modern Times and The Great Dictator.

While similar to the American eight-disc Chaplin Collection that has been available for Region 1, this Essentials box replaces the flawed late-career Limelight by City Lights, arguably Chaplin's greatest film and the one classic still awaiting release in America. Each of the four titles includes an excellent introduction from Chaplin biographer David Robinson and a half-hour featurette in the newly produced Chaplin Today series, which offers more background on the film, followed by contemporary filmmakers' perspective on the Chaplin film in question. The best addition however is the inclusion of a wealth of rare archival inclusion, ranging from outtakes and deleted scenes to screen tests and previously unseen behind-the-scenes footage. The supplements for City Lights even include a full seven-minute sequence that was completed, but cut by Chaplin at the last minute as it held up the main narrative too much. It's a brilliant scene, as funny on its own as just about anything in his completed masterpiece. The other extras and featurettes are deliberately playful, making one wish at times for a more thorough background documentary. Thankfully, the 132-minute documentary Charlie easily makes up for this absence, offering an authoritative, highly engaging look at Chaplin's complete career.