Son of Silent Scream Series: Laugh, and the world laughs with you.

What counts as a horror flick?

The extremity of the genre's typical content and the genre's assumed goal – to induce horror in the viewer – seem to make the question a bit silly, but the assumption of self-evidence is, I think, a bit deceptive. Content-wise, there's no distinct element you can point to that marks horror, and only horror, as a genre. Supernatural elements are a staple of fantasy films. The depiction of human suffering and death, or simply the threat thereof, is common in countless genres. The goal of inspiring horror, fear, or revulsion is hardly limited to the horror genre – it's a staple of crime flicks and the driving idea behind much of John Waters's early works. More importantly, even if we couldn't find this motivation in other genres, we'd be a loss to explain why so many movies identified as "horror" films don't seem all the concerned with producing actual scares. You could make a small library of schlock grindhouse fair that is more concerned with camp kicks and titillation than it is with inducing fear, but few horror fans would deny these flicks the label "horror." And this doesn't even get into the admittedly fun but ultimately pointless arguments about what particular brand of horror is the One True Horror.

I bring this up, my sweet lil' Screamers and Screamettes, not because I have any proposals that will untangle this particular Gordian knot. Instead, I mention it because the issue seems to haunt today's entry in the Son of Silent Scream Series: Paul Leni's 1928 Victor Hugo adaptation, The Man Who Laughs. Read the comments on Netflix and there's a repeated refrain running through the majority of them: This isn't really a horror film. There's the grudging acceptance approach: "This is a classic, but it isn't really a horror movie . . ." You've got the bait-and-switch accusation: "Though this movie occasionally looks and sounds like a horror film (and certainly influenced the way future horror films were shot at Universal), this movie is straight-up melodrama in German Expressionist clothing." There's the analytical take: "For starters, this really isn't a horror movie. Yes, the main character is grotesque, in a similar vein as Frankenstein. But he is not feared as a monster, nor does he have any malicious intent. I would categorize this as a romance/drama" and "A classic from Universal is often lumped in with their other horror classic but its really not. It's a period piece / melodrama with horror overtones." And this impulse to de-horror the film isn't restricted to self-appointed amateur critics. No less a critic than Roger Ebert sounded of on the real genre of the film: "The Man Who Laughs is a melodrama, at times even a swashbuckler, but so steeped in Expressionist gloom that it plays like a horror film." I could go on, but you get the idea.

So, is The Man Who Laughs a silent horror film or not?

First, let's a take a look at the flick in question. The Man Who Laughs is a relatively faithful adaptation (right until, of course, the upbeat Hollywood ending) of the 1869 Victor Hugo novel of the same name. Set in England during the 17th century, the film tells the story of Gwynplaine. Gwyn's pops was the rebellious noble who revolted against James II. The irate king executed the rebel and sold the young Gwyn over to Comprachios, a breed of gypsies known mainly for using proto-surgical techniques to turn purchased children into freakish sideshow attractions. In Gwyn's case, the Comprachios alter his mouth so that he always wears a painfully full grin.

The young Gwynplaine is eventually abandoned by the Comprachios and, over the course of a brutal winter's night, ends up in league with Ursus, a traveling showman and philosopher waging a lopsided rivalry against his showbiz contemporary Shakespeare, and Dea, a blind woman who loves Gwyn and attempts to break through his truly epic self-loathing. (The traveling troop also includes a dog named, somewhat unfortunately, Homo – a name that leads to several unintentionally comedic title cards throughout the flick.) Mutilated as he is, an lacking any knowledge of his titled lineage, Gwyn becomes part of Ursus's show and, despite the pain he feels at being a freakish display, becomes something of a celebrity.

Performing in a carnival outside of London, Gwynplaine becomes the erotic fixation of the Duchess Josiana, and jaded libertine who finds court life dull and is turned on by the potential taboo the malformed Gwynplaine represents. However, unbeknownst to either Gwyn or Josiana, the Duchess's attraction becomes a tool for court intriguers who wish to destroy Josiana to curry the favor of the Queen. As various conspiracies close in around Gwynplaine, his titled background is revealed, his lower class show biz friends are endangered, and he becomes a pawn in political game he doesn't fully understand.

The plot is truly a go-for-broke, everything-and-the-kitchen-sink affair. There's plenty of violence and darkly fetishistic sensuality, but there's also some genuinely touching melodrama, an elaborate costume drama of court politics, several overtly comedic scenes, at least one major action sequence, and an old-fashioned love story that ties everything together. It is this mutt-like plot, a storyline that snags every successful element it can from any genre that will sit still long enough to be plundered, that leads to all the confusion as to whether or not The Man Who Laughs is properly a horror movie.

And is it?

Personally, I'm inclined to say that the film is usefully considered a "horror film." Though the elements may strike us as a little quaint now, Gwynplaine's mutilation, the Duchess's perverse sexuality, and the sinister intrigues of the of the court were specifically meant to fill viewers with a sense of dread. [For the contrary opinion, check out the comments - user "my daroga" gives a thoughtful explanation of why it isn't useful to think of The Man Who Laughs as a horror film.]

More importantly, I'm not sure whether or not The Man Who Laughs is an according to Hoyle horror flick or not matters. It is an essential film for the history of the horror genre because it is part of the stylistic bedrock on which Universal built its legendary horror franchises. Leni's film is recognizably part of the same universe as Dracula, Frankenstein, The Wolf Man, Freaks and all the other first gen talkie horror films. Leni's film alternates between a vaguely anachronistic storybook "old Europe" and night scenes filled with inky black proto-noir shadows he evolved for his Expressionistic work back in Germany (on the ball readers will remember that Leni helmed the flicker Waxworks, one of last year's Silent Scream Series selections).

Even the casting choices act like a sort of bridge from one era to the other. Gwynplaine is played by the legendary Conrad Veidt, who appeared as Cesare the murderous sleepwalker/zombie in silent horror classic The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari. Veidt would go on to play a slew of villains in the talkie era, most notably Major Strasser in Casablanca. Olga Vladimirovna Baclanova, who plays the Duchess (and looks remarkably like an "Express Yourself" era Madonna), is another bridge between the silent and talkie eras of horror: she would later appear as Cleopatra, the murderously cruel beauty in Tod Browning's 1932 Freaks. Admittedly, the over-stuffed plot is atypical of the now iconic Universal horror flicks of the 1930s. But the rich, genre-bending storyline does foreshadow the mature, classy horror flicks produced by Lewton for RKO in the 1940s. For fans of classic Universal horror films or silent filmmaking at its most lush and accomplished, The Man Who Laughs won't disappoint.

SCREAMIN' FUN FACT: It is widely held that the grimace of Conrad Veidt's Gwynplaine in The Man Who Laughs was the visual inspiration for Batman's arch-villian, the Joker. True? I don't know, but I can certainly see why people might believe it. See below.

Silent Scream Series: House of Wax, Version 1.0.

Greetings, Screamers and Screamettes! Welcome to the very first post of ANTSS very first series: the Silent Scream Series. Let's get started, shall we?

If you were going to try to identify the place of birth of the modern horror flick, you could do a lot worse then proposing Weimar Era Germany. In little more than a single decade, between the German defeat in the first World War to the rise of the Nazis, German filmmakers produced a slate of horror flicks that remain the bedrock of cinematic scariness: The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, The Golem, Nosferatu, M, and dozens of others.

German filmmaking got off to slow start. Despite the efforts of native-born film pioneers, the German film market was dominated by foreign products: mostly from America and France. Native film efforts were also hampered by prevailing notions of what was and was not "proper" for Germans. Film's that did not mimic stage conventions or adapt "tasteful" literature were looked down upon.

World War I drastically changed this picture. Wartime conditions dried up the flow of foreign films to the market. Without the competition of foreign films, German filmmakers had a massive and completely captive audience. A national industry that had played third fiddle for a couple of decades was suddenly faced with supplying the demand of the entire nation. Unfortunately, this sudden rush of production did not seem to spur anybody to great creative heights. The movies of this era are often dismissed as shoddy works, full of wartime jingoism and lacking in any real sense of how film could differ from the stage. What the years of wartime isolation did do was create a truly impressive filmmaking infrastructure. When the war ended, Germany possessed several first-rate studios, a new class of filmmaking professionals, and a stable of nationally recognized performers (including several notable performers who, atypical of the time, were strictly film stars instead of slumming faces from the theater).

It was these conditions – the psychological impact of the war, the presence of the necessary production facilities, and the cultural freedom that marked the short lived attempt to establish a liberal democracy in German – that allowed for this creative explosion. The first film in ANTSS silent horror flick series is a product of this post-war boom in German film.

Waxworks, the 1924 film by Paul Leni and Leo Birinski, is a sort of sampler platter of German silent cinema. The film is an anthology piece. The framing narrative involves a young writer who is hired by the owner of an amusement park wax museum (which the English titles available on the Kino DVD set in Luna Park on Coney Island) to create background stories for his star attractions. With the museum owner's daughter looking flirtatiously over his shoulder, the writer sets down to work. What follows are three short films, each centered around one of the wax figures on display.

The first segment is a sort of fantastic comedy set around Harun al Raschid, Caliph of Bagdad during the 1,001 Nights era. This, the longest of the three films, uses Expressionist set pieces to create a Westerner's fantasy of the exotic Middle East. The plot involves a poor baker (same actor who plays the writer of the frame story) who, after his wife (the actress who plays the museum owner's daughter) catches the eye of the royal minister, concocts a plot to steal the Caliph's "wishing ring." While the baker contrives to steal the Caliph's ring, the Caliph – played by German film legend Emil Jannings – contrives to steal the baker's wife. Through a series of misunderstandings, the baker comes to think he murdered the Caliph. In the end, the quick thinking of his wife saves the day.

This first story is light fare. The fairy tale plot moves well enough, but never gets to deep or moving. Here the real star is the set design, which later informed Douglas Fairbanks's classic The Thief of Bagdad (itself the primary source of Disney's Aladdin). The city of Bagdad becomes a warren of tunnels and bridges, domes and surreally fake palm trees. The sets have a dream-like quality and, when the baker leads the royal guards on a chase through the town, they really come to life.

The movie takes a considerably darker tone with the second segment. Focusing on Ivan the Terrible, the movie looses all sense of humor. Where al Raschid is an absurd comedic figure, Ivan – played by Conrad Veidt, who was the sleepwalker in Caligari and, in a role better known to modern film fans, Major Strasser in Casablanca - is a sadist, vile character. The plot for this segment rambles about. We start with Ivan visiting his dungeons, where poisoned prisoners have hourglasses, timed to match the effects of their poisons, placed before them. They get to watch their remaining moments slowly slip away. Based on the suspicions of a royal advisor, Ivan decides that the royal poison-maker intends to do him in. As he leaves the dungeon, he leaves orders that the poison-maker is to be killed.

Ivan, having had enough poisoning for one day, then leaves to attend a wedding where he's the guest of honor. Fearful of his life, Ivan makes his host, the father of the bride, change outfits with him. Along the way, assassins mistaking the host for the Czar kill the host with an arrow to the heart. The death of the host would normal put the kibosh on a wedding party, but not when Ivan is present. He commands the wedding guests to continue with the party, making them dance and go through the motions of merrymaking, all while they sob over the dead host, whose body is left laying on the front steps with a big old arrow in it.

Deciding that he hasn't yet completely effed up the party, Ivan then decides to take the bride as his own mistress and orders the groom locked in the royal dungeon. Meanwhile, the poison-maker, knowing his own death has been ordered, writes Ivan's name on one of the hourglasses. While torturing the groom, Ivan's minions discover the glass and assume this means he's poisoned. Facing his own mortality, Ivan's brain snaps and he's reduced to a cackling idiot, endless turning the hourglass over and over in an effort to stay what he believes is his imminent doom.

The second segment is fairly nasty work, especially coming, as it does, after what is a very lighthearted story. Less visually thrilling then the first segment, the second segment emphasizes its brutal, relentlessly grim plot and relies on the acting of Veidt, who is brilliant as the mad dictator, to carry the tale. Ivan's bleak story is haunting and effective.

The final segment of the film brings us back to the framing narrative. The writer, who has now scribbled his way into the small hours of night, falls asleep at his writing desk. He dreams that the last of the wax figures – Jack the Ripper (identified as Spring–Heels Jack in the English title cards) – comes to life and pursues him and the museum owner's daughter through the now deserted amusement park.

This is the shortest of all the segments, but the film really pulls out all the stops for it. Expressionist set elements and trick photography are used to create one of the most distinctive chase scenes ever. In his classic critical work, From Caligari to Hitler, Siegfried Kracauer said that the final segment "must be counted among the greatest achievements of film art." How them apples grab you, Bob? You can argue all you want with me. I'm just some blogger. But Kracauer's famous, so there you go.

Waxworks is a curious flick. The first segment is not really horrific, but the rest of the film is. The tone starts off light-hearted to the point of near goofiness, only to turn inky black in the second segment and stay that way. This would be less of an issue for horror fans if the first segment wasn't also the longest. I recommend Waxworks for those who dig the visual style of Expressionist works like Caligari or who want to get a sense of the range German fantasy films had at the time. Those interested more strictly in horror's roots might want to pass this house of wax by.