SCFZ poll: Tod Browning

[flip]

Polling the films of Tod Browning.

The rules:

- your list can include no more than half of the Browning films you've seen, up to a maximum of 5. So if you've seen seven of his films, for example, you can list only a top 3. It's only if you've seen ten or more of his films than you can list the maximum of five.

- i'll assume ballots are ranked unless you tell me otherwise. unranked ballots are fine.

- deadline for ballots: next Friday, in seven days, whatever day that is

- if anyone is watching films for these polls, then i'll extend the deadline up to three days, if someone requests an extension

- next poll: whoever posts the first ballot in this thread is free to nominate the director we poll next, unless you've nominated in this round already (everyone should get a chance). Already nominated this round: bure

umbugbene created an index on letterboxd of all of our previous polls here: letterboxd.com/umbugbene/list/index-of-all-scfz-director-polls/

one rule for nominees: at least 3 scfzers need to have seen 10+ of a nominee's films, or at least 4 scfzers need to have seen at least 8 of the nom's films, so if it isn't clear if that will be the case, we'll confirm that's true before moving forward

if 24 hours pass after a poll opens, and no one eligible to nominate has posted a ballot, then i'll nominate someone, and then we'll start over, and everyone will be able to nominate again

[flip]

we'll use the extended rules for this:

• if you've seen an odd number of films, you can round up instead of down when deciding the length of your ballot (e.g. if you've seen 7, you can vote for 4 instead of 3)
• if you've seen more than ten, you can vote for more than five, subject to the ordinary rule above

[flip]

Outside the Law (1920 version)
Freaks

seen three

[greennui]

6,

West of Zanzibar
Dracula

[sally]

♥♥♥

only seen 6

gonna watch some more (there's a john gilbert one woo hoo) then poll my brains out

[Evelyn Library P.I.]

1. Dracula
2. The Wicked Darling
3. Freaks
4. Mark of the Vampire

Seen 6 7. I only really like Dracula, which I regard as a great film. The others I've seen all have significant problems in my view, but I wanted to fill out a full ballot and Freaks & Mark of Vampire certainly have virtues.

[brian d]

seen 3

freaks
the unknown

[Roscoe]

DRACULA
THE UNKNOWN
FREAKS

[Monsieur Arkadin]

Seen 3

The Unknown
Freaks

I thought Dracula was wildly disappointing (with the exception of Lugosi, who was great.)

[grabmymask]

Freaks
Dracula

[sally]

well this brightened up my lunch hour!

as well as wielding(/welding LOL!) a giant shiny phallus, john gilbert also takes his shirt right off!

(probs won't make my final list but again and again, what i've seen in browning is a preoccupation with the intersection/agency of illusion onto reality/construction of competing perception which seems to be a thread in some of his films although having said that haven't seen dracula yet (was saving it) and can't remember freaks since i watched it a zillion years ago)

fast workers (1933)

[nrh]

what i've seen in browning is a preoccupation with the intersection/agency of illusion onto reality/construction of competing perception

this is basically the plot of mark of the vampire, aka the horror the great garrick

edit: of course now i see there is a very smart discussion on letterboxd between you and evelyn...

[nrh]

The Devil-Doll
The Unholy Three
The Unkown

(seen five)

[sally]

what i've seen in browning is a preoccupation with the intersection/agency of illusion onto reality/construction of competing perception

this is basically the plot of mark of the vampire, aka the horror the great garrick

edit: of course now i see there is a very smart discussion on letterboxd between you and evelyn...

i may have oversold it there! i just think browning deserves more credit than 'just' being a director of the macabre, even the way he's split the frame above between the competing dicks suggests it's worth paying a bit more attention to his craft (although i have no idea how they managed to film those scenes without corpsing, that wasn't the only scene where gilbert was jack-hammer fucking the building, i couldnt stop giggling, i guess they were all drunk)

[nrh]

[sally]

oh i see someone has thought about it (i raved about devil doll in the 36 poll) who is that?

[nrh]

jean louis schefer, from ordinary man of cinema. a lot of browning in that book (mostly freaks).

[sally]

oh that's cool. my admittedly brief google searches last year when i got intrigued about browning didn't turn up much written stuff about him beyond 'oooh dark'. but of course the french have. (not that i'm going to read any cinema book, i'll get hysterics, far too exciting, but i will bump danses macabres up the viewing list i guess)

[Evelyn Library P.I.]

Yeah, I definitely agree with this reading of Browning - a consistent thread through his work, and it's the relationship between reality and illusion. I should probably give Mark of the Vampire a second hearing now that I'm more open to what Browning is aiming for.

Unfortunately, American and British critics seem to have neglected Browning relative to Whale - Sarris's entry in American Cinema is 'Subject for Further Research' and it's one of his most vaguely non-committal entries. He does say that "Browning's career is more meaningful than Whale's in terms of a personal obsession," but he doesn't elaborate at all on the nature of that personal obsession, so that's hardly much to go on.

Sarris also dooms Dracula, like most viewers today, as "dully static." The same criticism attaches to Little Caesar, which I think is equally great. My sense is that audiences increasingly just find early sound movies too alien to their palette to appreciate, but I found that once I acquired the taste for early sound, Dracula (as well as Little Caesar) stood out as worthy of its film-historical reputation. I also have an undying crush on Bela Lugosi, which helps!

[Curtis, baby]

i will watch more BUT for now

The Unknown
The Devil-Doll
The Unholy Three
Freaks
West of Zanzibar

===

my thoughts on tod browning: nobody came close to capturing lon chaney so well. if lon chaney is the best ever at facially expressing (which he is) then tod browning is surely the best at capturing the expression

another thing about tod browning is sometimes rappers reference, like, the idea of lounging around, as a contrast to the more active behaviours described elsewhere. IF you want to start some song about how you were just sitting at home watching freaks, you can definitely employ some "tod browning" + "odd clowning" action. that is a rap that you can use for free because all my bars are real shit, i really lived shit and my raps are true. and in reality i would never be lounging around just casually watching a tod browning movie SANS lon chaney

[nrh]

Yeah, I definitely agree with this reading of Browning - a consistent thread through his work, and it's the relationship between reality and illusion. I should probably give Mark of the Vampire a second hearing now that I'm more open to what Browning is aiming for.

Unfortunately, American and British critics seem to have neglected Browning relative to Whale - Sarris's entry in American Cinema is 'Subject for Further Research' and it's one of his most vaguely non-committal entries. He does say that "Browning's career is more meaningful than Whale's in terms of a personal obsession," but he doesn't elaborate at all on the nature of that personal obsession, so that's hardly much to go on.

Sarris also dooms Dracula, like most viewers today, as "dully static." The same criticism attaches to Little Caesar, which I think is equally great. My sense is that audiences increasingly just find early sound movies too alien to their palette to appreciate, but I found that once I acquired the taste for early sound, Dracula (as well as Little Caesar) stood out as worthy of its film-historical reputation. I also have an undying crush on Bela Lugosi, which helps!

as much as i like sarris - my one friend who had a class with him in columbia just remembers his coming into the lecture hall and saying how much he loved 27 dresses, katherine heigl, what a woman!, which...ok - he seems completely unsuited to talking about a guy like browning, who seems incapable of ever making a totally functioning machine of a film (maybe mark of a vampire aside, which is perverse in its own way) but can make clusters of images that resonate as much as anything in that late period of silent movies and the start of sound.

[Evelyn Library P.I.]

I recall reading that he'd fall asleep in seminars at Columbia and that he was defended in this by the dean or some higher-up on grounds that it was an honour for students to attend seminars with Sarris, irrespective of whether he taught or slept during them

[Lencho of the Apes]

Falling asleep at the podium was his version of the late-director insouciance he championed in movies like Seven Women.

I guess I really really really need to see The Unknown, don't I? In the absence of that, I'll go with

Freaks
West Of Zanzibar
Dracula
Fast Workers
Wicked Darling

[sally]

i am still loving the idea of (the little) people in movies as the lost bodies of the characters of a prior drama. i had never thought about films like that. i guess it also means that IMAX is an abomination.

and there are 2 1929 brownings!

[...]

The only thing that kinda bums me out about Browning, and Whale for that matter, is that they really should have flipped their famous Universal monster properties. Browning would have been the better choice for Frankenstein and Whale Dracula. Whale is a master of cinematic hysteria while Browning more the mania, and as mentioned, doubling. Whale would have killed it with Renfield and Lucy, while Browning would have done better with Frankenstein and his monster in my thinking. Oh well, they both did fine work as it is, so no real loss I guess. Anyway, glad to see some Mark of the Vampire love, I submitted that one to Mubi way back when and couldn't find many takers for it.

The Devil Doll
Mark of the Vampire
The Unknown
West of Zanzibar

Might switch that list around since all the Brownings I've seen could be on it, save for The Thirteenth Chair, or maybe I'll get a chance to watch another before the end of the poll

[rischka]

i will watch a double feature of the wicked darling and outside the law today



priscilla dean is a fun proto-feminist action hero

[sally]

god bela lugosi is hot (bite me bite me bite me) and i enjoyed all the silence but the problem with iconic movies is that you've seen half of them in clips before, sort of a re-(undead)-un-watching so i am un-nonplussed now about dracula and don't know what to make of it apart from bite me bela

[rischka]

k i've got 11 now so i can vote

the unknown
freaks
the unholy three
the devil-doll
the wicked darling

[Holymanm]

Freaks
West of Zanzibar

Seen five-o

[Lencho of the Apes]

re-(undead)-un-watching

When I re-engage with this'n, I always wait for the armadillos.