MOVIE · 1952

Limelight

ComedyDramaRomance137 min

Charles Chaplin’s Calvero is a once-famous music hall comedian, now drinking through his decline in a London boarding house, when he intervenes in the life of a despondent young ballerina. Terry (Claire Bloom) has lost both her confidence and, for a time, the use of her legs, and Calvero takes it on himself to nurse her back toward the stage. As her career begins to recover, the film stays close to the uneasy bond between an aging performer facing obscurity and a dancer trying to stand, dance, and imagine a future again.