** SPOILERS for entire plot**
I was recommended this film after enthusing about SHOOTING STARS (1928 - see my review). It shares both a lead actor, Brian Aherne, and young director, Anthony Asquith, with its predecessor, but I was warned at the time that it doesn't rank quite as high.
Having now seen them both, I think I'd concur. The character-work at the beginning is good, but the ending is less successful - the melodramatic chase and fight are too long; the bar brawl is handled better - and the eventual outcome is too clearly telegraphed all along. It feels more morally simplistic.
The two films are recognisably by the same hand, but oddly it's the later production that feels more old-fashioned, and comes across as being from a less-practised director. (Perhaps the absence of Bramble's restraining influence? :-)
There's a lot more sub-titled dialogue in this one, or at least it felt that way; a lot more shots of people's lips moving when you can't see what they're saying, I mean. That works, as before, for the distance shots, for example where the station master is trying to clear the platform and Bill is simultaneously trying to clear himself from this accusation out of the blue. The body language says it all, and a modern film might well take the same long shot with just an indistinct hubbub on the soundtrack. But when we're dealing with close-ups on conversations, the effect is more consciously 'silent' and less simply 'film'.
Added to this, the dialogue we actually see on the title cards is on the whole less cuttingly effective. "Shooting Stars" verged on black comedy; "Underground" was, unfortunately and inadvertently, more reminiscent of a contemporary farce I'd seen the previous week about an inventor pursued up and down the escalators and the lift by a party of foreign spies. "Shooting Stars" ended in complete silence from the audience - I suspect the general laugh in "Underground" at the moment when Nell rushes into the lift and embraces a victorious Bill was not the intended reaction...
I think "Shooting Stars" benefits from the artificiality of its setting, making the melodrama more plausible in a scenario where, for example, it's normal for people to fire guns at each other. "Underground" brings melodrama into real life, where it doesn't fit so comfortably; it also suffers from an implausibly (and, so far as I can see, unnecessarily) short timespan. In "Shooting Stars" we are privy to the climactic days of a clandestine affair that has been going on for some time, but in "Underground" we are given to believe that an entire love-affair, from first sight to engagement to rift to reconciliation, takes place over the course of two or three meetings. It's hard to take these emotions so seriously, and that's perhaps why Kate's tragedy was the only one that really attained grand status - she had clearly loved Bert a long time (and, given his reputation as a lady-killer, been deceived before).
But the chief flaw in the film, I would say, is the long and overly-milked chase scene after the murder. It doesn't even make particular sense, under the circumstances, for Bill, who has no authority in the power station (Lot's Road? - it powers the Underground and is located down by the river) and who barely knew Kate, to be the lone avenger hunting the murderer down. Aherne's fair and rather delicate good looks don't make him a particularly plausible hard type (although I don't know - again, the fight in the pub works a lot better).
Above all, however, there are far too many last-minute escapes. From the roof. From the rope. Bill falling into the water (he doesn't seem very wet when he climbs out...) From the re-electrified rails. From the edge of the platform with the oncoming train. And the concept of the two rivals pummelling each other to the finish in a lift full of passengers is frankly faintly ludicrous...
It would have worked a lot better, in my view, if Asquith had taken a leaf out of Dickens' book and had Bert slip and fall to his death (or get hung up in the rope...) while trying to flee from the power station. Bill doesn't need to be personally involved at all. Let it be the irony of Fate. Then cut directly to the final scene, depicting the virtuous getting their reward (at least, I assume that was the intended message!)
There are fine and characteristic scenes in this film, and it's fascinating to see how the London Underground has changed quite remarkably little in the last eighty years. But compared to its predecessor I feel it falls short. It feels dated. The other didn't.
It's not so much that the subject material this time is too lurid, for it was before. It's more that it is here presented completely straight, expecting us to take it at face-value, without that saving satirical edge. "Underground" needs to laugh at itself more. In those scenes when it does, it's good.
I was recommended this film after enthusing about SHOOTING STARS (1928 - see my review). It shares both a lead actor, Brian Aherne, and young director, Anthony Asquith, with its predecessor, but I was warned at the time that it doesn't rank quite as high.
Having now seen them both, I think I'd concur. The character-work at the beginning is good, but the ending is less successful - the melodramatic chase and fight are too long; the bar brawl is handled better - and the eventual outcome is too clearly telegraphed all along. It feels more morally simplistic.
The two films are recognisably by the same hand, but oddly it's the later production that feels more old-fashioned, and comes across as being from a less-practised director. (Perhaps the absence of Bramble's restraining influence? :-)
There's a lot more sub-titled dialogue in this one, or at least it felt that way; a lot more shots of people's lips moving when you can't see what they're saying, I mean. That works, as before, for the distance shots, for example where the station master is trying to clear the platform and Bill is simultaneously trying to clear himself from this accusation out of the blue. The body language says it all, and a modern film might well take the same long shot with just an indistinct hubbub on the soundtrack. But when we're dealing with close-ups on conversations, the effect is more consciously 'silent' and less simply 'film'.
Added to this, the dialogue we actually see on the title cards is on the whole less cuttingly effective. "Shooting Stars" verged on black comedy; "Underground" was, unfortunately and inadvertently, more reminiscent of a contemporary farce I'd seen the previous week about an inventor pursued up and down the escalators and the lift by a party of foreign spies. "Shooting Stars" ended in complete silence from the audience - I suspect the general laugh in "Underground" at the moment when Nell rushes into the lift and embraces a victorious Bill was not the intended reaction...
I think "Shooting Stars" benefits from the artificiality of its setting, making the melodrama more plausible in a scenario where, for example, it's normal for people to fire guns at each other. "Underground" brings melodrama into real life, where it doesn't fit so comfortably; it also suffers from an implausibly (and, so far as I can see, unnecessarily) short timespan. In "Shooting Stars" we are privy to the climactic days of a clandestine affair that has been going on for some time, but in "Underground" we are given to believe that an entire love-affair, from first sight to engagement to rift to reconciliation, takes place over the course of two or three meetings. It's hard to take these emotions so seriously, and that's perhaps why Kate's tragedy was the only one that really attained grand status - she had clearly loved Bert a long time (and, given his reputation as a lady-killer, been deceived before).
But the chief flaw in the film, I would say, is the long and overly-milked chase scene after the murder. It doesn't even make particular sense, under the circumstances, for Bill, who has no authority in the power station (Lot's Road? - it powers the Underground and is located down by the river) and who barely knew Kate, to be the lone avenger hunting the murderer down. Aherne's fair and rather delicate good looks don't make him a particularly plausible hard type (although I don't know - again, the fight in the pub works a lot better).
Above all, however, there are far too many last-minute escapes. From the roof. From the rope. Bill falling into the water (he doesn't seem very wet when he climbs out...) From the re-electrified rails. From the edge of the platform with the oncoming train. And the concept of the two rivals pummelling each other to the finish in a lift full of passengers is frankly faintly ludicrous...
It would have worked a lot better, in my view, if Asquith had taken a leaf out of Dickens' book and had Bert slip and fall to his death (or get hung up in the rope...) while trying to flee from the power station. Bill doesn't need to be personally involved at all. Let it be the irony of Fate. Then cut directly to the final scene, depicting the virtuous getting their reward (at least, I assume that was the intended message!)
There are fine and characteristic scenes in this film, and it's fascinating to see how the London Underground has changed quite remarkably little in the last eighty years. But compared to its predecessor I feel it falls short. It feels dated. The other didn't.
It's not so much that the subject material this time is too lurid, for it was before. It's more that it is here presented completely straight, expecting us to take it at face-value, without that saving satirical edge. "Underground" needs to laugh at itself more. In those scenes when it does, it's good.