The highlight of the week. A rare screening of a brilliant silent film with Lon Chaney and a young Joan Crawford directed by the legendary director Tod Browning of Freaks fame. Do not miss if you get the chance to get down to Soho for this. One thing is for sure: you'll get a friendly welcome from the Society Film Club - you can find out more about the people behind the club here and you can find out more about tonight's screening on their Facebook page here.
Time Out review:
'As with Browning's Freaks, one wonders how MGM ever got conned into making this resplendent study in morbid psychology. As much a casebook as a horror movie, it tells the truly marvellous tale of Alonzo the Armless Wonder (Chaney, of course), who uses his feet to perform a circus knife-throwing act. Only masquerading as armless (wanted by the police for a strangling, he's concealing the telltale evidence of a hand with two thumbs), he falls for pretty Estrellita (Crawford), the bareback rider. But she has a trauma about being touched by men, so he besottenly decides to have his arms amputated, only to find a handsome strong man emerging as a successful rival for her heart, cue for a fiendishly vengeful Grand Guignol finale staged during the strong man's act. One of the great silent movies, astonishing in its intensity, this is by far the best of the remarkable series of Browning/ Chaney collaborations.'
Tom Milne
Here is an extract.
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