What people forget about W.C. Fields—after innumerable caricatures—is what a strange, sad creature he was, how brilliantly wobbly his timing, how agreeably slapdash his movies. Alcoholism is the subtext: His heroes are forever out of sync, his time out of joint. He could be mean—as in his breathtaking (and, in one scene, amazingly raunchy) short The Dentist, or discombobulated and abused and passive-aggressive, as in It's a Gift (pictured) and Man on the Flying Trapeze. All three open Film Forum's series April 22 and 23. But come back for the shorts, some rare silents, The Bank Dick, and that zany ensemble farce International House.
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