#28: The Man Who Laughs
A tale of love amidst misery
This review was originally posted to Twitter on January 5, 2019
Initial release: 1928
Director: Paul Leni
Some films don’t look like the genre they’re supposed to be in, or otherwise subvert the boxes people tend to put them in. The Man Who Laughs is one such film; it’s called a melodrama, but at heart it’s an expressionist gothic romance. Initially a Victor Hugo novel published in 1869, Laughs, like some of Hugo’s other novels, is a dark, complex political tale full of murder and revenge aimed directly at the upper classes. The movie, in contrast, is quite stripped down — and the heroes live at the end.
Conrad Veidt (what an actor!) stars as Gwynplaine, a carnival freak in the early 1700s who was disfigured as a child by agents of King James II. The only woman he believes could love him is the blind Dea, and the two of them work for their surrogate parent, Ursus the snake oil salesman. The cruel jester who engineered the execution of Gwynplaine’s nobleman father discovers Gwynplaine is still alive, and, eager for scandal, arranges with Queen Anne to have him granted his father’s title and estate, and marry the vampy duchess Josiana. Things go poorly.
Told that Gwynplaine is dead, Ursus and Dea are thus banished from England, and the whole traveling circus is shipped off to the docks. Gwynplaine, meanwhile, lambasts the nobility, and at the first opportunity, he dips out of the castle and heads out to find his family. In the end, the jester is slain by Ursus’ pet wolf, Gwynplaine is reunited with his adoptive family (even the wolf lives!) and they all sail off into the sunrise. it’s a tidy end, but really, the plot doesn’t matter. What does matter is the look of the film.
Like many films of the era, The Man Who Laughs is a starkly expressionist film. While many silent films were visually stunning as a matter of necessity, German expressionism was the height of the form, and as filmmakers fled the Nazis, they took their styles to Hollywood. With this in mind it’s easy to see how some might sort The Man Who Laughs into horror or even film noir — both genres that owe much to expressionism. It’s shot through with a moody, almost oppressive atmosphere, with sometimes fantastical set design and lighting. More to the point, while Gwynplaine is unambiguously heroic, his terrifying, grinning form easily gives rise to images of none other than Batman’s arch-nemesis, the Joker — and Batman works have often had an expressionist bent to them, especially in film.
The soundtrack is a highlight of the film. Originally released entirely silent at the very beginning of the “sound film” era, the film was successful enough that it was temporarily pulled and re-released with a full soundtrack, with music and sound effects (no dialogue tho.)
The silent film era is often forgotten today. At most, people might have seen a Charlie Chaplin film or maybe Metropolis — and only clips, at that. but it’s worth going back to see how many of the filmmaking techniques we take for granted today were being invented on the spot. The Man Who Laughs is definitely a good example of that, one of the last films of German expressionism, influencing the burgeoning horror genre as well as an example of masterful makeup work — there’s a reason Veidt’s grinning leer is in every book about horror films.
While I can’t recommend the film for the story, it has some great performances, obviously from Conrad Veidt but also especially Mary Philbin’s nearly doll-like portrayal of Dea; and I can certainly recommend it for its visual style. And it’s a piece of film history besides.
