I loved Lon Chaney as a masochistic clown in He Who Gets Slapped, a bizarre and wonderful film. Chaney played a different sort of clown in Laugh, Clown, Laugh, a funny one--supposedly. Flik was meant to be the clown who kept all Rome laughing. But the problem was, Chaney wasn't even remotely funny or clown-like. The best clown humor he could muster was to don a foot-long dildo-nose and stroke a stuffed chicken (a cock?). Maybe the studio should have hired a director who knew something about clowns, or hired a clown coach to help Chaney come up with some funny bits. There needed to be some real humor to contrast with the tragic bits, and there wasn't.
The tragic love story part was age-old, but fairly interesting in a pseudo-incestuous kind of way. It reminded me a little of one of the installments of Kieslowski's Dekalog, and also a little of Fellini's Variety Lights. Chaney was generally better when he was out of makeup. And Loretta Young--I can't believe she was 15 when this was filmed. Jeez, talk about precocious. I feel dirty.
The tragic love story part was age-old, but fairly interesting in a pseudo-incestuous kind of way. It reminded me a little of one of the installments of Kieslowski's Dekalog, and also a little of Fellini's Variety Lights. Chaney was generally better when he was out of makeup. And Loretta Young--I can't believe she was 15 when this was filmed. Jeez, talk about precocious. I feel dirty.