(1921)
Dir - James Young
Overall: MEH
Despite what its title The Devil may allude to, this cinematic version of Ferenc Molnár's 1908 Broadway play of the same name bares few hallmarks to any future horror tropes, even with the Great Deceiver being the main character. Played by veteran stage actor George Arliss in his screen debut, he portrays Satan as a charming gentleman of mischievous deeds, pitting two lovebirds against each other in an attempt to prove that evil can triumph over good. He does this by gaining people's trust, putting his hands on their shoulders, and telling them whatever he needs to in order to implant his bothersome scheme. Arliss widens his eyes and creeps around fiendishly at times, but nothing of dramatic importance happens throughout the entire affair, and the Devil's deeds are more long-winded and pointless than outright diabolical. It is only within the closing two minutes that he is discovered for the prankster that he is, pathetically thwarted by Lucy Cotten who prays to god and simply walking away, at which point Arliss' hairline resembles horns and he bursts into flame as the sign of the cross is superimposed over him. Lost for decades, the film was eventually rediscovered in the 1990s, but it suffices as a historical curiosity only.
(1925)
Dir - Tod Browning
Overall: GOOD
Once again revisiting the circus life from which he was accustomed and would frequently dip into for inspiration, director/co-writer Tod Browning's The Mystic has flown under the radar in his oeuvre, at least compared to his more celebrated works with collaborator Lon Chaney. Chaney is absent for this round, (though he would appear in the same year's similarly veined The Unholy Three), so instead we have a cast of less A-list thespians in a tale of capitalist greed corrupting those who are indoctrinated in such ways. As always, Browning paints his gypsies and carnival employees in a sympathetic light, even as they become consumed by suspicion and avarice. That is because it is an American business man who intrudes on their Hungarian operation overseas, bringing them back to the states to perform elaborate cons on the upper class. Yet as opposed to later Browning films such as The Unknown and Freaks, this one takes on an optimistic tone in its closing moments since everyone's cold, money-grubbing hearts are won over by love and the irresistible influence of naive gentleness. Supernatural elements are toyed with and more than likely existing in a psychological sense, but it still has some of the more memorable seance scenes from the silent era, with white-sheet ghosts and disembodied hands emerging out of pure darkness while Aileen Pringle's title character does the customary, melodramatic, spiritual medium shtick.
(1926)
Dir - Ronald West
Overall: MEH
The earliest surviving cinematic adaptation of Mary Roberts Rinehart's 1908 novel The Circular Staircase and the first to be directly interpreted from Rinehart's 1920 play The Bat, the film of the same name helped to establish whodunit motifs that would be reinforced for years to come. Director Ronald West would remake the material yet again and only four years later as The Bat Whispers, plus one more arrived from filmmaker Crane Wilbur after several decades starring Vincent Price. West's two takes on it bare few differences between them, following an identical plot with the same comedic beats in place. They also both feature impressive set design, and while the ambitious and gliding camera work would be front and center in the next version, this still has impressive wide shots of rooms with eighteen-foot doors that make everyone look like tiny insects trapped in a spooky old house. We also get a literal bat signal, so it is no wonder that Bob Kane would later go on record by admitting the inspiration from here that he took in creating Batman thirteen years later. On that note, the title criminal looks more ridiculous than frightening with his big Mickey Mouse-esque ears/rodent-faced mask on, but even if the film is hardly essential since everything here would be later improved upon, it is still an adequate production.
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