This 1931 Charlie Chaplin classic is the first film in the “Down With Depression” series at the Ontario City Library, 215 E. C St., screening at 6:30 p.m. Thursday. I’ll be there to introduce the film. You can read more about the series in last Sunday’s column.

Read about “City Lights” on Wikipedia here and Roger Ebert’s essay on the movie here. Spoiler alerts apply in both cases, of course.

Ebert concludes, for those of you uncertain about silent films:

“Most of Chaplin’s films are available on video. Children who see them at a certain age don’t notice they’re ‘silent’ but notice only that every frame speaks clearly to them, without all those mysterious words that clutter other films. Then children grow up, and forget this wisdom, but the films wait patiently and are willing to teach us again.”