This silent classic from the embryonic stages of the horror genre was filmed by Tod Browning about four years before directing Bela Lugosi in the first sound version of 'Dracula' (1931). By this stage he had already shot a large number of two reelers since starting his directorial career in 1915. Browning's background was as a carnival barker, clown and and black-faced minstrel before joining DW Griffith in 1913 and, as with this film, a number of his films utilise carnival characters and the circus milieu, from 'The Show' (also 1927) to 'Freaks' (1932).
Set in Spain, Lon Chaney Senior plays Alonzo, an 'armless' knife-thrower who is passionately in love with the circus owner's daughter, Nanon (played by a young Joan Crawford). Nanon has a pathalogical fear of being touched by men, so one would have thought she need look no further, were it not for the attentions of Malabar, the circus strongman (Norman Kerry). However, Alonzo is not as he seems; a mass murderer who hides his arms and his trademark bifurcated thumbs strapped beneath a corset. As his dwarven Lautrec-like sidekick Cojo (John George) points out, should they ever marry it would not be too long before Nanon discovers his secret. Alonzo therefore bribes a surgeon to remove his arms, only to discover that the object of his obsession has overcome her phobia and has found relief from her condition in the bulging arms of Malabar.
The rather grotesque story of amour fou unfolds steadily and surely, with a neat sting in the tail at the end, but it is Chaney, the 'man of a thousand faces' that really makes the piece. Born in 1896 to deaf deaf-mute parents perfected his skills of mime by necessity, so was a natural for the silent screen where he became the first major star of the genre in films such as 'The Miracle Man' (1919), 'The Hunchback of Notre Dame' (1923) and 'The Phantom of the Opera' (1925). Browning and he made a total of ten films together, starting with 'The Unholy Three' (1925) and including 'London After Midnight' (1927) and 'West of Zanzibar' (1928). What is most impressive here is the way in which he contorts his body, expressing the role through his posture. Scenes such as him smoking a cigarette with his feet while his arms lie draped over the sides of his armchair, or twiddling his toes with an empty glass of wine in front of him when his beloved fails to turn up to an arranged rendez-vous are just mind-boggling.
Unfortunately for Chaney, in the same year as this film came 'The Jazz Singer', the first ever talkie, and the following year, the all-talking horrors of 'The Terror' (Roy del Ruth). Chaney only ever made one sound film, a remake of 'The Unholy Three' in 1930, but was recovering from a throat cancer operation when it was shot and died shortly after. His son, Lon Chaney Jnr, took over his mantle to become one of Universal's early major horror stars, and later a prolific B-movie fixture in the likes of 'The Alligator People' (1951) and 'Al Adamson's 'Dracula Vs. Frankenstein' (1971).
Set in Spain, Lon Chaney Senior plays Alonzo, an 'armless' knife-thrower who is passionately in love with the circus owner's daughter, Nanon (played by a young Joan Crawford). Nanon has a pathalogical fear of being touched by men, so one would have thought she need look no further, were it not for the attentions of Malabar, the circus strongman (Norman Kerry). However, Alonzo is not as he seems; a mass murderer who hides his arms and his trademark bifurcated thumbs strapped beneath a corset. As his dwarven Lautrec-like sidekick Cojo (John George) points out, should they ever marry it would not be too long before Nanon discovers his secret. Alonzo therefore bribes a surgeon to remove his arms, only to discover that the object of his obsession has overcome her phobia and has found relief from her condition in the bulging arms of Malabar.
The rather grotesque story of amour fou unfolds steadily and surely, with a neat sting in the tail at the end, but it is Chaney, the 'man of a thousand faces' that really makes the piece. Born in 1896 to deaf deaf-mute parents perfected his skills of mime by necessity, so was a natural for the silent screen where he became the first major star of the genre in films such as 'The Miracle Man' (1919), 'The Hunchback of Notre Dame' (1923) and 'The Phantom of the Opera' (1925). Browning and he made a total of ten films together, starting with 'The Unholy Three' (1925) and including 'London After Midnight' (1927) and 'West of Zanzibar' (1928). What is most impressive here is the way in which he contorts his body, expressing the role through his posture. Scenes such as him smoking a cigarette with his feet while his arms lie draped over the sides of his armchair, or twiddling his toes with an empty glass of wine in front of him when his beloved fails to turn up to an arranged rendez-vous are just mind-boggling.
Unfortunately for Chaney, in the same year as this film came 'The Jazz Singer', the first ever talkie, and the following year, the all-talking horrors of 'The Terror' (Roy del Ruth). Chaney only ever made one sound film, a remake of 'The Unholy Three' in 1930, but was recovering from a throat cancer operation when it was shot and died shortly after. His son, Lon Chaney Jnr, took over his mantle to become one of Universal's early major horror stars, and later a prolific B-movie fixture in the likes of 'The Alligator People' (1951) and 'Al Adamson's 'Dracula Vs. Frankenstein' (1971).