Der Mann mit den 1000 Gesichtern (1957)

Der Mann mit den 1000 Gesichtern: Directed by Joseph Pevney. With James Cagney, Dorothy Malone, Jane Greer, Marjorie Rambeau. The life and career of vaudevillian and silent screen horror star Lon Chaney, including his contentious relationship with his neurotic wife and his premature death.

“James Cagney was 58 years old when he starred in this movie as Lon Chaney, who died in 1930 at the age of 47. The story starts out in the early 1900s when Chaney was a Vaudeville performer in his 20s! His son was born in 1906 and he started working in films (as an extra) in 1912 or 1913 at the age of 30. Chaney divorced his first wife in 1913 and remarried in 1914. All of these events happened to Chaney before he was 31.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eWhile Cagney does give a good performance, heu0026#39;s so u0026quot;too oldu0026quot; for the role, itu0026#39;s hard to get past it. The filmmakers try to hide it by having Cagney is clown make-up or or theatrical guise through a lot of the early part of the film when heu0026#39;s married to the first wife (Dorothy Malone, whou0026#39;s 33 here). With Malone out and the second wife (Jane Greer, also 33) in, Cagney looks like their father.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eThereu0026#39;s a lot of lip service to Chaneyu0026#39;s film career, which really took off with THE MIRACLE MAN in 1919. That film, which exists now only in fragments, starred Thomas Meighan and Betty Compson. Chaney had the showy supporting role of u0026quot;the Frogu0026quot; (a role originated on Broadway by Percy Helton). This is pretty well done. We see lots of drawings of Chaneyu0026#39;s subsequent characters in films and two of the most famous are re-enacted.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eThe main trouble with the re-enactments of THE HUNCHBACK OF NOTRE DAME and THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA is that while Chaney created his characters with makeup, hooks, wires, and rubber so that his facial expressions were free. Cagneyu0026#39;s disguises are mostly just Halloween masks and do not come close to the original creations.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eIrving Thalberg is played by Robert Evans, whom Norma Shearer spotted by the pool at the Beverly Hills Hotel and promoted him for the role of her dead husband. Roger Smith plays Chaneyu0026#39;s son. He was u0026quot;discoveredu0026quot; by Cagney in Hawaii and promoted for the role of Chaney, Jr.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eOthers in the cast include Jim Backus as the press agent, Marjorie Rambeau as the old-time actress, Marjorie Bennett as Vera the maid, and Celia Lovsky as the mother. u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eThis film is probably a fine biopic if you know nothing about Lon Chaney. If you do, then it comes across as a vanity production of the worst kind.”