"The Mask of Fu Manchu" (1932) on Warner Archive Instant

"They have way's in the East of shattering the strongest courage."  

     Myrna Loy may be my favorite actress of all time. Her and William Powell in "The Thin Man" picture's (mostly just the first two) epitomize the breezy, witty elegance I love about old Hollywood. Their performance's and intoxicating (pun intended) chemistry together are what make the film's so wonderful- not the workmanlike direction (despite some fine work by James Wong Howe), not the screenplay which doesn't do justice to the source material- "The Thin Man" is a screen classic because it's star's willed it to be by being so damn charismatic and watchable. Well, Dashiell Hammett's essential novel has to be credited, too. Even though it's richness and dark side were watered down in translation to the screen, it's sense of humor remained intact, and Loy and Powell perfectly capture the dynamics of the crime solving couple. Two year's before "The Thin Man" would make her a bona fide Hollywood legend, Loy acted in a picture based on one of author Sax Rohmer's "yellow peril" novel's, "The Mask of Fu Manchu". It's representative of the kinds of role's Loy was given before her ascendancy to superstardom. Her angelic, yet somewhat exotic looks often caused her to be cast in non-Caucasian part's. "Thirteen Women", also available through WAI, is another great example. Loy had been in the business almost a decade and had made around eighty movie's before the film that made her career. Her "Fu Manchu" co-star was someone who understood taking the long road. Despite having been in Hollywood for 15 year's, Boris Karloff had only just become the King of the Monster's the year before in "Frankenstein".

     Sir Lionel Barton (Lawrence Grant) has been tasked with finding the tomb of Genghis Khan, on the edge of the Gobi Desert. The British Government must find it before the fiendish supervillain Dr. Fu Manchu (Karloff) does. They fear if he obtains Khan's mask and sword he will lead the East against the West. But, before Sir Lionel leaves the British Museum on his quest he is kidnapped by Fu Manchu's agent's who have been hiding in sarcophagi.

     We are introduced to Fu Manchu in his stylish lair of supervillainy, working in his laboratory. His distorted reflection flank's him, showing the true face of his twisted soul. Sir Lionel refuses when he is tempted with money to divulge the tomb's location. He's then subjected to the "torture of the bell", where he is placed below a giant bell and made to endure it's ceaseless tolling. As we watch the torture continue, Fu Manchu is established as a truly merciless, evil character. Despite the makeup he wears, Karloff portrays Fu Manchu in a rather straightforward manner, not using the offensive, stereotypical dialect often employed by actor's in "yellow face".

     "I ask you to receive a message from my ugly, insignificant daughter.", is how Fu Manchu introduces Fah So Lee (Myrna Loy) to an audience of his devotee's. It's a hoot seeing Nora Charles herself keep a straight face while delivering ominous dialogue of silly gravitas.

     Sheila (Karen Morley), Sir Lionel's daughter, accompanies the British expedition to the tomb, where they find Khan's treasure. Fu Manchu's men stage a raid on the house where the Brit's are staying. This leads to some fairly violent pre-code moment's when one of the archaeologist's is stabbed in the back and shoots his attacker before dying. Later, Sir Lionel's severed hand falls out of a tree (yeah...you read that right) as a warning to the group.

     Terrence (Charles Starrett), Sheila's beau, acquiesces to the threat and brings the sword to Fu Manchu's lair. In a fantastically staged and shot sequence an obvious Karloff stunt double conducts electricity into the weapon, reducing it to nothing. The 1930s must've been a great time to own an electrical equipment company in Hollywood. Why have movie laboratories stopped being made up of thing's which buzz and produce lightening? Modern realism is so aesthetically unpleasing. Throughout the picture, the evocative, shadowy cinematography of Tony Gaudio gets the most out of some really great set's. It may be the B-grade material of serial's, but it's given an A-list treatment here.

     Enraged by what he believes to be an attempt to trick him with a fake sword, Fu Manchu orders Terry to be tortured. Fah So Lee sees to this in a moment of pre-code kink, having her servant's whip him over and over, while orgiastically yelling "Faster! Faster!". Loy's wardrobe throughout the film is ridiculously wonderful and exotic. She portrays the arch villainy of her character here with the same ease as the light hearted comedy for which she'd become known.

     The violence continues to escalate when Sir Lionel's corpse is dumped at the house where the British team is staying. Nayland Smith (Lewis Stone) of the British Secret Service, the chief government agent there, goes to an opium den he believes to be connected with Fu Manchu to investigate. In a proto Indiana Jones moment, he fall's through a trap door into a snake filled subterranean lair and is captured by the fiendish Doctor.

     The torture's of Terry persist when he is subjected to an injection of Fu Manchu's mind control formula in a completely mad scene of baroque pulp weirdness. Fu Manchu extracts the poison from a tarantula, then allows a snake to bite one of the black servant's who line the room, in order to take the venom from him. Fah So Lee observes the proceeding's, smoking her pipe, surrounded by her servant's; the camera holds her cruel beauty in close-up.

     Using Terry as his instrument, Fu Manchu gains possession of the sword. Will he use his new power to conquer the world? Will Nayland Smith be able to extricate himself from the pit of crocodile's and stop him? Will Sheila be sacrificed? Will Terry become the love slave of Fah So Lee (as torture's go, that one ain't so bad)? It all comes to a head during a scene of wholesale slaughter by electrocution.

     Fu Manchu is the personification of the Anglo fear of losing the seat of privilege and control in society. This paranoia reaches it's psychotic crescendo in a scene where Fu Manchu urges his follower's to, "Kill the white man and take his women." Indeed, the last scene in the film, showing a servile, homely Chinese man waiting on our heroes is a racist reaffirmation of the Caucasian status quo.

     Outmoded, offensive racial views aside, "Mask of Fu Manchu" is still a hell of a good time. It's premise is antiquated and outdated, but the story is told in such a bold, unrestrained manner that it's tough to resist. Violence, drug den's, severed hand's, wanton sexuality- it's pre-code nature allows the film to indulge the most lurid and fun element's of pulp fiction. Karloff portrays Fu Manchu with his trademark gentlemanly malevolence. Four year's before Elsa Lanchester held the screen with him in "Bride of Frankenstein", Myrna Loy proved herself worthy of the task, matching Karloff with her elegant physical presence.

"Tomorrow's Children" (1934) on Youtube

 "The doc here just wants to cut a little of the badness out of me."

     Eugenics and America have a weird, extensive history together, one that has been cast into the shadow's of history. Before the whole Hitler thing put the kibosh on selective breeding, sterilization for select individuals was supported and encouraged by both science and the American government. In researching legendary circus attraction Schlitzie the pinhead for my review of "Freaks", I discovered the 1934 picture "Tomorrow's Children" which deals with the then contemporary social issue head on. Directed by future "House of Wax", "He Walked By Night" and "Mysterious Island" screenwriter Crane Wilbur, it's a somewhat confused take on what is still an uncomfortable chapter in the American story.

     Fresh faced couple Jim (Carlyle Moore Jr.) and Alice (Diane Sinclair) are young and in love. Jim has a bright future in the laundry business and is eager to get hitched. Nancy, though, is saddled with a terrible home life taking care of her irresponsible, alcoholic parent's and disabled brother's. The film gets off to a bleak start, with her drunken louse of a father (Arthur Wanzer) getting the news that his baby has been still born. "One less mouth to feed.", he replies.

     The pathetic sadness continues when Nancy goes to see her mother (Sarah Padden). "Poor lucky little devil", her mother says, referring to the dead baby. Later as the doctor's discuss the incident, one of them expresses relief, saying, "Good thing, too. She already had a house full of idiot's and cripple's." This film is an incredible repository of callous, insensitive dialogue, especially when viewed through the cultural prism of the 21st Century. "...see, have I gotta sock ya to say yes?", is Jim's romantic marriage proposal to Alice, and unable to resist the charm of threatened physical abuse, the lucky little lady agrees.

     Right on the heel's of this happy occasion, Nancy is hit by some really bad news, courtesy of a social worker waiting at her house. She's poor, and her family won't stop having kid's, so what does the government want to do? Why sterilize the whole clan, of course. Their reasoning is, "Most of the past three generation's have been feeble minded...each generation more of a problem..". Alice escapes from the house and hops a train where she is almost sexually assaulted by a hobo. She jumps off and gets a ride from a kindly man who turns out to be a sheriff (Dick Rush...great name). He delivers her to the very court she was trying to avoid in the first place. In one day Nancy's life has turned into a misogynistic Kafkaesque nightmare.

     Inside the courtroom, Schlitzie stands before the judge (Frank LaRue), who sentences him to sterilization. Dressed in men's clothing and sporting a beard, it's incredible how normal the microcephalic freak show performer appears. The judge seems to pass the same sentence on every defendant who is brought before him: forced sterilization. Every defendant, that is, except the pervy creepo who moment's earlier, in a moment of pre-code titillation, ripped off a nurses clothing. He has a Senator representing him thanks to his daddy's political connection's, so the judge reverses his order.

     Jim convinces Dr. Brooks (Donald Douglas) to argue Alice's case, but the judge will hear none of it. Nancy is condemned to sterilization. Brooks feels responsible for Nancy's situation and vows to help her. Throughout the picture, I kept viewing it as a dystopian, fascist alternate version of America and had to keep reminding myself that what's portrayed in the film isn't so far from the actuality of what was happening in the country at the time.

          At the hospital Schlitzie is prepared for his procedure. Spike (Hyram A. Hoover), the other poor mope sentenced to the same fate, is scared they are going to chop off his manhood, but Dr. Brooks gives him an enthusiastic and detailed description of the operation that plays like an educational film put out by the vasectomy society. Here it becomes unclear what the film's stance is on the issue. Dr. Brooks, crusader of low income people's right to procreate, sure is gung ho about the idea when it comes to delinquent's like Spike and Schlitzie. So is this not so much an anti-eugenics picture as a eugenics reform picture? Is it an argument for the fair and just use of forced sterilization? I'm not sure.

     Dr. Brooks tries unsuccessfully tries to convince his boss, Dr. McIntyre (W. Messenger Bellis...another great name) to spare Nancy, arguing that the poor are unfairly targeted and that eugenics would have robbed history of some it's greatest mind's. As the clock ticks closer to Nancy's surgery, Brooks rushes to her house in a last ditch effort to try and convince her mother to sign a form exonerating her.

     "Tomorrow's Children" is a strange low budget relic of both Hollywood and America'a past. A sterilization thriller about the right's of the individual versus the cold logic of the system; Frank Capra by way of David Cronenberg. It's a message picture, but one so muddled it's unclear what exactly the message is.

   

     

   

"Freaks" (1932) on Warner Archive Instant

"You laugh at them, shudder at them, and yet, but for the accident of birth, you might be even as they are."

     Tod Browning never left the carnival behind. He spent the early part of his life travelling with different shows, doing various jobs, including a "Living Corpse" routine, where he would be buried in a coffin (fitted with an air tube) for day's with only pocketful's of malted milk ball's for sustenance. That kind of experience, gained from having led a life outside cinema before stepping behind the camera, is something that has been increasingly rare in the post film brat generations. Tod Browning the carny informed Tod Browning the director; the live's of those who work the midway is an element in many of his work's including "The Unknown", "The Unholy Three" and, most famously,"Freaks", a morality tale set in the world of sideshow performers.

     Browning's interest in the physically malformed had been apparent in many of his works with Lon Chaney such as the aforementioned "The Unknown", as well as "Where East Is East" and "The Blackbird". He wastes no time in "Freaks" portraying the ugly scorn with which the world treats the performer's that populate the picture. In a series of short scene's he shows the "freaks" to be happy, caring people who are patronized, mocked and treated cruelly by the "normal" world. Few films take aim at hypocrisy so effectively in such a short time.

     We are thrown into into a fully realized, living, breathing world with an ensemble of characters. The viewer is immersed in the everyday backstage life of the carnival performer. Hans (Harry Earles), a dwarf, is smitten with beautiful trapeze girl Cleopatra (Olga Baclanova). She exploits his feelings for money and gift's, while making a fool of him behind his back with her domestic abuse loving boyfriend Hercules (Henry Victor), the Strong Man.

     The movie has a rapid fire pace, and Browning never stops bombarding the viewer with unique and unsettling situations and image's still unparalleled eighty year's later. Whether it be the charming chronicle of the relationship issues of Siamese twins (Daisy and Violet Hilton) or the upsetting moment when Hercules punches the Half Woman-Half Man (Josephine Joseph) square in the face, we are constantly forced to react to things we have never seen before. In a poignant scene of profound kindness, the freaks gather around the bed of the Bearded Lady (Olga Roderick) and her newborn child. The Pinheads (Schlitzie, Elvira Snow, Jenny Lee Snow), Koo-koo the Bird Girl, Johnny the Half Boy (Johnny Eck), Angeleno the dwarf (Angelo Rossitto), the Bird Girl (Elizabeth Green) and the Half Woman-Half Man are framed by Browning's camera as if they were in a classic painting, not displayed as grotesque's, but as loving friend's. Director's such as John Waters and Werner Herzog, who force their audience to acknowledge the existence of society's outliers, are very much the children of Browning.

     At the center of this environment, a romance blossoms between Phroso the clown (Wallace Ford) and Venus (Leila Hyams), who walked out on Hercules due to his abuse of her. Theirs is an innocent, enthusiastic love, especially when juxtaposed with the cynical manipulations of Cleopatra. Frieda the dwarf, who was once the object of Hans' affection, goes to Cleopatra, and in a scene of brave humility, begs her to leave Hans alone. During the course of this, she lets slip that Hans possesses a fortune and with this his fate is sealed. Daisy Earles, the actress who plays Frieda gives an incredible, heartbreaking performance embodying pure selfless love.

     We cut forward to the wedding feast, a sideshow bacchanalia. Cleopatra openly cavorts with Hercules, too dumb and drunk to hide the transparency of her motives. There at the wedding table a chant breaks out, "We accept her, one of us...gooble gobble...". The freaks pass a goblet, each drinking from it. When it comes time for Cleopatra to drink, she tosses it at them, vanity making her unable to even pretend to be "one of them". Afterwards she mockingly gives Hans a piggyback ride, while Hercules accompanies on trumpet. It's an operatic moment of cruelty.

     As the day's pass, the freak's watch as Cleopatra pretends to nurse Hans back from a poisoning for which she is responsible. In these scene's Browning conveys the message that in this world it is Cleopatra who doesn't belong. She has made the fatal mistake of confusing being different with being stupid. The final sequence on the caravan during a thunderstorm where the undercaste assert themselves against those who would hurt them is a vicious, primal tour de force. It's the thematic inversion of torch wielding villagers chasing the monster; a society of the unusual seeking to purge the corrupting influence of the normal world from it's midst. At it's core this is a story of community.

          One senses Browning's own sweat and passion in every frame, and it's what sets him apart from many of his contemporaries. James Whale, for instance, directed his films with the remove and humor of a technically gifted intellectual, but Browning inhabited his pictures, dwelling within their dark world's. With "Freaks", his role as sympathetic chronicler of the marginalized reached it's apex. He created a vehicle for these people to be viewed as humans, and it remains a shockingly unique and compassionate achievement.

"Mark of the Vampire" (1935) on Warner Archive Instant

"Forget your absurd old superstitions. This is nineteen hundred and thirty-four."

   

     By the time Tod Browning made "Dracula" in 1931, he had already established himself as a talented silent filmmaker, mainly through his collaborations with the legendary Lon Chaney. In fact, it was Chaney who was originally slated to star in the production before lung cancer ended his life. Browning's "Dracula" is an essential adaptation of the story, although much criticism has been made of the picture. Some feel the film is a creaky relic of the silent era. This has never been something I've agreed with. Browning was indeed a pre-talkie director, but I find the arcane and beautiful visual language of that bygone time perfect for the subject matter. Lugosi and Frye, under the direction of Browning, both etch the iconography of their characters in stone, forever defining them. What hurts the film most in the eyes of many is the total lack of musical score. While I'm not saying it wouldn't be better with a soundtrack, the absence of one creates a unique mood, as if the film is inhabited by the silence of the past. I apologize for this introductory digression, but it was important to briefly discuss "Dracula" since it informs so much of the picture we are reviewing today. The two era's of Browning's career would meet four years later when Lugosi stepped into Chaney's shoe's in "Mark of the Vampire", a remake of the Browning/Chaney legendary lost silent "London After Midnight".

     Peasants singing in the town square, a foggy graveyard, whispered warnings of vampire's preying in the night- "Mark of the Vampire" immediately immerses the viewer in 1930s horror trope heaven. Night falls and in the morning Sir Karrell Borotyn (Holmes Herbert) is found dead. Inspector Neumann (Lionel Atwill) arrives in town to investigate. He doesn't buy the claims of Dr. Doskil (Donald Meek), who has ruled it death by vampire.

     As Borotyn's daughter, Irena's (Elizabeth Allen), wedding day approaches, her fiance, Fedor (Henry Wadsworth), arrives unexpectedly at Baron Otto's (Jean Hersholt), where she has been staying. Dishevelled, he says he blacked out near the castle and doesn't know what happened. Upon his neck he bears the mark of the vampire.

     Browning directly quotes "Dracula" with Lugosi's entrance into the picture. Count Mora walks down the stairs of his castle, flanked by his daughter Luna (Carol Borland), a ghostly, sepulchral beauty. This sequence mirrors that earlier film, and both exhibit Browning's penchant for cutaways to bugs and rodents.

     Mora and Luna appear outside Irena's room, and fall upon her in the mist shrouded night. Professor Zelin (Lionel Barrymore) is brought in to inspect Irena. He zealously believes, as do the villagers, that blood suckers have been feasting in the night. Barrymore acted for Browning a number of times, and he portrays Professor Zelin as a wonderfully crotchety version of Van Helsing. Zelin sets to hanging "bat thorn" all over the damn place, because I guess wolf's bane isn't indigenous to the region.

 

      Browning worked with noted expressionist cinematographer Karl Freund on "Dracula", and "Mark of the Vampire" sees him teaming with another legendary lensman, James Wong Howe. The scene in which Neumann and Otto visit Sir Borotyn's tomb is a work of gloomy, gorgeous unease. Later, during the film's most famous sequence, the Count stands within his castle and the undead Borotyn plays the organ. Luna descends from above, a spectral, winged night thing; an angel of Hell come to Earth. The Count and Luna haunt the film with their phantom presence, and their scenes pierce the veil to reach a place beyond the tangible, living world in the same way "Carnival of Souls" and many of Jean Rollin's work's would do decade's later.

     The Professor decides the only course of action is to enter the castle and destroy the vampire's before sunrise. Otto joins him and they become trapped in the vaults as daytime ends. Drawn by a vampiric influence, Irena makes her way to the Count's abode, as well. And then...a plot twist awakens the film from it's Gothic slumber and the intruding light of rationality overcomes the narrative. If you're like me and don't wish to be shaken from the gloomy fugue of the film up to that point, then I suggest starting the film over when the scene of Zelin hypnotizing Otto occurs, thereby creating a hypnagogic Mobius strip.

 

       It's worth noting that there is no score to this picture. In "Dracula" the lack of score is often attributed to early talkie technical limitations, but with "Mark of the Vampire", made year's later, it has to be viewed as a deliberate directorial choice. As with the earlier picture, I find it adds an element of strangeness to the overall effect.

     "Mark of the Vampire" is another example of Browning's command of mood and atmosphere, and highlights his ability to interweave the beautiful and unsettling. The ending does detract a bit from the impact of the film, but it also provides a delightfully humorous self reflexive moment for Lugosi that almost makes the whole thing worth it.


   

   

"My Blood Runs Cold" (1965) on Warner Archive Instant

"That's right, Julien. We're all descended from a bastard."

     William Conrad made the same amount of films in one year as Terrence Malick did in twenty-five. As mentioned in our review of "Two On A Guillotine", the entirety of Conrad's cinematic directorial career was contained within the year of 1965. Today, we look at his second picture, the love through the ages psychological suspense story, "My Blood Runs Cold"

     We open with a Byron quote read by an uncredited narrator (does anybody know if it's Conrad doing the voice-over?) A woman stands before her home above the sea, a gauzy optical effect overlaying the entire pre-credit sequence. A male voice calls out the name "Barbara" in a ghostly bellow. Roll credits.

     Afterwards, we join Julie (Joey Heatherton) and Harry (Nicolas Coster) on a California highway en route to a marina that is being dedicated to her father, Julian Merriday (Barry Sullivan). Julie speeds erratically and almost hits motorcyclist Ben Gunther (Troy Donahue). Ben ends up on the side of the road, and Julie's car careens into the Pacific ocean. The shot of her T-Bird in the surf is a memorable one and embodies the mid 20th century as well as any image I've seen.

     Relatively unharmed by the accident, Ben repeatedly refers to Julie as "Barbara". In a bit of odd, ham handed plotting, Julie and Harry bring Ben along to the marina after taking him to the hospital. Ben doesn't seem to mind, though, quite the contrary. After dinner at the Merriday's, he makes his affection for Julie known to Harry; "I've known her a long time...a lot longer than you have."

     Julie inquires of her aunt Sarah (Jeanette Nolan) if there was ever a member of the family named Barbara, and she informs her it was the name of her great grandmother. Later, Ben arrives at "Spindrift", the family estate Julie has been restoring and stares at her like a creep for a while before making his presence known. He gives her a locket with her image in it, telling her it was given to him a hundred year's ago by Barbara Merriday. At this point the script demonstrates it's total lack of confidence in the audience's intellect and spells everything out with this bit of dialogue: "...you're trying to tell me I'm the reincarnation of the woman in this locket...you're the reincarnation of someone Barbara Merriday knew..." The locket turns out to be genuine after it is authenticated by none other than Floyd the Barber himself (the appearance of Howard McNear is hands down the most exciting moment of the film).

     Heatherton's heavy lidded screen presence is all ice blond upper class entitled ennui. Her and Donahue have the energy together of a Quaalude party; their's is a lethargic love. She doesn't act in the picture so much as wander through it in a Valium haze.

     Conrad does manage to conjure some fine imagery out of a scene where Julie and Ben visit the undersea cave where their past selves supposedly made love. The visuals of them-especially Heatherton- bathed in sea mist and reflected light have a shimmering luminous beauty.

     The caretaker of "Spindrift" is found murdered and Ben becomes the chief suspect of the police investigation. He and Julie elope together, heading out to sea in bad weather. I was hoping a violent thunderstorm at sea would defibrillate a pulse into this picture's cinematic heart, but it remains a flatliner. Instead, we get a brief moment of the boat enduring the storm and a really long scene of Julien and Sarah discussing Julie's affair's and working through their familial angst. This is indicative of how the picture consistently fails to exploit it's dramatic elements, providing nothing to engage the audience for any length of time.

     A late third act revelation regarding Ben's dubious sanity adds some urgency to the proceedings. Conrad does some good work down the stretch; there's a visually remarkable sequence of Ben and Julie journeying through a dreamy coastal fog, and a climatic action sequence at a factory that almost commits to a heartbreakingly memorable ending (akin to Conrad's two other film's) before pulling back at the last second. But, there's nothing so notable as to make the arduous journey through the rest of the picture worth it.

     "My Blood Runs Cold" is a languorously paced would be thriller whose character's are as unengaged with the narrative as the audience. It could easily stand to lose fifteen minutes from it's running time. George Duning's score is extremely enjoyable, but it's easy listening nature only adds to the overall flat affect. Lastly, Donahue's performance towards the end isn't terrible at all, but when it comes to 50's and 60's pretty boy's with a dark psyche, I'll take Robert Wagner in "A Kiss Before Dying" any day.  

   

   

Annnnnnnd we're back...

     A Halloween vacation that was supposed to be a week and a half  turned into two and a half weeks. The time was spent soaking my brain in the weird fictions of Clark Ashton Smith and Ray Bradbury, as well as getting back in touch with the early Cronenberg films and revisiting my all-time favorite film franchise, "Phantasm". Enough with the excuses, let's get back into it...