The Unknown is a 1927 American silenthorror film directed by Tod Browning and starring Lon Chaney as carnival knife thrower Alonzo the Armless and Joan Crawford as the scantily clad carnival girl he hopes to marry. Chaney did collaborative scenes with real-life armless double Paul Desmuke, whose legs and feet were used to manipulate objects such as knives and cigarettes in frame with Chaney's upper body and face.
Plot
Alonzo the Armless is a circus freak who uses his feet to toss knives and fire a rifle at his partner, Nanon. However, he is an impostor and fugitive. He has arms, but keeps them tightly bound to his torso, a secret known only to his friend Cojo, a little person. Alonzo's left hand has a double thumb, which would identify him as the perpetrator of various crimes. Alonzo is secretly in love with Nanon. Malabar, the circus strongman, is devoted to her as well, but she has a strong fear of men's arms and cannot stand being pawed by them, so she shuns him. She only feels comfortable around the armless Alonzo. When she embraces and kisses him, he is given hope, but Cojo warns him that he cannot let it happen again. If she holds him, she might feel his arms. When Antonio Zanzi, the circus's owner and Nanon's father, discovers Alonzo's secret, Alonzo kills him with his bare hands. Nanon witnesses this through a window. A flash of lightning reveals that her father's killer has a double thumb on his left hand, but she does not see his face. Since Alonzo is believed to be armless, he is not a suspect. When the circus leaves town, Alonzo has Nanon remain behind with him. He takes extreme measures to try to have the woman he loves. He blackmails a surgeon into amputating his arms. While he is away, however, Malabar's steadfast love finally enables Nanon to overcome her phobia, and she agrees to marry him. When Alonzo returns to Nanon, she excitedly tells him the news. Alonzo is shocked and horrified, first laughing, then crying, confusing the couple. He then learns that Malabar and Nanon have been practicing a new act, where the strongman's arms are seemingly pulled in opposite directions by two horses. During the first performance, Alonzo stops one treadmill in an attempt to maim or kill his rival. When Nanon starts to intervene, Alonzo threatens her with a knife. However, she rushes to calm down one of the horses. Alonzo tries to save her from injury by pushing her out of the way. The horse knocks Alonzo down and fatally stomps on him. In the original film script and some discarded filmed sequences, Alonzo murders both the doctor and Cojo, to eliminate them as witnesses before he returns to claim Nanon.
Ken Hanke considers the film to be in many respects the best of Browning's films with Lon Chaney. Burt Lancaster said that Chaney's portrayal in The Unknown featured “one of the most compelling and emotionally exhausting scenes I have ever seen an actor do.” It is listed in the film reference book1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die, which stated, "Drawing a remarkable and haunting performance from Chaney and filling the plot with twists and unforgettable characters, Browning here creates a chilling masterpiece of psychological drama."
Restoration
For many years the film was missing, until a 35 mm print was located at the Cinémathèque Française in 1968. In 1973, at a lecture given at George Eastman House, Cinémathèque Française director Henri Langlois said the delay in finding the print of The Unknown was because they had hundreds of film cans marked l'inconnu in their collection. Several early scenes are still missing, but these do not seriously affect the story continuity.
