Whenever I watch a silent film at the Portage Theater, an old movie palace on Chicago’s north side, it’s like stepping back in time and escaping the pressures of the day. On Friday evening, I saw Josef von Sternberg’s Underworld as part of this summer’s series from the Silent Film Society of Chicago. Underworld is a well-crafted and well-acted film that stands the test of time, so I don’t want to imply that the movie was in any way “old-fashioned.” What I am referring to is the way the Silent Film Society takes great care to recreate the movie-going experience of the silent era, and this stands in stark contrast to today’s tacky, uncomfortable cineplexes with their self-absorbed, cell-phone-addicted audience members.

The Portage, which originally opened in 1920, now seats a little more than 1300; on Friday, the theater was well over half full with an attentive audience of all ages and types. Before the program started, people milled about the lobby looking over the t-shirts and books for sale, or they sat in their seats actually talking to each other instead of yapping on cell phones. I liked that the audience consisted of people from different generations who had all come to see this famous 1927 gangster saga, though probably for different reasons.

The evening began with a sing-along of standard tunes from the pre-World War II era. The lyrics were projected onto the big screen, along with theater cards from the old days that reminded ladies to remove their hats. I am a horrific singer who would have emptied the theater as soon as I opened my mouth, so I did everyone a favor and just watched the faces of others who were less inhibited. The experience reminded me of the scene in It Happened One Night when a bus load of passengers sing “The Man on the Flying Trapeze,” creating an atmosphere of camaraderie and community among them.

Afterward, organist Jay Warren talked for a few minutes about the Society’s efforts to restore a theater pipe organ that they had rescued from the nearby Gateway Theater. In bad shape, the organ is being repaired by a specialist who is getting paid through box office receipts, t-shirt sales, and other fundraising efforts. Warren called the theater pipe organ the “backbone” of the silent film experience. Original scores for silent films were written for the pipe organ, which not only provides a full sound but also sound effects. While acknowledging that the modern scores and instrumentation heard on DVD releases of silent films can be good, Warren reiterated that the Silent Film Society of Chicago seeks to preserve the musical sounds and stylings of the original silent era.

The festivities put everyone into a good mood to watch Underworld, which was briefly introduced by a local film historian. He noted that Paramount Pictures, which produced the film, was disappointed in von Sternberg’s interpretation of the material and released it in only one New York theater. But, audience reaction was so strong that the film was soon released in theaters across the country. Underworld proved to be a rich viewing experience, and I found much to enjoy and think about. I am sure I got as much out of it as the original audiences who made the film a hit through word of mouth. 

HECHT DREW ON CHICAGO GANGSTERS TO DEPICT BULL WEED AND HIS CRONIES

Based on an original story by Ben Hecht, which was adapted into a screenplay by Charles Furthman, Underworld became a model for the gangster genre. The tale of Chicago crime boss Bull Weed features many of the conventions later associated with the genre, including a protagonist who is attractive despite committing heinous crimes, tough-talking gangster molls with colorful names who dress in the high fashion of the day, shootouts and getaway cars, and urban locales such as crowded speakeasies, seedy apartments, and dark dangerous streets. Bull Weed rules the underworld with his gang though not without complications from his rival, Buck Mulligan. Bull is rough and course but also sympathetic and likable, particularly after he takes in a derelict lawyer and gives him a job. Called Rolls Royce by Bull, the smart and well-educated attorney finds his dignity thanks to the gangster’s generosity. Unfortunately, Rolls Royce and Bull’s girlfriend, Feathers McCoy, fall in love, and when Bull goes to jail for killing Mulligan, the love triangle takes center stage.

Hecht worked as a reporter for the Chicago Daily News in the 1920s during Al Capone’s heyday, and some of the characters are clearly patterned after real-life Chicago gangsters — an extra treat for Chicago audiences. Even after all this time, Chicago natives love their gangster lore as much as the city’s leaders hate the colorful legacy left behind by Capone and the officials he bribed. Buck Mulligan owns a flower shop, which is his legitimate front, and he is fond of sending floral arrangements to the funerals of his dead rivals. Mulligan is patterned after Chicago’s Dion O’Banion who ran his gang known as the North Siders from his State Street flower shop. O’Banion was also fond of sending arrangements to other gang leaders, and he was shot down in his shop while arranging flowers for small-time hood Mike Merlo. The underworld of clubs, speaks, and easy crime depicted in the film could easily describe the real Windy City during the Jazz Age. But, more recognizable to most classic film fans is the resemblance between Underworld and Howard Hawks’s Scarface from 1932. Also written by Hecht, Scarface famously features a Capone-like protagonist who eliminates a rival who runs a flower shop. Other bits and pieces from Underworld were also reworked into Scarface, including the symbolic use of an advertizing sign. In the beginning of Underworld, Bull Weed looks up at a neon advertisement for a finance company that blinks “The City Is Yours,” which underscores the gangster’s good luck at robbing banks and skirting the law. In Scarface, the sign is an ad for Cook’s Tours and reads “The World Is Yours,” which is shown several times in the film, including at the end when it flashes over the gangster’s dead body, serving as an ironic commentary. Finally, the climaxes are similar, with Bull Weed holed up against the cops in his old hideout with a fortified back entrance, just like Scarface shoots it out with police in his fortress-like apartment.

GEORGE BANCROFT AS BULL; EVELYN BRENT AS FEATHERS

Despite the similarities, the two films have different themes and points of view as well as different strengths, no doubt due to the directors involved and the specific decades they were produced in. Released during the Roaring 20s, Underworld launched Josef von Sternberg’s career, while Scarface, a product of the Depression, was produced by Howard Hughes and directed by Howard Hawks. Underworld represents pre-Dietrich von Sternberg and, on the surface, might seem the stellar opposite of the hothouse atmosphere, exotic locales, and hyper-sexual female protagonists of his 1930s films. Yet, Underworld fits into von Sternberg’s themes, preoccupations, and style, despite the gritty, contemporary subject matter.

THE LOVE TRIANGLE DRIVES THE CHARACTERS' ACTIONS

Though Underworld has the trappings of a gangster film, the melodrama of the love triangle drives the characters’ motivations and choices, and therefore the narrative. Bull does not kill Mulligan over business; he kills him because Buck tried to rape Feathers, and Bull ends up in jail for it. Feathers and Rolls Royce want to break Bull out of jail, but their growing attraction for each other compromises their loyalty to Bull. Finally, they resolve to repress their feelings in order to “do the right thing,” which in this case is the illegal act of busting Bull out of the big house. By this time, Bull knows about Feathers and Rolls Royce, and jealously compels him to make choices that go wrong for him. In the end, Bull is recaptured by the police, but he realizes that his girl and his best friend did not betray him despite their love for each other. He helps them escape to a better life while he returns to jail and a death sentence. When captured, one of the cops remarks that his jail break only gained him an hour. But in that short time Bull has learned how to give and receive love and loyalty, and the course, rough gangster replies, “That hour was worth more to me than my whole life.” Just as love, sex, and desire drive the behavior of the characters in von Sternberg’s Dietrich films, so do these emotions smolder under the tough exteriors of Bull, Feathers, and Rolls Royce and compel them to make specific decisions. Highly touted as the forerunner of the classic gangster tale, Underworld differs because of the melodrama that is central to the narrative. The world spins on love, sex, and desire, at least according to von Sternberg, and illustrating the impact of these emotions on human behavior became his stock in trade.

VON STERNBERG'S GLORIOUS LIGHTING SKILLS REVEAL HIS PAINTERLY APPROACH TO CINEMA.

Earlier this month, I had seen von Sternberg’s Scarlet Empress, a beautiful-looking film that virtually shimmered with magical lighting effects and rich textures. Underworld’s stark, empty streets and dark interiors looked nothing like Empress, but it still reflected von Sternberg’s painterly approach to cinema. The title “Underworld” refers to the criminal world, a domain that exists beneath mainstream society — separate from it yet still preying on it to survive. Though Bull and his crowd make merry, at least in the first half of the film, von Sternberg relegates them to spaces closed off from the rest of the world. They party at a speakeasy called the Dreamland Café, which is underground below street level; Rolls Royce lives at Bull’s old hideout located on the top floor of a dilapidated apartment building at the end of a dark hallway. The gangsters’ ball takes place in an unidentified locale with no visible connection to the outside world. And, Bull spends much time in a jail cell, closed off from friends and associates. Even the streets are dark and empty, with tall buildings on either side trapping the gangsters who stagger, scurry, stumble, or trip along the sidewalks. Their choice of the criminal life eventually traps them, which is anticipated by the closed-off spaces they inhabit.

BAR MOTIFS THROUGHOUT THE FILM SYMBOLIZE THAT THE CHARACTERS ARE TRAPPED BY THEIR EMOTIONS AND IN A LIFE OF CRIME.

Related to the closed-off locales is the focus on doors and doorways, which rarely allow the characters to leave an environment. Most often, we see a character entering the door, rather than exiting, as though the doors are trapping the characters inside. Von Sternberg’s high-contrast lighting, with the help of cinematographer Bert Glennon, emphasizes entrapment by casting bar and web shadows across the doorways or down the staircases leading from the doors. The exception occurs at the end when Feathers and Rolls Royce escape to a new life by exiting through the secret passageway in Bull’s old hideout. They are the only characters to get away, because Bull closes the door behind them, trapping himself in the apartment where he is caught by the police a split second later.

Likewise, the constant close-ups of clocks and watches remind viewers that time is running out for Bull and his cohorts. As the film progresses, more close-ups of time pieces occur, increasing the tension and suggesting that Bull’s end is near. Von Sternberg excelled at visually conveying the themes and ideas of his narratives, and this early work was no exception.

A good silent movie viewed the way it was intended — in a theater accompanied by live music and sound effects — does not show its age. The urban subject matter, moral ambiguity, deft handling of filmmaking style and techniques by von Sternberg, and excellent acting by George Bancroft, Evelyn Brent, and Clive Brook made Underworld my best viewing experience of the month.  I doubt if anyone in the theater missed sync-sound dialogue. Intertitles were kept to a minimum, and von Sternberg interjected shots to visually convey “sounds” — such as close-ups of Tommy guns, factory whistles, and musical instruments. Plus, the immediacy of the pipe organ’s live music and sound effects, including a simulated police siren and the rumblings of an explosion, made spoken dialogue unnecessary.
The rest of the silent film series at the Portage Theater on Chicago’s north side includes the slapstick comedy Girl Shy with Harold Lloyd, the drama Piccadilly with Anna May Wong, Douglas Fairbank Sr.’s classic Thief of Baghdad, and the Oscar-winning Seventh Heaven with Janet Gaynor. I recommend the silent film experience for film buffs, families looking for a movie to entertain all its members, and couples looking for a date-night bonding experience. It’s the perfect summer activity.