Tangled web… The Spiders (1919-20)

Gadget girl: Lio Sha spies on a Spiders meeting using a TV screen

This blog is yet to feature Fritz Lang and I’ve no idea why it’s taken so long to discuss the director of M, Doctor Mabuses and Metropolis – one of the main films that sparked my silent interest – not to mention The Big Heat and other personal favourites like Clash by Night (featuring Barbara Stanwyck on blistering form).

The Spiders includes Lang’s fourth and sixth films, made in his late twenties when he was clearly still developing his style and whilst they’re not absolute classics, they contain plenty of invention and hints at later themes – Dr Mabuse especially in terms of over-organised crime, hi-tech, mind-power and relentless, high-detail plotlines.

The Spiders' hi-tech base

The series was clearly influenced by Louise Feuillade – with Das Spinnen resembling Les Vampires with a bigger budget and femme fatale Lio Sha just a black jumpsuit away from Irma Vep whilst the bank robbers in part two wear Judex masks and the plot is hand-to-mouth in a breathless sequence of extended jeopardies.

The action runs away with itself from time to time and, whilst this could be down to missing footage, it also reflects Lang’s occasionally rushed editing. His shots are wonderfully framed and filmed by his cinematographers (Carl Freund, Carl Hoffmann and Emil Schünemann) but sometimes they don’t always explain themselves… Hero Kay Hoog flies over the Spiders’ base and climbs out of the plane, next we see him on their roof -  without a parachute: surely not? Similarly when Hoog is trapped by the Spiders in an airtight room and they start filling it with water he somehow finds a way out and is seen swimming towards a friendly rowing boat.

Locations for grand adventure

But these are quibbles as both films are high octane adventures that crack along at pace with many a surprise along the way: the jeopardy is convincing enough.

Part One: Der Goldene See (1919) (The Golden Sea although The Golden Lake is apparently a closer translation)

Events begin with a prologue in which an older man is being pursued along a cliff by an Inca warrior. He writes a last desperate message and seals it in a bottle, throwing it into the sea just as he is felled by the warrior’s arrow.

The scene shifts to a San Franciscan hotel in which are gathered various wealthy adventurers including one Kay Hoog (Carl de Vogt) who has found the bottle and managed to decipher it. He tells the assembled audience that the sender had found an undiscovered Incan civilisation which jealously guards their untold riches, killing any outsiders who learn of their whereabouts. Our proto-Indiana Jones has no option but to seek out this hoard for himself…

Kay Hoog tells his tale whilst Lio Sha listens on...

Amongst his rapt audience is one Lio Sha (Ressel Orla) who camps it up wonderfully for the camera. She listens all too carefully to Hoog’s tale and is soon revealed to be one of the leaders of an organised crime gang called The Spiders. They attempt to steal the note and location of the treasure but not before Hoog has worked out the location. So begins a race to win the gold.

Hoog arrives and makes his way through the jungle to lake where he sees the beautiful Inca Princess Naela (Caligari’s Lil Dagover) bathing. Just as a massive boa constrictor is about to fall onto her Hoog rushes in and despatches the snake thereby ensuring the Princess’ gratitude and soon much more…

Hoog spies the princess swimming in the Golden Lake...

The Spiders are less careful and the Inca steal Lio Sha away intending her for human sacrifice at the hands of the unwilling Princess. Naturally Hog cannot allow this and leaps to the rescue of his criminal foe and as he is about to be overwhelmed, the Spiders arrive en mass armed with rifles... all hell breaks loose.

Sha and Hoog briefly join forces

The Europeans end up in the treasure caves but there are surprises in store that place all of their loves in peril and not everyone gets out alive...

Part Two: Das Brillantenschiff (1920) (The Diamond Ship)

The next instalment finds Hoog still in pursuit of The Spiders whose ambition and organisation looks to have grown.

Hoog had learned of the existence of a diamond shaped like the head of Buddha in the first film and now the chase is on for this mystical jewel which The Spiders believe will enable them to rule all of Asia (natch). They are robbing as many banks as possible in the hope of tracking down the diamond and Lio Sha is overseeing an operation running like a “well-oiled engine” and stretching from San Francisco across to the Orient.

The well-oiled machine at work...

Hoog manages to track down the group’s lair but the subsequent raid is not quick enough to prevent their escape and his group is almost crushed in a steel chamber as they take a hidden elevator to their freedom. Learning of a hidden city beneath Chinatown using a clue from the raid Hoog succeeds in infiltrating a Spiders meeting only to be trapped and almost drowned. He manages to escape having learned about the gang’s “Diamond Ship” on which he smuggles himself aboard hidden in a well kitted out packing crate – all mod cons!

Hoog examines the evidence

Meanwhile we learn of the Spiders’ Master (Georg John) - a man of great willpower who can hypnotise almost anyone to do his bidding. He is shown in India forcing Yogi All-hab-mah (Friedrich Kühne) into revealing who may have the diamond. We are shown an English privateer who acquired the diamond and this changes as the generations pass to that of his descendant, the Diamond King, John Terry (Rudolf Lettinger).

Yogi All-hab-mah senses the Diamond King...

Hoog leaves his crate long enough to intercept the Master’s message to his crew: the orders are to set sail for England to find Terry. Hoog makes a daring escape from the ship running up the rigging pursued by dozens of men and diving off one of the masts to swim ashore.

Yet, by the time he reaches Terry’s house, his daughter Ellen (Thea Zander) has been kidnapped by the Spiders who were unable to locate the diamond in his house and are now holding her to ransom in exchange. The problem is... Terry doesn’t know where the jewel is…

Hoog in action

But Hoog is a master of intuitive detective work and noticing the portrait of Terry’s forebear: the privateer who originally obtained the jewel, he is quickly able to piece together the clues to discover that the old pirate had buried his treasure in a cave on the Falkland Islands before he and his crew had fallen victim to an unexplained catastrophe… which left only the captain left standing and able to return home.

As Hoog and Terry discus the location they are overheard by a spy from the Spiders: Fourfinger-John (Edgar Pauly). They catch him but cannot prevent him from alerting his comrades via homing pigeon: the race is on.

Lio Sha watches as The Master hypnotizes Ellen Terry

The climax is every bit as climactic as you’d expect as Hoog and Lio Sha engage in one final conflict: who will emerge victorious and will Terry ever see his daughter again?! You’ll just have to watch the films to find out.

The Spiders is great fun and shows a more playful side to Lang than I’ve seen in his later work. It may be uneven in parts but there’s a lot packed into a relentless story that feels more like conjoined episodes of a serial than two feature films.

Hoog closes in on the treasure... but so does Lio Sha

I watched the Kino DVD which comes complete with a super score from Ben Model who keeps pace with the action with expert invention. It’s available directfrom Kino and other online retailers.

Wheel of fortune... The Wheels of Chance (1922)

Whilst I’ve seen quite a few late-period British silent films, I’ve seen very little from the early twenties (not for want of trying). Director Harold M. Shaw’s version of HG Wells’ novel is a gentle social satire that entertains whilst leaving you reading through the lines for its author’s original intentions.

Never-the-less, this is a charming, well-made film that serves as a time-capsule travelogue of Sussex and Hampshire in the days when they were opened up to cycling free spirits yet to be crowded off the highway by motor cars and heavy goods vehicles.

George K. Arthur

George K. Arthur (later to feature in von Sternberg’s The Salvation Hunters as part of a long career) plays Hoopdriver, an assistant at draper’s shop who has planned a week of freedom on his new bicycle. The only problem is he hasn’t quite managed to learn how to ride it yet.

Meanwhile over in the select suburbs, a couple who are planning an altogether more elicit adventure. Jessie Milton (Olwen Roose) has been persuaded by her man-friend Bechamel (Gordon Parker) to travel with him down to his sister’s house in the Sussex town of Midhurst. Her domineering mother (Mabel Archdale) would never countenance such a venture – such things are not welcome in Surbiton - and so, the two skulk off on their bikes in the early hours…

A question of balance...

Hoopdriver wends his wobbly way through picturesque lanes devoid of motor traffic and Shaw works some excellent mobile shots of pastoral perambulation even as you marvel how he’s managed to get so far. Arthur does very well at nearly riding his bike: almost as difficult as deliberately playing a piano badly only rather more painful.

He chances across young Jessie and the two engage in a brief conversation – he’s impressed by her refinement: she’s no shop girl. He leaves her waiting for her male friend and a few minutes later encounters Bechamel angrily trying to fix a puncture, the young man offers to help and gets a hail of invective in response – a wonderful title card graphic hinting at the language used.

Jessie and the bounder Bechamel

Hoopdriver reaches Midhurst and books himself into the hotel only to find that the couple have also arrived there. But all is not quite as it seems…

We already suspect the man is a bounder but the full extent of Bechamel’s caddishness is soon exposed as, after re-joining Jessie, he reveals that his line about his sister was a lie and that he has booked them into an hotel as man and wife! This is shameful… "You are mine! Netted and caught - but mine!”

Meanwhile Mrs Milton has noticed Jessie’s disappearance and sets off in pursuit accompanied by three male friends who are eager to please the comfortably off widow. The portly Widgery (Judd Green) leads the way on his bike whilst the cadaverous Dangle (Wallace Bosco) and monocled Phipps (Clifford Marle) stay in close attendance with the distressed mother.

Wallace Bosco, Clifford Marle, Mabel Archdale and Judd Green

Once Bechamel has revealed his full awfulness, Jessie looks for an escape. There are no more trains to anywhere and she decides that Hoopdriver is her only hope… persuading him to help her escape on their bikes whilst Bechamel awaits her surrender. They fly off just as Dangle arrives… the chase is on.

Jessie decides that she wants to continue her adventure and to free herself of her middle class shackles and, instinctively trusting Hoopdriver, she asks him to go with her. The young man is flattered and decides to paint an improved picture of himself, inventing a more impressive persona as Chris Carrington, colonial diamond mine owner who is considering standing for “Parleyment”…

The game's up!

They stay on the road to Fareham unaware that they are being pursued and that Widgery has guessed at their direction sending the others ahead by train whilst he follows by bike. The Surbiton party spots them and Phipps gives chase on a horse and trap. Unfortunately his control of both cart and horse means that having caught up he cannot stop… Jessie realises what is happening and the couple divert to Winchester.

The Wheels of Chance gives very good countryside and we are treated to lovely views of Hampshire and Sussex roads as well as the towns and villages – on through the tiny village of Wallenstock to Chichester.

Hampshire haven...

But the relationship between “Chris” and Jessie is perhaps not developed enough and there are only occasional hints of Hoopdrivers’ social awkwardness as Jessie notices his habit of almost waiting on her… he doesn’t have the right bearing for a diamond miner.

Jessie’s break for freedom is also never fully explained but then perhaps that’s the point: she’s a polite rebel without a cause… just in need of distraction.

No spoilers…  I won’t give away the ending as it’s less predictable than you might expect: this is more Ringwood than Hollywood.

George K Arthur is the stand-out performer investing Hoopdriver with a peculiarly-British mild heroism that sees him engage in slap-dash fist-cuffs in order to defend Jessie’s honour. He never gives up even though his self-confidence is defined by his position but maybe this adventure will ultimately give him a new direction.

 The Wheels of Chance is occasionally screened round London and the print I saw could do with a clean-up and digital release… but there’s a long queue for that.

The lost world… Merton of the Movies (1924)

"This is such a good picture that we intend seeing it again at the first opportunity we have."

New York Times, September 8, 1924

Recent research from the Library of Congress has concluded that up to 75% of American films made before the advent of sound have been lost. How much does this add to the allure of silent film and do we count ourselves especially lucky to be able to watch that which survives? There’s no way of knowing how many classic have been dumped and whether what remains is almost by definition the best, the most watched and the most cherished? But, without doubt, many great films will never be seen again and many entertaining films that might have added to our appreciation of the period and its entertainments.

Aside from bemoan their loss, what can we actually do about non-extant films? Maybe the answer is to try and put them in context and to try and give them some kind of existence in memory.

Maybe, like Bradbury’s characters in Fahrenheit 451, we should all task ourselves with committing to memory at least one silent film so that it lives on in some way… maybe by drawing together the available information we can somehow resurrect them at least enough to catch a glimpse of what might-have-been and what actually-was…

Viola Dana and Glenn Hunter

Merton of the Movies is a lost film from 1924 directed by James Cruze, starring Glenn Hunter (who had earlier featured in Smilin' Through) and Viola Dana (star of many dozens of films from 1910 onwards including Children of Eve)  and which enjoyed some success being nominated as one of the top ten films of the year by the New York Times.

It was based on a 1919 book written by Harry Leon Wilson who also wrote The Ruggles of Red Gap which was later turned into a film starring Charles Laughton... In 1922, the book was adapted into a Broadway play by George S. Kaufman and Marc Connelly and a tie-in novel was published including stills from that production.

My copy of the 1922 edition, issued to tie in with the play's success: thanks Mary!

My friend Mary found a copy for 75c in a bookstore near where she lives in Santa Barbara and kindly sent it to me knowing it would be just my cup of tea. So now, ladies and gentlemen, I am able to re-tell the story of the book that led to the play and then onto the film and let your imaginations fill in the rest with the aid of the few shots that remain…

The book begins with some very dense, florid prose as cowboy Buck Benson does battle with one Snake le Vasquez for the honour of city girl Estelle St. Clair… you wonder if this is just aged creaky style but its Wilson’s post-modern humour poking fun at not just the movies but also our dreamy devotion to them.

Buck confronts Snake le Vasquez

 The participants turn out to be two showroom dummies and one stock room one: Merton Gill (Glenn Hunter) who whiles away his working hours daydreaming of being a western film star. He is employed by Mr Gashwiler (Charles Sellon) at his general store and is saving every penny for his big chance in Hollywood.

Merton has an ally in Tessie Kearns (Gale Henry) who writes scenarios in her spare time – none yet published – as well as accompanying Merton on frequent trips to the local movie house. He worships BB the star of dramatic serials and rather looks down on the slapstick shorts served on the undercard: real drama was worth more than laughter.

Soon Merton heads off to chance his hand with his savings and the promise of his old job back if things don’t work out - Mr Gashwiler obviously seeing nothing much to lose in the extension of such generosity…

Merton finds room and board and begins a daily routine of looking for work as an extra at the Holden Studios where BB films her serials… part-stalker, part-dreamer, you wish Merton the best but you’re not convinced he’ll get very far.

Flips buys Merton a square meal (image thanks to Jay Parrino...)

He encounters others on the fringes of the business including Mr. Montague (Charles Ogle) and his daughter Sally – nicknamed “Flips” (Viola Dana) who seems to have a finger in every pie and to know everybody and everything. Merton decides he doesn’t like her “frivolity” he prefers that movies are taken more seriously.

Wilson’s construction of cohesive inner dialogue for Merton is expert and you wonder how this could ever be translated onto the silent screen – a voice-over would help explain the young man’s nativity and an earnestness that blinds him to neuro-typical responses almost throughout the whole book.

Flips sees something in him and she persuades slapstick specialist  Jeff Baird (DeWitt Jennings) that his unflinching seriousness will have hilarious results when placed in the context of the latter’s silly comedies. Young Merton also bears more than a passing resemblance to  Harold Parmalee (Elliott Rothe), a successful and serious dramatic actor.

The formidable Flips

So it is that Merton gets into the movies thinking that he’s filming the start of a new serious strain of from the joker and his wobble-eyed cast (any resemblance to Ben Turpin is entirely deliberate…). But it’s vital that in order to be the joke, Merton mustn’t get the joke and Wilson works very hard to enable Baird’s hood-winking to succeed. His every improvised excuse for how things look is rapidly assimilated as justification for some of the extremes Merton must endure.

Things go well but Flips worries about how he’ll react when he discovers the truth… in spite of it all she’s going soft on the guy.

But Bairns thinks only good can come from being successful and even laughter is better than no applause at all… He rushes Merton into his next feature and aims to complete that before the cat is let out of the bag.

No spoilers… you can’t see the film but you really should read the book! There’s also a remake featuring Red Skelton in 1947 but it’s also fair to say that Show People owes more than a little to Merton.

Merton is so well-informed about the movies, how they’re made and how the effort in front of the camera can only truly be appreciated once all of the editing, cutting and post-production has been completed. Merton’s nights on the lot show evidence of Wilson’s depth of research and it’s especially fascinating to get a glimpse of the production process. Most of all, the attitude of the film-makers to what was already a massively successful business, is so revealing: the clichés were already in place probably a decade before the book was written.

Glenn Hunter in the play

The play was a huge success and Glenn Hunter had starred in one of the touring products. You can imagine he’d do very well in this role but Photoplay thought Charlie Ray would have been better. The New York Times was rather more enthused:

"Mr. Hunter's performance is all that could be wished. He makes Merton wistful and hopeful... While he is pathetic, he is persistent, and his frowns and smiles, his puffed-out chest and speaking eyebrows keep one constantly interested, and often stir one to hilarity."

Glenn Hunter as Merton as Buck

The Times described Viola Dana as splendid and you can imagine how she’d cope very well with the wise-cracking Flips, always addressing life on the balls of her feet – up for anything!

Ultimately, it’s hard to do anything other than imagine which bits of the 335 page novel would have informed the film and perhaps the play might provide a closer fit (it’s downloadable from the Internet Archive). But the book, as all source materials, stands on its own right and is stillavailable from Amazon. Second hand copies are also on eBay, later editions without dust-jackets are quite affordable, but a mint copy of the first edition could set you back over $2,000.

Maybe one day the celluloid will be found… it’s a slim chance but every so often, cinematic dreams do come true as Merton himself would attest.

No school like old school… College (1927)/ The Electric House (1922) BFI with Costas Fotopoulos

It’s taken me a little while to make it to the BFI’s Buster Keaton season but I picked a good combination in his 1927 feature College supported by 1922’s The Electric House or, as the BFI’s booking office screen briefly had it, The Electric Horse…

Both films felt fresh and if you’re looking for an un-guarded, un-contextualised, reflex-reaction to a 90-year old film, Buster can provide it: tonight we were grinning like it was 1927…

Buster is arguably the most timeless of all silent comics because, whilst he takes risks like Lloyd and has the grace of Chaplin, he underplays with such measured restraint: you want him to react and by talking everything in his stride he lets you in on the joke in a very genuine and naturalistic way. Against the artificiality of the films is balanced the real danger of the stunts – he broke his ankle in The Electric House –  yet he’s always true to himself and he doesn’t hide the seriousness in his work. This diligence and invention is still capable of surprising the most cynical of cinephiles and we were rewarded with many laugh-out-loud moments.

Ronald sways from left to right...

Directed by James W. Horne and Buster Keaton from a story by Bryan Foy and Carl Harbaugh, College tells the tale of the bookish Ronald (Buster) who follows his sweetheart, Mary (Anne Cornwall) to college in order to show her he’s as much an athlete as an aesthete.

He wins the school prize and gives a speech decrying the “Curse of the Athlete” as it makes fellows forget to learn as they concentrate on physicality. Unfortunately Ronald’s suit is shrinking before his audience’s eyes after he was soaked in a rain shower, and as the audience bays in disgust at his words, they laugh their heads off as he tries to hide his diminishing clothes. It’s a rip-roaring start and the pace hardly lets up through the rest of the film.

Mary is shocked and Jeff gets mad...

Mary tears a strip off Ronald for his narrow-mindedness and goes off with Jeff (Harold Goodwin) – one of the jocks. Worse still, they are both headed for Clayton College an expensive but un-academic institution that thrives on sports. Determined to win Mary back, Ronald changes course and heads off to Clayton with a bag packed with sporting gear he has no idea how to use.

Naturally Ronald begins to fit in like a square peg as we see him trying out for the baseball team and then the athletics squad making a wonderful mess of sprinting, shot put, hurdles and high jump. Mary admires his spirit but despairs of his co-ordination… she seems stuck with Jeff as Ronald is seen to be thrown by his own hammer and barely clears the pole let alone the vault.

The hammer throws the thrower

Meanwhile Ronald has a couple of unsuccessful jobs as a soda jerk who is too jerky and a black waiter… best to draw a veil over that.

We’re hoping for some kind of redemption for Ronald and he may find it through the Dean (Snitz Edwards). Initially delighted to find this academic high-achiever had chosen his sports-obsessed college the Dean is appalled at Ronald’s low marks but, when the young man confesses the reasons, a chord is struck for once the Dean had had to make the same decision and played safe… and sour.

He orders the coach to give him a chance as cox on the college rowing team because “he’s got brains”. The coach attempts to drug Ronald but he swaps his cup with the preferred coxswain and there’s no other option as Clayton’s eight face the most significant contest in their history.

Jeff steps over the line... as the crew take issue with their new cox

Meanwhile, Jeff has been expelled and locks Mary in her room knowing that if he’s found there she will also have her place terminated: he wants to force her into marriage.

No spoilers… Can Ronald redeem himself and save the girl? All plays out in a breathless final ten minutes which allows Keaton to finally show us how fast he can run, jump and think! And there’s a coda which is a surreal take on the usual ending… to be believed it has to be seen!

As my wife observed, just like Mary we admire Ronald’s heroic failure to ever give up – he just keeps on going and you’re rooting for him all the way, laughing with and not at: in Buster we trust.

 
There’s an academic start also to The Electric House as Buster lines up on graduation day to collect his degree in botany only to be given a colleague’s certificate in electronics.

He’s given the job of wiring up an advanced modern house by a family who depart on vacation leaving him with only a book on electronics to help.

On their return we fear the worst but, initially it seems like Buster has done a good job as he demonstrates a moving staircase which moves smoothly enough but perhaps a bit too fast as it launches the master of the house out of the landing window and into the swimming pool.

By and large Buster’s automations appear to work well, the mobile bath, the automated book selection in the library and the billiard table that re-sets itself. There is some trouble with the mini-railway that delivers the food to the dining table but that’s only because Buster accidentally re-lays the rails pointing towards the lady of the house… dinner is swerved!

But then the man who should have got the electronics degree turns up eager to revenge himself on the man who stole his honours degree… and things go a lot haywire.

The Electric House packs a lot of invention into its twenty minutes: all perfectly arranged by its director and star.

Costas Fotopoulos provided energetic accompaniment to both films that matched Buster’s every slip, trip and fall. Playing for comic effect must be a rare treat for the improvising musician and, as with all humour, the timing has to be spot on. It was.

For home viewing College is now available on Blu-ray in the US from Kino Lorber. The Electric House is available as part of the Buster Keaton The Complete Short Films collection, readily available from Movie Mail.