The Unknown (1927)

☆ ☆ ☆ ☆

The Unknown (1927) – T. Browning

AKA Alonzo the Armless. Lon Chaney is a circus performer who shoots bullets and throws knives (at 22 year old Joan Crawford) with his feet. He romances lovely Joan who has a pathological fear of being touched -- perfect! But Alonzo really does have arms that he's hiding away because he is a wanted murderer who has three thumbs. Thinking Joan would reject him if she found out he really had arms, Alonzo does the unthinkable. And when she falls in love with the strong man, he thinks up an ugly plot. An amazing silent spectacle of dread.

Sunrise (1927)

☆ ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆

Sunrise (1927) – F. W. Murnau

Poised on the very verge of the sound era (with a pre-recorded soundtrack including sound effects but no spoken language), Murnau’s Sunrise represents the culmination of cinema as dream (and his first and only Hollywood film with no constraints).  With characters named only “The Man”, “The Wife”, and “The Woman from the City”, the screenplay operates as a fable purporting to tell a moral tale at an abstract level (“a song of two humans” is the film’s secondary title and the themes are Manichean).  However, it is the rich details of the mise en scene (country vs. city) – magically created from ceiling wax and shoe polish and other items in Murnau’s bag – that absorb and transport the viewer, and enable her or him to gasp as The Man nearly drowns The Wife to pursue a naughty relationship with The Woman from the City, to weep at the outcome of this harrowing event, and then to weep again when forgiveness is granted, love is renewed, and all moves toward a epiphanic happy ending (save only for a terrible storm and, of course, not for The Woman from the City).  Truly, each shot in Sunrise is a painterly vision, crafted by hand and in the camera (with no help from CGI). Just think at what might have been if Murnau hadn’t died in a car crash four years later.

Underworld (1927)

☆ ☆ ☆ ☆

Underworld (1927) -- J. von Sternberg

Pre-Dietrich silent film from von Sternberg is a rather rollicking gangster yarn with a couple of great set-pieces (the mobsters' ball and the final shoot-out, of course). The three or four central characters are larger than life, propelled through this dream-world (of Chicago?) by the usual blunt motives: love and jealousy (but also loyalty). A cut above yer usual silent fare (but not at a Murnau standard).

Napoleon (1927)

☆ ☆ ☆ ☆ ½

Napoleon (1927) -- A. Gance

I balked a bit at the prospect of a 3 1/2 hour silent film (which is also why Greed is still waiting) but Napoleon truly won me over.  Of course the restoration by Robert A. Harris (sponsored by Coppola and many others) is breathtaking, but takes nothing away from Abel Gance's 1927 achievement.  This is an experimental film with fantastic editing, hand-held camera work, superimpositions, hand-tinting, plus an amazing use of widescreen triptychs at the end (yes, three screens, sometimes in panorama, sometimes showing different things).  This would be boring for 230 minutes but it's not -- instead, Gance propels the narrative forward with Napoleon's ups and downs, starting in childhood but then rapidly skipping to his early triumphs, time in jail during the Reign of Terror, and then rehabilitation as a leading general.  The only drawback was my knowledge of French history was sometimes lacking (however, I was more likely to feel educated than confused).  An amazing masterpiece.