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The barbarian out of his time, the gentleman of the gutter, the plumed kitty. Not the hard-boiled tabloid of Ben Hecht's screenplay but the oneiric poem of Josef von Sternberg's camera, the "Dreamland" dive deep in the jagged metropolis. (Scarface was the aim and Alice in Wonderland the result, says Godard of À bout de souffle.) Bull Weed (George Bancroft) out of the exploding bank, scooping up the philosophical sot (Clive Brook) and knighting him "Rolls Royce." His moll (Evelyn Brent) is nicknamed "Feathers" because she wears them "all over," one floats down to the cuspidor on the ground in a marvelous encapsulation of form and content. "Attila the Hun at the gates of Rome," that's the truculent hoodlum roaring amid sinuous abstractions, he gazes up and the neon sign flashes "The City is Yours" at him. The seething nemesis (Fred Kohler) runs a flower shop as a front and expires next to his specialty, funeral wreaths. A bullet in the antique clock states the jewelry robbery, the stolen bracelet is as much a talisman as the bent coin and the lily in the lapel, the wizened dandy (Larry Semon) turns the perfuming of a handkerchief into a ballet of gesture. "Annual armistice," the gangland ball—a tangle of streamers and a blizzard of confetti, "a devil's carnival" that cracks the protagonist's veneer of ebullience for the beast underneath. There's the Law and then there's Fate, Bull plays checkers in his cell while the illicit couple face the clash of loyalty and desire. "Just a boob breaking jail," cornered in a shootout where shrapnel and smoke bombs become integral part of the Sternberg décor, there's no key for the door behind the bookcase. He loses his mistress but receives the rarest reward, the chance to choose his death in the realm of violence. Ray in Party Girl is the true heir. Cinematography by Bert Glennon. With Helen Lynch, Jerry Mandy, and Alfred Allen. In black and white.
--- Fernando F. Croce |