Opposite: Brigitte Helm starred in ALRAUNE as the woman without a soul, the subject of an evil scientific experiment. Below: You ever think you love someone, then you meet someone
else...someone who has dark, magnetic eyes, is uninhibited, isn’t afraid to show emotion, is excited whenever you appear, who wants to sweep you off your feet, who has soft, ticklish fur all
over...TMI. Sorry. (from THE GORILLA).
Above: “What’s the world coming to in 1940? How will we live, love & settle world affairs when television will take the place of newspapers & telephones. When airplanes, dirigibles & helicopters will take off from roofs. When women will wear trousers.
And there can be no war?” screams the ad for the 1930 re-release of HIGH TREASON.
their careers had ended. But the public wanted to hear their favorite actors talk—or sing!
THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA, THE HUNCHBACK OF NOTRE DAME, THE MONSTER, and many other films, decided that “talking pictures” were not a fad. To remain a star, to conquer the new medium of talking pictures, he had to choose a special vehicle. He chose a remake of his silent crime hit, THE UNHOLY THREE, but not before he negotiated a new, lucrative contract with Irving Thalberg at MGM to continue his amazing career as “The Man of a Thousand Voices”. In THE UNHOLY THREE, he created five different voices and signed a legal affidavit that stated there was no trickery—they were all his voices. The film opened to great success, but Chaney was destined to step out from behind the flickering shadows of the silent era for only a brief moment. The world’s greatest pantomimist, the “Man of a Thousand Faces”, died of a throat hemorrhage, and with his passing the curtain was lowered on the silent era forever.
AMAZING, ASTOUNDING, and WEIRD THE JAZZ SINGER, starring Al Jolson, was the first commercial
success of the talking era. Although it was a financial bonanza in 1927, talking pictures were considered by many to be a passing fad and an artistic abomination until 1930. Critics felt that talking got in the way of the story. The transition of silent films into the age of sound wasn’t an easy
one. The technology was primitive. Few knew how to operate the equipment. Many theater owners didn’t have the money to install the expensive new machinery (it wasn’t even feasible until RCA marketed an inexpensive $2500 conversion halfway through the year). Also, the voices of many of the greatest stars of the silent screen were high-pitched, whiny, or spoken with an incomprehensible accent. Those who couldn’t adapt found that
82 FAMOUS MONSTERS OF FILMLAND • SEP/OCT 2011
It was novelty—and novelty was needed to help people forget, even for an hour or two, the daily search for a job, the struggle just to put food on the table, and the dark thoughts of the bleak economic wasteland that seemed to stretch on forever with no end in sight.
Fans of Science Fiction were growing in number. They
devoured the seminal Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Horror magazines published at that time. AMAZING STORIES, ARGOSY, ASTOUNDING STORIES, GHOST STORIES, the classic WEIRD TALES and WONDER STORIES were the vanguard of an army of “pulp” magazines (named for the cheap wood pulp paper on which they were printed) that would flood the newsstands during the 1930s—all for the price of ten cents. Reading, listening to the radio, and playing board games were all
fine ways to save money, but going to the movies was an emotional experience which could not be duplicated. And now there was an added dimension. Musical accompaniment and sound effects were common, but hearing real voices speak the husky throatiness of a femme fatale, the hissing threats of the villain, the strong, reassuring voice of the hero—this was what the public wanted.
BRIGITTE AT THE HELM The German film ALRAUNE (also known as DAUGHTER OF
EVIL) starred Brigitte Helm (METROPOLIS) as a beautiful but emotionless creation, the result of an experiment—the artificial insemination of a prostitute with the sperm of a criminal—that was born without the capacity to feel love and empathy. Helm had played the same role in the 1928 silent film, which critics considered to be a better film. ELSTREE CALLING was a forgettable musical about early TV. The first all-talking serial THE VOICE FROM THE SKY was the
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