MovieChat Forums > West of Zanzibar (1928) Discussion > A great movie!

A great movie!

posted 17 years ago by wtl471629
5 replies | jump to latest

And Lon Chaney is brilliant once again. TCM does a great job of bringing these movies and fortunately they show this one once in a while so you need to be on the lookout for it if you haven't seen it. I am not sure if any parts have been left off but TCM is pretty good at giving a verbal explanation of missing parts like they did with Metropolis.

SPOILIER WARNING! PLEASE READ NO FARTHER IF YOU HAVEN'T SEEN THIS MOVIE.

Lon Chaney is brilliant. You can never forget his fiendest joy as he tells Lionel about what he has done to his daughter but when Lionel laughs and tells him that it is really his (Lon's) daughter the expression of changing from cruel fiendest joy to extreme horror is priceless. A great movie indeed.

[–] Xcalat3 15 years ago

yeah great silent flick

When there's no more room in hell, The dead will walk the earth...

[–] poems71 15 years ago

Great vehicle for the great Chaney. Wonderfully odd, twisted, affecting and poignant. Shakespearian in a Chaney/Browning way. Also, to those who do not like silent movies, see this and I will bet you cannot stop until the end.

[–] oldmotem 14 years ago

This is a great performance - silent or otherwise. At times in this movie, Chaney looks totally like a ragdoll. His legs are totally rubber. INHUMAN. That man was INHUMAN.

Superb actor and make-up artist, contortionist, etc.

[–] sleepybone 14 years ago

This is my favorite Chaney performance-- I think the main reason this movie is better than the re-make (Kongo in 1932) is because Phroso is so much more sympathetic, both in the writing and in the acting, than Walter Huston's character in Kongo.

[–] xerses13 13 years ago

judyhill57-1; This is one of the first CHANEY films I can remember seeing. It was shown on PBS/Chicago in the early 1970s'. Interestingly the print was better then this version on TCM and had a more effective musical score.