When Universal found that they had two monumental successes on their hands with "The Hunchback of Notre Dame" and "The Phantom of the Opera", both of whom had for their main characters a being so deformed and hideous, they turned once again to Victor Hugo for what they hoped would be another hit. But Lon Chaney was not available - he had gone to MGM in the meantime and was now established as their top star and they were not about to lend him. The late 1920s saw German expressionism at it's height in Hollywood and the studios at the forefront of the surge were Fox and Universal. So Universal turned to the country of it's founder's birth and in particular a thriller called "Waxworks" to find both a new director, Paul Leni, and a star, Conrad Veidt.
The very grim Victor Hugo story is about an outlaw band - the dreaded Comprachicos, whose surgeon roves the country carving huge grotesque grins onto young children's faces, forcing them to grow up to become side show freaks. There are some chilling images in the prologue where Gwynplaine, as a child, wanders among bodies and human bones hanging from scaffolds as a blizzard whips up. The little boy then finds the blind Dea clasped in her dead mother's arms. The England that Paul Leni has conjured up is a bleak and haunted world.
As the years go on Gwynplaine (Veidt) becomes the "laughing man", a strolling player in the troupe of Father Ursus (Cesare Gravina), the one person who didn't turn his back on the orphans, but to Dea (beautiful Mary Philbin), who cannot see his hideous grin, he will always be goodness and light. Chaney could not have bettered Veidt's performance in which his eyes are truly the windows to his soul.
At Southwark Fair, one of the sideshow proprietors (George Siegman, a Griffith regular) realises that Gwynplaine is the missing heir to Lord Clancharlie's estates, now taken over by the seductive Duchess Josiana and the ambitious Barkiphedro who had Gwynplaine's father tortured and killed in the "Iron Lady" over 20 years before. Olga Baclanova is just a sensation - the censor must have been asleep - she has two nude scenes within her first introduction and she plays a Countess who loves nothing better than donning dirty peasant rags and mingling (and allowing them to take great liberties) with the ruffians down at the fair.
The last part of the film is very Griffith influenced ("Orphans of the Storm"). Gwynplaine's castle and land have rightfully been restored to him but he is being forced into marriage with the lustful Josiana. Dea (like the blind Louisa in "Orphans") is thwarted at every turn until she and Ursus are forced from the city by the power hungry Barkiphedro, then it is Gwynplaine's turn to race through the town. His head was turned by Josiana and in the scene where she strips away his mask and, displaying both lust and loathing, kisses his deformed mouth, there is so much sensuality and passion in her performance, a reviewer at the time commented that "she burns holes in the screen".
The Kino release that I have features a restored orchestral Movietone soundtrack, complete with a theme song "When Love Comes Stealing" that they may have hoped would be as popular as "7th Heaven's" "Diane" - but it wasn't.
The very grim Victor Hugo story is about an outlaw band - the dreaded Comprachicos, whose surgeon roves the country carving huge grotesque grins onto young children's faces, forcing them to grow up to become side show freaks. There are some chilling images in the prologue where Gwynplaine, as a child, wanders among bodies and human bones hanging from scaffolds as a blizzard whips up. The little boy then finds the blind Dea clasped in her dead mother's arms. The England that Paul Leni has conjured up is a bleak and haunted world.
As the years go on Gwynplaine (Veidt) becomes the "laughing man", a strolling player in the troupe of Father Ursus (Cesare Gravina), the one person who didn't turn his back on the orphans, but to Dea (beautiful Mary Philbin), who cannot see his hideous grin, he will always be goodness and light. Chaney could not have bettered Veidt's performance in which his eyes are truly the windows to his soul.
At Southwark Fair, one of the sideshow proprietors (George Siegman, a Griffith regular) realises that Gwynplaine is the missing heir to Lord Clancharlie's estates, now taken over by the seductive Duchess Josiana and the ambitious Barkiphedro who had Gwynplaine's father tortured and killed in the "Iron Lady" over 20 years before. Olga Baclanova is just a sensation - the censor must have been asleep - she has two nude scenes within her first introduction and she plays a Countess who loves nothing better than donning dirty peasant rags and mingling (and allowing them to take great liberties) with the ruffians down at the fair.
The last part of the film is very Griffith influenced ("Orphans of the Storm"). Gwynplaine's castle and land have rightfully been restored to him but he is being forced into marriage with the lustful Josiana. Dea (like the blind Louisa in "Orphans") is thwarted at every turn until she and Ursus are forced from the city by the power hungry Barkiphedro, then it is Gwynplaine's turn to race through the town. His head was turned by Josiana and in the scene where she strips away his mask and, displaying both lust and loathing, kisses his deformed mouth, there is so much sensuality and passion in her performance, a reviewer at the time commented that "she burns holes in the screen".
The Kino release that I have features a restored orchestral Movietone soundtrack, complete with a theme song "When Love Comes Stealing" that they may have hoped would be as popular as "7th Heaven's" "Diane" - but it wasn't.