Abbreviated Entry...
So most of June has been pretty brutal for me schedule-wise. Big Time Life Events™ of close family members (weddings/funerals/reunions) have conspired to make the movie-every-day thing rather difficult. I've still managed to watch one every day, but the end result of everything life has thrown my way is that I'm as exhausted as I've ever been. So to keep my sanity (and this blog going), I'm going to do things a bit differently for a little while - I watched the movies, but rather than the standard entry, I'll just do a little synopsis, a little imdb research, quote some of the reviews (can you do that?) and bounce off of them. Followed up by my general impressions.
Okay, thanks!
The Man Who Laughs
In this film, a young boy named Gywnplaine is cruelly disfigured by an evil king - a surgery is performed on him that leaves his face with a permanent smile. He is adopted by a man who travels the country, and Gywnplaine becomes famous as a sideshow-style act. As a grown man, he seems content to travel about with his adopted father and having people laugh at him, even if he is sad on the inside. He's troubled by the fact that Dea, the woman he loves and who they travel with, cannot see his face because she is blind. He's convinced that she would not love him if she could see his face... I guess he's pretty insecure.
But the evil king dies, and it comes to light that Gywnplaine is actually royalty. So the new queen (or something) tries to get her kind of bitchy daughter to marry him. Gywnplaine is uncomfortable with the set up, but since he doesn't feel like he truly belongs with Dea, he gives the whole royalty thing a shot. But things do not go as planned - as people are pretty much used to just laughing at Gywnplaine, regardless of the circumstances. Will true love conquer all? Tune in to find out!
The Man Who Laughs is a spellbinding piece of visual art. Veidt's acting is sensational. I knew the plot of the story and wondered how he would portray feelings of sadness and regret with a permanent smile carved on his face.
-Thanks "rmartyna" via imdb
While The Man Who Laughs is not a horror film outright, it is visually striking enough (and Gywnplaine looks disturbing enough) that it is often considered as such. And the overall sense of gloom plays to the horror genre as well... it's kind of a drama/tragedy/horror hybrid, I guess.
And Conrad Veidt does a great job as Gywnplaine. Acting with a prosthetic on your face can't be easy, and doubly so when you don't have the extra added benefit of sound. Veidt is able to sell the sadness of his character convincingly using only his eyes and body language, and it's truly a performance you have to see to believe.
I was impressed with the beautiful cinematography, which is exceptional for the time. The score and sound effects are used very well, so well that sometimes you forget that you are watching a silent picture. With the outstanding performances, particularly Veidt's, this is a classic of silent cinema that deserves to have a much wider audience.
-Thanks "MrETrain" via imdb
I've watched a few silent films for this little project, and I'll often say "it's good, but I wouldn't start here if you're not in the habit of watching old/silent movies." Well, I'd say The Man Who Laughs *would* be a good place to start. The whole film is extremely well-crafted and the story just works. If you don't feel at least moderately engaged with this film, I'm guessing that silent movies just aren't for you.
In some ways the plot is simplistic and occasionally too much so, but the look of the thing is relentlessly fascinating. Director Leni endows his world with grotesque faces, vulgar sexuality, and deliberately twisted visuals--particularly so in the first half of the film, which is greatly famous for the sequence in which the abandoned child stumbles through a snow storm beneath gallows bearing rotting corpses to find the infant Dea. Veidt's hideous grin, an early creation by make up genius Jack Pierce, is remarkably effective; the performances are memorable, and although the second half of the film is excessively predictable the whole thing goes off with a bang.
-Thanks "gftbiloxi" via imdb
It's true. "Relentlessly fascinating" is a good way to put it. Yes, the plot might be on the simplistic side, but just about anything from the 1920s would be considered somewhat simple nowadays. I had this disc sitting around from Netflix for a while - a little fearful of the fact that it is a 110 minute silent film. But The Man Who Laughs moves by really fast, and is a great accomplishment not only as a movie but as a piece of art, especially when you consider the era in which it was made. The sets are great, the crowd scenes are extremely well done, and the look of the film is really quite amazing.
Overall, The Man Who Laughs strikes me as the kind of film that is not only a good movie, but an important one as well. It's the sort of older film that, while very much a product of it's time, seems very forward thinking as well. It has a sort of epic feel (the big cast and lavish set pieces) that I just didn't expect from a silent film. And the overall vibe of the film, with its undertones of horror, seems ahead of its time as well. It's a remarkable piece of art, and definitely worth checking out.
I would recommend this film.
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