Century Film Project

Celebrating the movies our ancestors loved

Tag: Crime films

November 13, 2021

The Haunted Castle (1921)

Originally released with the more prosaic title “Schloss Vogelöd” (“Castle Vogelöd”), this early work by F.W. Murnau skirts the edges of horror and Expressionism, without fully committing to either. Murnau does show his talent for psychological drama here, as well as atmosphere and narrative structure.

The movie begins by showing us a large manor, drenched in rain. We learn from intertitles that this is the home of Lord von Vogelschrey (Arnold Korff) and that the traditional hunting season has been rained out for several days. We move to the interior of the castle and see the host and his bored guests, who are playing cards, smoking, reading newspapers and the like. A servant enters the room and announces Count Oetsch (Lothar Mehnert), which seems to disconcert everyone. Count Oetsch enters and Vogelschrey takes him aside to another room. The guests outside gossip and we learn that the count got his title a few years ago on the death of his brother by shooting, and that he is suspected of the crime. This rumor gets nourished by a retired Judge of the District Court. Vogelscrhey informs Oetsch that his brother’s widow will soon be here, implying that he (Oetsch) should leave, but Oetsch acts nonchalant and makes it clear he intends to stay.

Read the rest of this entry »

Leave a comment
October 31, 2020

The Penalty (1920)

Lon Chaney established himself as the master of makeup and evil characters with this crime-horror feature after years in cinema, developing his range and honing his abilities. His character’s complexities lead to a surprisingly sympathetic portrayal of a man driven by revenge and evil.

The movie begins with a classic supervillain-origin-story: a child who has been in an accident is under the care of a young, freshly-minted doctor (Charles Clary), who amputates both his legs beneath the knees. When the doctor’s mentor arrives on the scene, he pronounces the amputations unnecessary, and the child learns of his disfigurement by overhearing them, then witnesses both doctors lying to his parents to cover up the mistake. Thus are the seeds of insanity sown. The boy grows up to become known as “Blizzard,” the chief of the criminal underworld in San Francisco. We first see him in his new role after a goon named Frisco Pete (Jim Mason) kills a streetwalker called Barbary Nell (Doris Pawn) in a dance hall. Pete runs back to Blizzard’s hideout and beat cops wisely choose to look the other way when they realize who is behind it. We learn that Nell has “wandered” from Blizzard’s gang, perhaps because for some strange reason he has put all of his girls to work in a sweatshop making hats. Read the rest of this entry »

Leave a comment
January 4, 2020

The Spiders Episode 2: The Diamond Ship

The second and final installment of Fritz Lang’s serial “The Spiders,” like the first one, owes a great deal to earlier silent cinema, but shows the innate talents of the still new director as he works in a somewhat formulaic genre.

The movie opens with a shot that could have been lifted directly from Maurice Tourneur’s “Alias Jimmy Valentine” – an overhead image of a jewel heist that shows a labyrinthine shop floor layout as various people move about and evade one another (it was a bank in the original). The Spiders break into the vault and take the jewels back to their base, but they are discouraged to find that the “Buddha Stone” is not among them. The Buddha Stone is a much sought-after prize that supposedly would “make Asia mighty” and  liberate its people from foreign rule if returned to them, so the Spiders want to sell it to the Indian-led “Asia Committee.” Apparently, they have looked everywhere for this precious and powerful jewel, but cannot find it. Read the rest of this entry »

Leave a comment
December 15, 2019

The Spiders (Episode One): The Golden Sea

This first episode in a crime serial was one of Fritz Lang’s first movies as a director, and is the earliest one that survives today. It shows his talent as well as how far the European movie business has come since the beginning of the First World War, but it also wears its influences rather obviously on its sleeve.

The movie begins with a kind of prologue in which we see an old hermit-type man throw a bottle into the sea just before being shot in the back with an arrow by a fellow wearing an elaborate feathered head dress. This is soon explained in a fancy club in San Francisco when a sportsman/adventurer by the name of Kay Hoog (Carl de Vogt) tells of finding the message in the bottle, which claims to be from a missing Harvard professor who has discovered and been held captive in a surviving Incan civilization. Hoog has verified the professor’s standing and lost status, and now decides to forgo a major boat race in order to head to Chile and try to find the immense treasure these Incans possess. Among his listeners is the lovely Lio Sha (Ressel Orla), who secretly works for the Spiders, an international crime syndicate of immense power and evil.

The spiders send some thieves who look like cut-rate Fantômas clones over to knock Hoog out and steal his map, leaving a large toy spider and a warning behind. Then the leader of the Spiders assigns Lio to lead a rival expedition to recover the treasure. Once in Mexico, she hires a bunch of roughnecks to assist her, and Hoog starts dressing like a cowboy. There’s a bar-room hold up in which he manages to recover a document that tells him about a mysterious “diamond ship,” though now the Spiders are in pursuit. He meets a professor (Georg John) who plans to fly in a balloon over the plateau where the Incas are, and he manages to climb aboard at the last instant despite the efforts of the Spiders to delay him.

Once we get to the Incan city, a lot of the movie is typical serial capture-and-escape material, with the Incans eager to sacrifice at least one of the trespassers, Lio Sha eager to kill Hoog, and her followers mostly interested in stealing the gold for themselves. Hoog meets  the Priestess Naela (Lil Dagover), and rescues her from punishment for refusing to sacrifice Lio. Lio and her gang are able to find the treasure, but chaos breaks out as the men start fighting over the treasure. Of course, at that moment the volcano erupts and wipes out the Incans as well as all of the Spiders except Lio Sha and one nugget-obsessed henchman.

Hoog and Naela are able to escape in a large floating basket and make their way back to San Francisco to be married. Lio Sha comes to him and asks him to join her, saying they would make a great team if they worked together and became lovers. Hoog refuses and Lio kills Naela in revenge.

This movie’s debt to the crime serials of Louis Feuillade would be less painfully obvious if Lang hadn’t cast Orla and dressed her to look so much like Musidora. She comes across as decidedly more German than French, however – she’s domineering and masculine rather than sexy and conniving. I find that de Vogt reminds me of René Cresté, who played “Judex,” though other reviewers compare him to a young William S. Hart. Hart played an Aztec in one movie, so maybe Lang was going for that here. I find it amusing that Lang thought “Kay” was a good first name for his all-American manly man hero. It’s not really clear to me why the “good” character is motivated to steal treasure from a civilization that has avoided Western contact, although all he does in fact is to fall in love with one of their priestesses and save her life. That said, the Spiders work well as a “Vampires”-style crime organization, and some of the best parts of the Feiullades sprang from the illogic of the series.

Overall, the film making technique of this movie is way ahead of the work Gaumont was putting out before and during the war. There are frequent close-ups, cuts within scenes, cross-cutting to enhance suspense, creative camera angles, and lighting. The camera moves to follow actors, and sometimes to reveal things at the right moment. In one scene, Hoog stands in front of a window of the cantina while Lio Sha carouses inside. Both of them are in perfect focus, and the edits each time Hoog peers inside allow us to think she might spot him at any moment. There’s a good use of silhouettes on the plateau at night, and we get actual darkness for night scenes, rather than just tinting a brightly-lit scene and expecting the audience to go along with it. When I was collecting screenshots for this article, I became especially aware of how fast the editing is compared to the movies I’ve reviewed up to now. Usually, I have plenty of time to choose my shot, but with this one, I had to hurry or it would cut away. The costumes and sets for the Incans are elaborate and beautiful (though probably not terribly authentic). Another break in logic came for me when the head-dress fellow snuck up on one of the Spiders’ guards and took him out. How did he not see that huge feathered thing coming right up to him?

The “diamond ship” subplot is a setup for the next episode, which came out in 1920, so I’ll be reviewing it soon as well.

Director: Fritz Lang

Camera: Emil Schünemann, Carl Hoffmann

Starring: Carl de Vogt, Lil Dagover, Ressel Orla, Georg John

Run Time: 1 Hour, 9 Min

You can watch it (together with part two, “The Diamond Ship) for free: here.

Leave a comment
October 27, 2019

The Master Mystery (1919)

To wrap up this year’s October review of chilling movies, I’m going to look at this serial starring no less a person than Harry Houdini. Once again, it’s not exactly a horror movie – it’s more of a crime serial ala Louis Feuillade – but it has madness, a robot, and lots of creative death-dealing situations for the hero to get out of, so I’m including it.

Our story begins in the home of Peter Brent (Jack Burns), the President of International Patents, Inc, a company whose nefarious scheme is to buy up the patents for new inventions from lone geniuses and keep them off the market – benefiting those who own existing patents by preventing free competition. Unbeknownst to Brent, one of his employees, Quentin Locke (Houdini) is actually an agent of the Dept. of Justice, investigating on the grounds of the Anti-trust Act, and he has wired Brent’s home for sound (most of the first shots we see of Houdini are his reactions to conversations other characters are having in other rooms, which can be a bit confusing). Locke is of course secretly in love with Brent’s daughter Eva (Marguerite Marsh), and Brent is actually having second thoughts about the whole scheme for her sake. Enter the real villains of the movie, Herbert and Paul Balcom (William Pike and Charles E Graham), a father-and-son team who hope to take over the company (the father) and marry Eva (the son). They also have collaborators in the form of a secretary named Zita Dane (Ruth Stonehouse) who is secretly in love with Locke and a lady-of-leisure with the unlikely moniker of De Luxe Dora (Edna Britton) who “dominates” Paul. Read the rest of this entry »

Leave a comment
June 25, 2017

Love’s Forgiveness (1917)

The final episode of “Judex” lives up to its title by being more about love and forgiveness than about crime and revenge. It serves almost as more of an epilogue than a discreet chapter of the serial.

The movie begins at the seaside villa which has served as Judex’s headquarters for the final parts of the story. Judex (René Cresté) and his brother (Édouard Mathé) lead Favraux (Louis Leubas) into a room and put him in a chair, where he contemplates his fate alone, and breaks down crying. Shortly, Judex leads Jacqueline (Yvette Andréyor) into the room to see her father. When he leaves the room, she reaches out at first towards him as if she cannot bear his departure, but then turns her attention to her father, embracing him. Judex rejoins his brother and mother, Countess de Tremeuse (Yvonne Dario), looking downcast. His mother assures him that Jacqueline now knows the truth, and that she loves him. The Countess now brings Le Petit Jean (Olinda Mano) to Jacqueline and Favraux, and the child seems to break the grandfather from his stupor, as he again accepts his role in the loving family. His expression resumes its blank look when Judex walks into the room and asks for Favraux to pronounce judgment upon him. Favraux asks to see the Countess first. Judex leads Favraux to his mother, and Favraux breaks down and begs her forgiveness. The Countess informs him that he is forgiven, because of the harm that revenge will bring to the innocent Jacqueline and Jean.

Meanwhile, the Licorice Kid (René Poyen) has found Robert in the yard and asks to see Cocantin (Marcel Lévesque). Robert takes him to the marina, where Cocantin and Daisy Torp (Juliette Clarens, if my deductions are correct) are returning from their adventures. Cocantin, still wearing Daisy’s hat, introduces her as his fiancée. The Licorice Kid appears to approve of his choice. The next day, Kerjean (Gaston Michel) is walking on the seaside when he finds the body of a woman – it is Diana Monti (Musidora), who evidently drowned in her attempt to escape justice the previous night. Michel, who has been deprived of his son by this woman’s machinations, appears to be bitterly satisfied at the discovery.

The official “Epilogue” is now announced with an Intertitle, and we see Judex’s now united family, represented by Robert, the Countess, and Le Petit Jean walking in the woods. They find Kerjean sitting sadly at the seaside and Jean runs up to him and kisses him, which brings him out of his reverie. Although he has lost his son, it seems he has a place with the family and can still partake of their love. Favraux, we learn, chooses to live in ongoing isolation without reclaiming his fortune. We see him pruning a tree in his old garden. He interrupts his work when a poor girl comes begging at the gate, and he gives her some money – proving his repentance is sincere, since the series began with him turning away a similar beggar in the Prologue. Next we see Cocantin and Daisy Torp in wedded bliss, with the Licorice Kid as their officially adopted ward. Cocantin proves his love by demonstrating that he is learning to swim on a tabletop. Finally, Judex and Jacqueline are shown in a happy embrace, having overcome everything to be together in one another’s arms.

And so ends “Judex,” the third of the crime serials directed by Louis Feuillade, perhaps France’s most important director of the late Nickelodeon period. I’ve seen all three now, and, due to the nature of this project, I wound up seeing them in the sequential order of their release: first “Fantômas,” then “Les Vampires,” and finally “Judex.” During that time I’ve discovered that each one has its fans and devotees, and that there isn’t agreement on which is the “best” of the three serials. I usually try to avoid reducing my reviews to simple analyses of whether I like a film or not, but I have to admit that for me the progression has been pretty much downward. “Fantômas” remains my favorite, then “Les Vampires,” and “Judex” is at the bottom of the list. This despite the fact that the filmmaking techniques, and especially the editing, decidedly improved over time. I have a theory that which one will be your favorite depends on which one you see first. They’re each so different that if you go into the second and third ones expecting more of what you got in the first, you’re bound to be disappointed.

That’s a compliment to Feuillade, really, a reflection of the breadth of his skill and imagination. He did not simply make three serials that were all the same, he made three very distinct cinematic experiences, linking them only in terms of cast and themes. And, just because “Judex” seems to me the least of the three Feuillade serials, doesn’t mean I haven’t enjoyed watching it. It’s easily one of the best serials of the period, even if it isn’t “Fantômas.” (I have yet to meet a silent fan who regards “The Perils of Pauline” with the devotion so many give to these movies. “Judex” was made in part as a response to criticism that Feuillade’s earlier crime films had glamorized criminals and de-emphasized the heroes. I think that’s part of why it seems less modern and interesting to me. I think Feuillade tries so hard to emphasize redemption and love that he forgets to include enough action, and his fascinating villainess winds up being cast off, literally killed off as an afterthought at the end of the series. But, in doing this he also more or less invented the concept of the superhero, an iconic figure that the world would spend the next century exploring and re-examining. That’s an accomplishment worth celebrating.

Director: Louis Feuillade

Camera: André Glatti, Léon Klausse

Starring: René Cresté, Yvette Andréyor, Musidora, Édouard Mathé, Gaston Michel, Yvonne Dario, René Poyen, Marcel Lévesque, Louis Leubas, Olinda Mano, Juliette Clarens

Run Time: 13 Min

You can watch it for free: here (episode incomplete. I have not found the complete episode for free online. If you do, let me know in the comments).

Leave a comment
June 17, 2017

The Water Goddess (1917)

The penultimate episode of “Judex” has what appears to be the final cycle of capture-and-release for the serial, ending on the cusp of a final resolution. An empowered female hero arises, even as our traditional male superhero begins to soften and appear more human.

An oblivious Judex.

The episode begins with Judex (René Cresté) explaining his determination to negotiate for the life of Favraux (Louis Leubas) to his brother (Édouard Mathé). He shows him a big wad of francs he intends to pay as ransom, then goes off to wait at the seashore. Even though he has foolishly gone alone, he is observed by chance by Cocantin (Marcel Lévesque) and his new fiancée, Daisy Torp (I believe she is played by Juliette Clarens). They are able to clearly see the rowboat “sneaking” up to shore behind Judex, but he obstinately stares in another direction, being surprised when Diana Monti (Musidora) reveals herself. He offers to negotiate for Favraux, but Monti makes him come back to the Eaglet with her, and Favraux asks him to write another note to his daughter, telling her that Judex’s life will only be spared if she comes herself. He refuses, giving away his identity and telling Favraux that when he comes back to his senses, he will realize that he does not belong with Monti and Morales (Jean Devalde). They respond by tying him to a post in the cabin. Read the rest of this entry »

Leave a comment
June 9, 2017

Jacqueline’s Heart (1917)

This episode of “Judex” serves as something of an interlude in the action of capture-and-release, but it does further the plot with an important discovery and confession. If you’re worried about “spoilers,” you’ll want to watch it before reading!

The entire episode takes place within the confines of the Mediterranean estate where the Countess de Tremeuse (Yvonne Dario) has brought Jacqueline (Yvette Andréyor) to recuperate after her most recent ordeals. Jacqueline is pouring her heart out to the Countess at the beginning of the episode, in distress because of her father’s fate. The audience, of course, knows that the Countess is the instigator of this tragedy, in her blind desire for revenge (see “The Woman in Black”). Her son Jacques de Tremeuse (René Cresté) listens in from a convenient balcony while Jacqueline wishes aloud that Vallieres were present to advise her. He immediately goes to his room and puts on his “Vallieres” disguise. Amost as soon as he arrives, Jacqueline gets a note from her father, tellng her he is alive and asking her to meet him at night in a secluded area with Le Petit Jean (Olinda Mano) After consoling her for a while, Vallieres/Jacques retires to his room and changes into his “Judex” outfit, presumably to meet the villains who have “liberated” her father.

At least we get to see him in the cape!

It is now night, and Jacqueline peers out of her window to see a caped figure creeping through the garden. Immediately, she runs to Vallieres’s room to awaken him, but instead she finds the wig and beard that Jacques wears when he’s dressed as Vallieres! The Countess comes in and sees her turmoil. She takes the confused Jacqueline out to a veranda and says that it is time to tell her the whole truth. We see their conversation acted out without Intertitles, although the audience knows what she has to say: Jaqueline now must realize that Jacques and Vallieres are one and the same, and that both are actually Judex.

The running times of episodes in Feuillade’s serials often vary greatly, but this one stands out as unusually short. Most of the “Judex” episodes have run about two reels long, but this clocks in at less than ten minutes, presumably not even a full reel of film. It’s possible that there’s some missing footage, but I haven’t read anything to confirm that and the episode as it stands clearly moves the plot forward (more than some of the longer episodes have in fact), so I’m inclined to think that it was meant to be this way. It’s also possible that title cards have been dropped from the discussion at the climax of the movie, but as it is, it leaves the audience to fill in the details of the Countess’s revelations and Jacqueline’s reactions from our memories and imaginations. The two actresses do a remarkable job of carrying off this emotional scene.

Director: Louis Feuillade

Camera: André Glatti, Léon Klausse

Starring: René Cresté, Yvonne Dario, Yvette Andréyor, Olinda Mano, René Poyen

Run Time: 8 Min, 30 secs

You can watch it for free: here.

Leave a comment
June 3, 2017

When the Child Appeared (1917)

This episode of the serial Judex does contain a kidnapping, trespassing, and a sexy swimsuit, but is mostly pretty staid family fare overall. As the plot develops, we become more concerned with family relations than with crime and revenge.

The movie begins at a Mediterranean estate, where Madame Tremuese (Yvonne Dario) has brought Jacqueline (Yvette Andréyor), Robert (Édouard Mathé), Le Petit Jean (Olinda Mano), and the Licorice Kid (René Poyen). Apparently, they are all relaxing and enjoying themselves, and also feel reasonably secure from the scheming of the villains, since the kids are allowed to play unsupervised, and the adults spend their time at the seashore. Next door, we learn, Judex (René Cresté) has brought Kerjean (Gaston Michel) and Favraux (Louis Leubas), who also needs some time in the sun to recover his sanity after his long imprisonment below ground. Judex reassumes the title Jacques de Tremeuse and arrives at his mother’s estate, announcing that he has only just returned from the colonies, but both Jaqueline and Le Petit Jean feel they have seen him before. It is decided to invite Cocantin (Marcel Lévesque) down to see them as well, and this gives Diana Monti (Musidora) and Morales (Jean Devalde) a chance to tail him in hope of finding Favraux.

Read the rest of this entry »

Leave a comment
May 29, 2017

The Usurer’s Grip (1912)

This educational film from Edison was made in collaboration with a Progressive-Era nonprofit that was fighting for equitable credit for working people. It has a clear message about the “right way to get a loan,” but is rather basic in terms of film technique.

The movie begins by introducing our protagonists: The “Jenks,” a middle class family with a sick daughter (Edna May Weick) on a set that appears to be a crowded urban apartment. The Intertitles inform us that they are having financial concerns due to the unexpected expense of her malady, and there is concern that they will lose their rented furniture. Then, Mr. Jenks (Water Edwin) spots an ad in the paper for a loan company that promises low rates and easy payments. The next scene shows the office of the loan company. Here, a poor woman on one side of a counter pleads for assistance, but is turned away by the female clerk on the other side. Then, our couple enters. The wife (Gertrude McCoy) takes a seat while the man goes up to the same counter the poor woman was turned away from. He is chastised when he steps a bit too far into the workspace of the clerk. She takes his information, however, and in the next scene we see the loan agent (played by Charles Ogle, who was the Frankenstein monster in the 1910 “Frankenstein”) visiting their home to make certain they have adequate collateral. He offers them a $25 loan, to be paid back in six “easy” payments of $7.50 per month – totalling $45! Mr. Jenks at first refuses, but the loan shark won’t negotiate and he needs the money, so he reluctantly signs the papers. The loan shark gives him the money, then takes a bill off the top to cover “drawing up the paperwork.”

Read the rest of this entry »

Leave a comment