The extreme lengths a man might go to to accommodate a young woman's fear of men may get him the exact opposite of what he wants as Lon Chaney finds to his dismay in 1927's The Unknown. In 2022, this gruesome sexual thriller from Tod Browning was completely restored to a full 66 minute length, surpassing the 49 minute version that was recovered in 1968. The world is fortunate to have access to this masterpiece again.
Eighteen year old Joan Crawford plays Nanon, Chaney's assistant and the object of his affections. Chaney's character is called Alonzo the Armless, so named for his apparent lack of arms. In reality, he has a perfectly functioning pair he keeps bound up in a corset.
They work in a carnival and Alonzo fires a rifle at Nanon, undressing her by expertly shooting straps off her garment. She doesn't mind this--in fact, Alonzo is the only man she feels safe with. Another carnival denizen, Malabar, also loves her, but she fears being held by a man. She's a young woman having trouble dealing with her sexuality and her neurosis about men's arms is easily read as a fear of her own attraction to the male body. It's an immature fear which Alonzo sadly interprets as something deeper. With greater sexual maturity, Nanon of course prefers men who aren't emasculated. Unfortunately, Alonzo doesn't realise this until he's done something drastic to be the kind of man he thinks, and she thinks, she wants.
Chaney gives a terrific performance. As in The Phantom of the Opera, he plays a man willing to commit murder and yet the viewer is compelled to see how fate has truly done him dirty. Browning conjures a sinister, textured carnival atmosphere, of course.
The restored version of The Unknown is available on The Criterion Channel.
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