THE EARLY SHOW, PT. 57

Three movies made during the changeover from silent to sound, and one from a decade later featuring what was briefly Paramount's B-movie stock company.

THE DOCKS OF NEW YORK (1928): There's nothing about The Docks of New York promising greatness. A ship's stoker saves a hooker who tried to drown herself in the East River. They go to a dive bar, get married, spend the night the together before he ships off the following day. He has a change of heart and swims back to land, where he learns she's in night court for a crime he committed. He confesses, gets sentenced to 60 days. The hooker promises to wait for him.  

Would you watch such a movie? Well, maybe you should, just to see how important a great director can be. For Josef von Sternberg elevates a cliched tale into something both human and humane. The first reel or two feature situations and characters you've seen in countless old movies, particularly silents like this. Yet von Sternberg molds it all into something that you gradually come to understand and care about. Sure, George Bancroft (the stoker) is rough around the edges -- drinking beer straight out of a keg -- and Betty Compson (the hooker) has been beat around by life pretty badly. Yet each brings out something positive in the other. For Bancroft, it means a real love he's never felt for any woman. For Compson, it's a belief that it's possible to find a man who cares about her.

Von Sternberg transforms these battered people into a couple you root for even in their tawdry surroundings; it's a master class for anyone who wants to learn what an "actor's director" is. Watch the dozens of extras in the bar -- each one appears to have gotten personal instruction from von Sternberg; their action never looks forced or phony. (One funny moment comes when Bickford and Compson converse in a corner, completely ignoring a rowdy fight going on in a mirror's reflection above them.) 

There's more, much more, in The Docks of New York than is covered here, from the genuine filth covering the stokers, to how Betty Compson begins rock hard and slowly softens into the kind of woman her character probably dreamed of becoming when growing up. If von Sternberg's first movie, Salvation Hunters, was the work of a self-styled artiste trying too hard to say something important, The Docks of New York is a masterpiece of an unexpectedly mature drama from a bold, thoughtful director. Spoiler alert: the happy ending feels neither forced nor tacked on. 

BONUS POINTS: Gustav von Seyffertitz (born in 1862!) steals his five-minute scene as "Hymn-Book Harry", the priest who reluctantly marries the wayward couple in the dive bar. With a mere look in his eyes, von Seyffertitz reminds all the barflies (and us) of the solemnity of the moment. Brilliant stuff.

INTERFERENCE (1928): As you could guess from the advert on the right, Paramount's first talking feature Interference has nothing to do with football. It is, rather, a melodrama of the British upper-class involving hidden identity, divorce, blackmail, and murder. Kind of like the royal family if you dig hard enough. 

While Interference possesses many of the drawbacks prevalent during the early days of sound, its story is actually quite involving. Phillip Voaze has a chance meeting with first wife Deborah Kane a decade after his disappearance in World War I. In need of a few shillings, Deborah hatches a blackmailing scheme involving letters written to Voaze years earlier from his former sidepiece Faith. Without knowing what the others are doing, Voaze, Faith, and Faith's current husband Sir John Marlay each visit Deborah. One of them would like to kill her, another really does, while the third is arrested for it. All this hubbub for a few old "Oh baby, what you do to me" mash notes! People sure were touchy in 1928.

There are coincidences galore throughout Interference, like Voaze just happening to choose Marlay as a doctor, but that's to be expected in any movie of this type. Evelyn Brent and Doris Kenyon (as Deborah and Faith respectively) get the lion's share of histrionics. Clive Brook, the kind of distinguished Brit that talkies were created for, is agreeably lowkey as the stiff upper-lipped Sir John, the doctor whose prescription for blackmail is a dose of lethal threats. 

But it's William Powell, as the sickly Voaze, who steals Interference. His clipped, eloquent delivery, heard onscreen for the first time, must have convinced the boys at Paramount's front office that he was far more suited to leading roles than his often-villainous supporting parts in silents. No surprise that his next movie, a silent titled The Canary Murder Case, was immediately reshot with sound. Now that kind of studio interference makes sense.

BONUS POINTS: One credit reads "Dialogue Arranged by Ernest Pascal", as if the guy cut up the script, tossed the shreds up in the air, and glued them together at random like William Burroughs. Another credit, "Based on a Lothar Mendes Production", refers to Mendes' direction of the silent version of Interference, which Roy J. Pomeroy followed for his direction of the talkie version, which was shot simultaneously. As with The Canary Murder Case, those were the days when studios could pay actors once for making a movie twice.

THE SQUALL (1929): The funniest feature of 1929 must have been The Squall. And making it even more of a hoot is that it's a drama. Ergo, if you ever want to convince your friends that early talkies get a bad rap, this is not the movie to show them. 

In a small Hungarian village, middle-aged couple hire a young Gypsy woman named Nubi as their housekeeper. She shows her gratitude by seducing every male in the household and turning all the women against one another. Money goes missing, the maid and gardener quit, Paul breaks up with his fiancée Irma, fights break out -- and Nubi the housekeeper doesn't even sweep the floor! 

Absolutely nothing else happens in The Squall, other than the audience wondering why Nubi wasn't fired after her first day on the job. As for the acting -- hoo boy. Myrna Loy -- still stuck in "exotic" roles -- is Nubi. She's supposed to be sexy but appears to be a thousand kernels short of a cob. Too, Nubi (or, rather, Loy) is stuck with 90 minutes' worth of dialogue along the lines of "Nubi not happy!" or "Nubi like diamonds!" Loretta Young, as Irma, sounds exactly what she was in 1929: a 16 year-old girl badly reciting lines for the first time. Yet nobody beats Caroll Nye as Peter, emoting his already purple dialogue to the point where his mouth probably tasted like grapes. As for the direction, Alexander Korda makes sure to keep The Squall at a dead snail's pace. 

Somehow, Loy, Young, and Korda eventually proved to be far better than The Squall would have you believe. In later years they all probably shook their heads just hearing the word "squall" in weather forecasts. As for the rest of us... the forecast for watching The Squall is a 100% chance of disbelief mixed with unceasing laughter.

BONUS POINTS: The miniature horse & wagons standing in for the travelling Gypsy camp manage to be laughable and utterly charming all at once. In fact, they give a better performance than any human in the picture.

KING OF CHINATOWN (1939): 

Paramount must have been pretty pleased with the previous year's Dangerous to Know, because they rounded up much of the same cast for this well-made crime caper. Give the studio credit, too, for trying to revive Anna May Wong's sputtering career even in B-pictures like these. 

If there's a problem for fans of top-billed Wong, it's that her character, surgeon Dr. Mary Ling, is often overshadowed by Frank Baturin, the white leader of a Chinatown protection racket, who was shot by his underling Mike Gordon on orders of the gang's accountant (nicknamed The Professor). After performing life-saving surgery on Baturin, Dr. Ling becomes his temporary live-in caregiver. As Gordon and The Professor take over the racket, Baturin decides to break up his criminal band, furthering the accountant's desire to get him out of the way once and for all. Moral: always be good to your money manager.

King of Chinatown is unique in that the sex and race of Wong's character are never a subject for conversation or contention -- she is simply a brilliant surgeon, period. But unwilling to leave well enough alone, Paramount cast white actor Sidney Toler as her Chinese father because... well, he was currently playing Charlie Chan over at Fox! And why is Armenian-American Akim Tamiroff using an Italian accent when playing a character with the Ukrainian name of Maturin? Oh heck, let's continue with busy second-rate dialect actor J. Carroll Naish using an Irish accent as The Professor for no reason other than Chinese and Italian were already taken. Mexican-born Anthony Quinn, as the red-blooded American gunsel Gordon, already lost his accent, so he gets a pass.

All this confusion helps to make King of Chinatown an even more fun 56 minutes than it already it is. And despite the odd casting (and accent) choices throughout, Anna May Wong was probably grateful for the chance to prove she could do something other than the usual Dragon Lady routine. But I still wonder how she felt about a white guy playing her Chinese father. 

BONUS POINTS: Super-annoying actor Roscoe Karns disappears from King of Chinatown before the end of the second reel, as if director Nick Grinde realized they didn't need an ambulance driver character ripped-off from MGM's Dr. Kildare movies.

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THE EARLY SHOW, PT. 38

 The only thing these four movies have in common is murder. I must get out in the fresh air some more.

PICCADILLY (1929): Likely one of the last great silent movies out of the UK, Piccadilly is probably one of the handsomest as well, a big-budget drama that could pass for a major US studio release (no offense to the British film industry), and a terrific vehicle for German director E.A. DuPont as much as its star Asian-American legend Anna May Wong. From its clever opening credits (resembling bus advertisements) to its ironic closing images, Piccadilly is often startingly entertaining. 

For some sensitive souls, its story might border on -- oh heck, let's say proudly resides in -- Asian-fetishization. Which is the whole point, children. Nightclub owner Valentine Wilmot falls hard for scullery-worker-turned dancer Shosho. This puts him in dutch with Mabel Greenfield, his club's former star and longtime paramour. Shosho, having lived forever in a Limehouse flophouse, is more than willing to take advantage of Wilmot's attentions, even if it means risking the relationship with her Chinese boyfriend Jim. Both Jim and Mabel notice what's going on; sooner or later one of these saps is going to snap.

One of Piccadilly's more interesting takes is how the principal Chinese characters positively drip with contempt for their white "betters". (King Hou Chang, as Jim, puts a whole new spin on the fine art of sneering.) Say what you want about Wong's Shosho, she is 100% in charge of her relationship with Wilmot, even when such a thing was, if not verboten, at least frowned upon. (It's easy to think that top-billed Gilda Gray felt like her character Mabel while watching Wong steal the movie from under her dancing feet.)

Aside from Jameson Thomas as Wilmot, a couple of other actors are worth a mention. If you were one of those kids in the 60s who watched Mary Martin's Peter Pan, you'll likely not recognize its Captain Hook, Cyril Ritchard, in his brief role as a dancer. But you absolutely cannot miss 30-year-old Charles Laughton in his even briefer part as the grotesque, demanding guest eating dinner at the club, in what looks like the prototype for the character of Mr. Creosote in Monty Python and the Meaning of Life. Almost a century after its release, the British Film Institute's restored print of Piccadilly (and its classy new score) can easily hold the attention of a willing, receptive audience.

BONUS POINTS:  Piccadilly has a five-minute sound prologue featuring Jameson Thomas and an unidentified actor setting up the story, filmed as a sop for audiences who were already turning their back on silents. Technically crude and creaky, it's a harbinger for what movies would become for the next year or two before coming up to speed.

THE KISS BEFORE THE MIRROR (1933): Vienna: Land of sausages! Snow globes! Murdering your wife for cheating on you! Well, at least that what Walter Bernsdorf thinks. As his lawyer, Paul Held, tries to put together a defense, he discovers that his wife, Maria, is behaving identically to how Walter's wife Lucy did before her demise. If a plea of momentary insanity works in Walter's case, then it should in Paul's, yes? 

Although a Universal picture, The Kiss Before the Mirror gives off Paramount vibes with its glossy sophistication. All credit goes to its unlikely director James Whale, between his classics Frankenstein and Bride of Frankenstein. Perhaps interested in discombobulating his audience, Whale sets up the movie as a typical romantic comedy of the time, allowing viewers to live vicariously through the adulterous lovers, before Walter unexpectedly shows up to blow his wife's brains out. It's a director's way of saying, Not so cute, is it?

Paul Lukas, as Walter, is a little pathetic -- why do these "mature" guys marry younger women who are way too sexy for them? Yet he offers to plead guilty to murder rather than see Paul kill Maria. And what a pleasure that Paul is played by Frank Morgan, who, as with his appearance in Any Number Can Play, easily makes you forget his dithering comedic parts. This guy had far more range than given credit for.

The Kiss Before the Mirror's nominal star, Nancy Carroll, is Maria (another wife too young for her husband!), whose sweet-on-the-surface behavior flips when Paul rightly suspects her of adultery. But the more interesting casting choice is Walter Pidgeon in his five-minute role of Walter's wife's paramour. Pidgeon's leading man career had momentarily derailed; perhaps Whale took pity on a fellow gay man by giving him what looks like a one-day job. (Pidgeon's primping and pirouetting before his date with Lucy appears to be a deliberate directorial signal to hipper audiences of the day). A forgotten gem, The Kiss Before the Mirror is marred only by what seems to be a studio-imposed happy ending -- which is nicely undercut by a shattered mirror symbolizing Paul and Maria's very imperfect future together. At least that's how I see it.

BONUS POINTS: Michael Mark, best known as the father of the drowned little girl in Frankenstein, is a courtroom spectator. James Whale sure was good to his friends and actors. 

 WHEN STRANGERS MARRY (1944): At the time of When Strangers Marry's release, Orson Welles declared the modest B-picture better directed (by William Castle) and acted than two recently acclaimed big budget releases, Double Indemnity and Laura. And while Welles's opinion is up for debate, When Strangers Marry is nevertheless several cuts above the average B of the time.

In presenting the story of a woman's marriage to a man she's known only three days -- and soon suspects of murder -- Castle manages to evoke more unease than the story has already. Sudden noises, harsh neon lights, confusion as to whether she's seen her husband or has hallucinated him -- no scene ends without a moment of foreboding. No supporting character actor looks ordinary when weird will do. In portraying the couple, Kim Hunter and Dean Jagger manage to squeeze every drop of angst the story offers, while soaking up some more and wringing it out again. Her husband, after all, is a killer... isn't he?

Kim's ally in this nightmare is Fred Graham, played by a fellow named Bob Mitchum. It would be interesting to know what audiences at the time thought of the tall, sleepy-eyed, drawling actor, seeing that even for a B movie he was way different from others of the day. It's a good bet that co-star Neil Hamilton, a veteran of silents, probably looked upon him as other older actors did Marlon Brando some years later: Who is this guy, where is he from, and why does he talk like that?

Within a year, when everyone definitely knew who he was, Monogram re-released When Strangers Marry as Betrayed, changing Bob to Robert to reflect his "new" billing in his star-making role in The Story of GI Joe, and bumping him from third to first place in the credits. As with Humphrey Bogart "starring" in a 16 year-old movie Call it Murder originally titled Midnight, Mitchum probably had a good laugh and toasted the ticket-buyers who were fooled into watching the same movie twice. But you know what? It was worth it. When Strangers Meet may not be Double Indemnity, but it's singularly fascinating, almost entirely thanks to William Castle's unique vision. 

BONUS POINTS: The nearly dialogue-free sequence of Mildred and Paul avoiding the police by wandering through Harlem before winding up at a gin joint is brilliant, and possible only in a B movie.

GREEN FOR DANGER (1946): At a small-town hospital in wartime England, Police Inspector Cockrill investigates the mysterious death of patient Joseph Higgins and flat-out murder of Nurse Bates. Sizing up two doctors and three nurses, Cockrill notes that they're the only ones who were connected to the victims. When one of them, Nurse Freddie Linley, almost becomes the third victim, Cockrill decides he can break the case with a scheme that could leave her on death's door a second time.

The British production Green for Danger is as good an example as any of David Mamet's dictum that any movie can be improved by getting rid of the first 10 minutes. Over half an hour is needed setting up the suspects' personal, psychological and sexual conflicts that would make Fleetwood Mac envious. But when Inspector Cockrill finally takes charge, the story finally works up to a good trot.

As with all good vintage mysteries, Green for Danger's suspects appear to have a motive, or at least act that way, so that our suspicions of the guilty party shift from moment to moment. A love triangle involving Nurse Freddie and the two doctors? The anesthesiologist's previous accidental patient death becoming known? And why did the mailman insist he heard a nurse's voice somewhere recently -- like maybe on a Nazi shortwave propaganda broadcast -- just before his death? 

Yet none of this would matter without Alastair Sim's wonderful, hilarious portrayal of the inscrutable Cockrill. The inspector takes delight in needling the suspects with his keen mind, dry wit, and quiet sarcasm. With a slouched manner and cool fedora, Sims makes Cockrill the British Sam Spade, only funny. Had Green for Danger starred almost any other British actor of the '40s, it would be a pleasant if unremarkable 90 minutes. With the brilliant Alastair Sim running the show, it proves how a truly great actor can, depending on your point of view, elevate a project or fool you into thinking you're watching a movie better than it really is. 

BONUS POINTS: Despite the credits reading "Presenting Alastair Sim as Inspector Cockrill", this was his 35th movie appearance in 11 years. Either Green for Danger was intended as the first in a series with the Cockrill character, or someone at the studio was really unfamiliar with his C.V.

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THE EARLY SHOW, PT. 27

 As the years pass by with ever-quickening speed, I realize now just how limited time has become. So if I don't like an old movie or TV show, I turn it off after 10 minutes. Therefore, the following were worth my hour or 70 minutes, but not necessarily yours. 

THE PHANTOM BROADCAST (1933): Roll over Milli Vanilli, and tell Bing Crosby the news!
Radio crooner Grant Murdock is the handsome heartthrob of women everywhere. What they don't know is that his sexy voice belongs to his hunchback/clubfooted manager and piano accompanist Norman Wilder. Wilder is willing to put up with Murdock's ego and thoughtless womanizing as long as the dough is rolling in. But Murdock goes too far when he sets his sights on Wilder's new voice student, the innocent Laura Hamilton. Wilder drops by his apartment intent on killing him, only to discover someone else has beat him to it. Believing Laura is the murderer, and wanting to protect her, Wilder calls the cops, falsely confessing to the crime. A moment later, Laura drops by, unaware Murdock is dead.  Now she tells him! 

What Monogram Pictures lacked in money, they more than made up for in the occasional offbeat movie like The Phantom Broadcast, sensitively directed by Phil Rosen. Filling out the movie is a subplot of gangster Joe Maestro trying to kill Wilder in order to take over Murdock's career. From what I've read about organized crime's decades-long influence in show business, I'd say that more was true to life than a musical ventriloquism act with a human dummy. Even less believable is the idea of Wilder taking a murder rap for a student he's known for one day. His far too noble -- make that stupid -- move leads to him getting shot by the police while escaping, only to make one last appearance on the radio, singing for a startled studio audience before dying. Yes, it's melodramatic and farfetched, but also surprisingly downbeat -- especially when the real killer, Murdock's jilted girlfriend, gets off scot-free on a cruise to Europe!

Of the cast, British-born Ralph Forbes is the best in his role of the unfortunate Norman Wilder. A handsome leading man already turning to character work in his late 20s, Forbes never plays for the audience's sympathy. Wilder accepts his fate, while having found a way to capitalize on his talent, even if it means being literally the man behind the curtain. Forbes has a nice moment when, standing before a full-length mirror, he briefly sees himself tall and proud, minus his physical deformities, before returning to his real self. For all its implausibility, The Phantom Broadcast is ultimately a fascinating B-movie that deserves a good restoration and reappreciation. Just don't expect much in the way of realism (except for a talented guy wanting to kill the jackass taking the bows).

BONUS POINTS: Phil Rosen also directed the previously-discussed Beggars in Ermine, The Strange Mr. Gregory, and The President's Mystery. A former cameraman, he was also a founding member of the American Society of Cinematographers.  Why doesn't this guy have a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame? 

NIGHT OF TERROR (1933): A hideous serial killer known as The Maniac has murdered millionaire Richard Rinehart. This doesn't seem to bother Arthur Hornsby, a scientist living at the Rinehart mansion, who has himself buried in the back yard for eight hours to prove that he's developed a way to revive the dead. As various Rinehart relatives meet a bad end, the faithful servant Degar sure seems to be the killer... as does his wife Sika... and Richard's brother John... In fact everybody but Arthur Hornsby, who's in a coffin six feet underground -- or is he?

Night of Terror seems to be Columbia Pictures' sole entry in the horror cycle of the early 1930s. The studio convinced Universal to loan out Bela Lugosi for his services as Degar, a role that defines the word "thankless". Columbia wasn't known for big budgets, but, Night of Terror could pass for a PRC quickie. "Exterior" scenes take place at night in order to disguise the cheap sets; actors peek through doorways and skulk around the mansion to pad out the running time; the smartass reporter continually insults the stupid police chief investigating the murders; the science behind an inane experiment is never explained; and the primary suspect -- Degar -- speaks slowwwly in order arouse our suspicion. The only thing we suspect is that the writers came up with Night of Terror the day before shooting started.

Lugosi likely knew he deserved better than programmers like Night of Terror -- it's easy to picture him silently choking every time his character Degar has to say "Yes, master" to his employer. (He was probably cast because of a similar "exotic" get-up he wore the year before in Chandu the Magician at Fox.) While it's always a pleasant change of pace to see Lugosi as someone other than evildoer, it's just too bad it has to be in a throwaway like Night of Terror. Looks good in a turban, though.

BONUS POINTS: In a strange finale, The Maniac -- who is actually pretty weird-looking -- returns to warn the audience not to tell anybody who the real killer is, or else, "I'll come into your bedroom late at night and tear you limb from limb!" I believe him.

DANGEROUS TO KNOW (1938): It's a tale as old as crime. Underworld kingpin Stephen Recka decides that marrying blue blood Margaret Van Case will be his entree to high society. All he has to do is frame Van Case's fiancée Philip Easton for embezzlement. Still, there is the little problem of Recka's jealous mistress Lan Ying... and Police Inspector Brandon snooping around... and his own gunsel Nicki Kusnoff trying to take over his criminal empire. Can't a gangster have a moment's peace?

I've said that the best B-movies were made by the Poverty Row studios, but Paramount's Dangerous to Know is an excellent example of what the majors were capable of when they hired the right people and left them alone. Director Robert Florey puts some thought into the camera set-ups, and getting solid performances out of the cast. 

And what a cast! Akim Tamiroff is Recka, a Bach-worshipping crime boss who has the city government under his fat thumb, yet wallows in self-pity for not being "respectable." His "exotic" live-in girlfriend Lan Ying is typical of the kind of role Anna May Wong was forced to accept at the time, but she gives it a depth that comes from experiencing the second-rate treatment she herself was given by the studios.

Offering strong support is Lloyd Nolan as Brandon, the witty yet driven cop who can gift Recka with a pair of chocolate handcuffs as a birthday gift while promising to get him to the electric chair eventually. (Nolan should have been given an entire B-movie series as Brandon. He's great.) Almost stealing movie is Anthony Quinn as Recka's sidekick Nicki -- not necessarily because of any overriding talent, but because he's only 23 years old and is already, y'know, Anthony Quinn. Possessing a smart director, crackerjack cast, and a speedy 70-minute running time, Dangerous to Know makes for a better watch than expected.

BONUS POINTS: A tense conversation between Lan Ying with a guest repeatedly uses the word "hostess" to get across the idea that she's actually Recka's live-in mistress -- a clever way of ducking the censor's scissors in the post Pre-Code days.

THE JACKIE GLEASON SHOW: EDDIE CANTOR'S 65TH BIRTHDAY (January 12, 1957): When the most interesting part of a live TV show is wondering if the star is going to keel over in the closing moments, something is wrong. But that's the chance you take when celebrating the not-so-healthy birthday boy Eddie Cantor, whose professional stage career began in 1907. 

Things begin badly enough when the flashy women who usually appear in Gleason's opening credits are replaced by lisping seven-year-old girls glammed up like Times Square trollops. Edward R. Murrow then warms up the crowd with a grim tribute more appropriate for a funeral. Then there's the dearth of Cantor's friends and contemporaries. Instead of, say, Jimmy Durante, Jack Benny, and Groucho Marx -- the kind of people who would give this show some entertainment value today -- we have the likes of... Eddie Fisher! Pinky Lee! Nepo-baby Mailyn Cantor! An interminable "Waiting for the Robert E. Lee" production number! I suppose Lucille Ball & Desi Arnaz's appearance makes some kind of comedic sense, but I don't recall a series titled I Love Eddie. At least Burt Lancaster gets two plugs for his latest movie, The Rainmaker, so it's not all for naught. 

The only people from Cantor's generation who deign to appear are George Jessel (who'd do 10 minutes at an autopsy) and Burns & Allen (in the 1957 version of Zooming in by appearing on film rather than in person). Hell, Jackie Gleason couldn't be bothered contributing a 15-second tribute, and it's an episode of his own show! 

Maybe Murrow's solemn introduction was appropriate after all. Viewers, aware of Cantor's two heart attacks, were probably concerned when, near the end, the enervated host needs to carefully sit down and slowly drink a cup of water provided by a stagehand. Immediately after the closing credits, Cantor was taken to the hospital by ambulance. Now that would have been interesting to watch.

BONUS POINTS: Thanks to one of the sponsor's commercials, we learn that the Bulova Senator watch can withstand the shock of its owner playing piano. 

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MOVIE OF THE DAY: "OLD SAN FRANCISCO" (1927)

What with COVID arousing anti-Chinese sentiment in some quarters, it's interesting to look back to remind ourselves this is nothing new. The 1927 silent movie Old San Francisco -- Warner Brothers' fifth release with a synchronized score and sound effects -- takes it one step further, essentially comparing them to vampires. See, things could be worse!

The year is 1906. Don Hernandez de Vasquez lives on his family estate in San Francisco with his granddaughter Dolores. Long past its glory days, the homestead has come under the scrutiny of land developer Chris Buckwell. 

Buckwell, highly-regarded by the business community, is hiding a secret: he's Chinese! Or, as the subtitles insist on referring to him, a Mongol (because it sounds more sinister). Buckwell is able to pass for white because he's played by Warner Oland, the Swedish-born actor who, some years later, would gain his greatest fame as Charlie Chan. 

Don Vasquez wonders why his granddaughter
looks so darned white.

Buckwell's reps, Michael Brandon and Terrence O'Shaughnessy, get nowhere with Vasquez sales-wise. But Terrence falls hard and fast for the comely Dolores, played by the homonynic Dolores Costello.

The usual mix-ups and misunderstandings occur during their courtship, allowing Blackwell to (forcefully) make his move on Dolores -- not for his own pleasure, but to sell her to a Chinatown pimp who intends on shipping her back to the old country. But you don't really think things will turn out that way, do you? 

One of Old San Francisco's more subtle moments.

There wouldn't be much reason to watch Old San Francisco if not for the character of Chris Buckwell, because it provides fascinating insight to Hollywood's (and America's) view of Chinese immigrants. 

And that regard is low. Real low. Like Grand Canyon low. While the average Chinatown resident here is regarded with, at best, a vague, confused fascination (like a wild animal who's been trained to ride a tricycle), Buckwell is, from the get-go, portrayed as the personification of evil. 

File under "Typical silent movie villain." 

While evil landowners were nothing new in movies by 1927 -- hell, every other Western had them -- they were just your regular bad guys (i.e., white). In Old San Francisco, Buckwell being Chinese elevates him to a first class villain. Passing himself off as white? Now we're talking pure blackguard.

But Chinese and manhandling the Spanish-but-white-looking virgin Dolores? Get the noose ready, boys!

Almost as bad as his wanton desires is Buckwell's religion. Ducking into his basement after a business meeting, he dons a robe and skullcap, and kneels before a giant statue of a Chinese deity. Lighting several tall sticks of incense, Buckwell prays for forgiveness for selling out his people to the Chinatown criminal underworld. At least he's sorry.

"And another thing, you could stand to lose 20 pounds!"

You'll never guess what else Buckwell keeps down there. A dwarf named Chang Lu -- and he's locked in a cage! Buckwell must enjoy being reminded what a scumbag he is, because the only function Chang Lu serves is to endlessly taunt him. "What fresh deed of evil is on your vile soul?" Chang inquires not unreasonably. "Not all the incense of the Indies will blot your sins from the eyes of heaven." I would have said, "You stink on ice!" but there's very little drama in that.

In Sweden, they cut to the chase and
called it Mongolians.

Before going further, it would be thoughtless not to add that Lu Chang is played by Angelo Rossitto, one of the stars of another Fisheye movie, Scared to Death, although he's most famous for his role in Freaks. Unless you're a fan of contemporary cinema. Then you'd definitely recognize him as The Master in Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome -- in 1985! That's a long career for a little guy.

But is there anything worse than attempting to defile the virginal Dolores Vasquez? Yes: blasphemy. Buckwell drops by the Vasquez ranch allegedly to pray at their shrine of Jesus. But while Dolores and granddad watch from behind in admiration, we see Buckwell himself fumbling with the sign of the cross, a look of confusion and disgust on his face. 

The Vasquezes aren't fooled for long. When Don goes into town on business, Blackwell returns to have his way with Dolores. Interrupted by the unexpected return of her grandfather and Terrence O'Shaughnessy (you remember him, right?), Blackwell threatens revenge. 

And don't wave garlic in front of him, either.

As Dolores faces him down, Buckwell steps near the shrine -- and recoils in horror, covering his face in Dracula fashion with his cape. Lowering it a moment later, Buckwell, to Dolores' horror, now appears 100% Chinese for the first time, his sneering mouth ready to take a bite of her. Or, as the subtitle puts it, "In the awful light of an outraged, wrathful Christian God, the heathen soul of the Mongol stood revealed."  

It's a staggeringly racist, shocking, bizarre moment. Yet I don't care how woke you are, when Buckwell drops his cape, the effect is so startling that your breath gets caught in your throat. Audiences watching it on a big movie screen nearly a century ago were probably ready to burn down their local Chinatown. 

Chinese woman; Swedish man playing Chinese passing himself off as
white; white woman of Irish descent playing Spanish. The magic of
the movies!

To add insult to ridiculous injury is that the only real Chinese actor who has something approaching a major role in Old San Francisco, Anna May Wong, plays Buckwell's stooge. 

Wong's most important job here is to help her boss kidnap Dolores in order to sell her into prostitution. Judging by her sullen expression, she appears to be aware of being forced into a similar situation.


The race baiting/blasphemy angle is even more wacky when you remember that Warner Brothers, like the other major studios, was run by Jews who played up Christianity as if at gunpoint. A decade earlier, the villain would likely have been a Spaniard, instead of a heroic figure like he is here. 

Dolores looks totally into this guy.

And a decade before that, an Irishman like O'Shaughnessy would have been played strictly for boneheaded laughs. Even here, the Vitaphone Orchestra plays a rip-off of "Believe Me If All Those Endearing Young Charms" whenever he enters a scene, just to remind you of his nationality. 

Come to think of it, there's absolutely no reason to make his character Irish other than to justify his courtship of a Spanish woman. After all, he isn't American white. He's a foreigner, like her. 

There goes the neighborhood.

Old San Francisco, then, is not headed for the Brotherhood Hall of Fame. Its casual -- make that defiant -- racism, along with its head-clobbering Christian agitprop, would likely cause demands for it to be disappeared like Disney's Song of the South if it were better known. It is, then, a textbook example of relative obscurity besting negative fame. 

Plus, Old San Francisco's climax provides the most hilariously preposterous cause of the 1906 San Francisco earthquake ever suggested. Without going into detail, it has nothing to do with fault lines. Except those, perhaps, around Warner Oland's evil eyes.

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MOVIE OF THE DAY: "DAUGHTER OF THE DRAGON" (1931)

Fu Man Chu is in a bit of a Chinese pickle. Convinced that a certain army officer named Petrie murdered Mrs. Fu Man Chu and their child decades earlier, he's made it his mission to enact revenge. After killing the offending Petrie and his son, Fu has returned 20 years later to kill the two remaining Petrie males. C'mon, Fu, take the song's advice and let it go!

But Fu only gets to the third generation Petrie before being shot himself by a police detective. With his remaining strength, Fu bequeaths the honor of killing Petrie #4 to his only child, Ling Moy, despite that she's -- eeww! -- his daughter! Sons, you see, are generally the only ones considered talented enough to do anything more complicated than pouring a cup of Jasmine tea. So not only is this nepotism, it's bad nepotism. In other words, Ming Loy is the Jared Kushner of the Fu house.

Half an hour later, and he's
hungry for her again.

Conveniently enough, Ling Moy lives next door to Petrie, and quickly turns on her charm. Petrie is soon following Ling Moy like a food delivery guy looking for a tip. Petrie's girlfriend Joan -- not accidentally Occidental -- sees the logogram on the wall, but can do nothing to stop his philandering ways. Maybe if she dyed her hair black and wore tight dresses.

Petrie's not the only one gaga-gai pan for Ling Moy. Chinese detective Ah Key also falls under her spell, to the point where he leaves his post guarding Ronald Petrie at her request -- not to engage in a little Eastern fun like he hoped, but so that Petrie can be kidnapped by her cronies. Like I always say -- dames, you can't trust them. Even Chinese ones.

It was fun while it lasted, eh, Petrie?

Before you can say "Peking duck", Ah Key is trussed up like a badly-wrapped mummy in an attic while Petrie and Joan are tied to chairs side by side awaiting their fate. Like her old man, Ling Moy turns up her nose at guns, preferring to kill her enemies in the most painful, ugly ways possible -- in Joan's case, getting fed an IV drip of carbolic acid. Why didn't Jack Kevorkian think of that?

But just to show she's got a heart, Ling Moy offers to turn off the drip... and force Petrie to stab Joan through the heart instead. As Jack Benny once said, I'm thinking it over!

Ah Key manages to throw himself out of the attic in order to get the attention of some cops, who raid the house. Ling Moy and her sidekick Lu Chung escape through a secret passage that leads to Petrie's house, where Ah Key is waiting. Two gunshots later, Ling and Lu are dead, while Ah Key dies at her side, promising to meet on the other side, where, presumably, they won't try to kill each other again.

Lu Chung, Fu Man Chu, and Ling Moy
surrender to Hollywood's racist demands.

Daughter of the Dragon pulls out almost all the old Hollywood tropes regarding Chinese people -- mysterious, exotic, heathen -- and, in the case of Ling Moy, slinky. The only thing missing are the opium dens. And if you happen to find one, let me know.

Other Hollywood clichés abound. The Chinese woman enticing the white sap. The Chinese cop happy to give his life for the white guy. Secret passageways built between houses without anyone noticing. A contractor like that would have his own series on HGTV.

Anna May Wong and Sessue Hayakwa
look for a way to cut their scenes from
Daughter of the Dragon.

And then, of course, there's the cast. Of the four major Chinese characters, only Anna May Wong was really Chinese. The rest were Swedish (Warner Oland as Fu Man Chu), Japanese (Sessue Hayakawa as Ah Key) and American (E. Alyn Warren as Lu Chung). In old Hollywood, an inclusion rider was the guy who rode shotgun on stagecoaches in Westerns.

In fact, Oland went on to play Charlie Chan, while Warren made a specialty of Chinese flunkies who were humble on the outside, nasty on the inside. You can call it racist all you want, but movies like Daughter of the Dragon are all the more entertaining for it. It's a combination of the absurdity with the fantastical that make some of these things even watchable.

It's probably why Miramax cancelled its much ballyhooed "reimagining" of soft-spoken Charlie Chan as action hero Charles Chan circa 1993. If only that had been the only idea of Harvey Weinstein's that didn't pan out.

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