The False Faces (1919)

Directed by

Irvin Willat

Genre

drama film, silent film

Country

United States

Runtime

1h 37m

Rated

NR

Rating

5.3 of 10 from 7 voters

Elsewhere

IMDb

How it feels

A man known as the Lone Wolf goes up against a villain named Karl Ekstrom. The story involves a haunted U-boat captain and a woman made up to look like a corpse. The film builds to a furious finale.

energetictensepulse-poundingtheatricalrestoredclassicnoir-tingedaction-focused

What happens

The False Faces is a 1919 American silent action film written and directed by Irvin Willat, based on the novel by Louis Joseph Vance, and starring Henry B. Walthall as Michael Lanyard, the "Lone Wolf," and Lon Chaney as Karl Ekstrom, the villain. A complete print of the film survives at the George Eastman House and at the Turner Film Library. It was thought to be lost for years, but was later found and somewhat restored. Director Willat was originally to have shared co-directing chores with Jerome Storm, but when the film's production was moved back from August to October, he ended up being the sole director. Lon Chaney's energetic performance, especially in the film's furious finale, remains an early example of his celebrated work. Chaney is shown applying a fake beard to his face in one scene, the only time he was ever photographed in a film applying his makeup. Chaney also designed and applied actress Jane Daly's makeup to give her the appearance of a "sea-corpse" as she appears to the haunted U-boat captain in the film. A cover reproduction of the film's sheet music exists. Based on a series of novels begun in 1914 by Louis Joseph Vance, the Lone Wolf character remained a part of popular culture for generations, with movies ranging from 1917 to 1949 starring Jack Holt, Melvyn Douglas, Warren William, Gerald Mohr (who had also played the part in a radio series) and others in the Michael Lanyard role, as well as a 1954-55 "Lone Wolf" television series with Louis Hayward delineating his fictional exploits. Henry B. Walthall had starred in D. W. Griffith's seminal The Birth of a Nation four years earlier, while Lon Chaney went on to become one of the world's most enduring cultural icons with performances in films such as the Hunchback of Notre Dame four years later and the Phantom of the Opera in 1925. (from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA)

More like this

• The Lone Wolf (1917)
• A Daughter of the Wolf (1919)
• Terror of the Range (1919)
• The Lone Wolf in Mexico (1947)
• When a Man Rides Alone (1919)
• The Man in the Open (1919)
• The Last of the Duanes (1919)
• Blind Man's Eyes (1919)