Skunkyrate Gripping story with well-crafted characters

TeenzTen An action-packed slog

Micah Lloyd Excellent characters with emotional depth. My wife, daughter and granddaughter all enjoyed it...and me, too! Very good movie! You won't be disappointed.

Darin One of the film's great tricks is that, for a time, you think it will go down a rabbit hole of unrealistic glorification.

ShinerMathison I will take this to my grave as the best film I've ever known and it will now and always be my absolute favorite - as well as Conrad Veidt now becoming my all time favorite actor in history. He is an astonishingly handsome depiction for Gwynplaine. Even with that goofy grin, it is still apparent how good looking of a man Gwynplaine was. Conrad Veidt's ability to emote using just his eyes is incredible. He is so moving in this film! There is no denying how Gwynplaine feels at any point in time because of this incredible actor. I was also surprised to find out that this character was the original inspiration for the - now so popular - "Joker". I always liked the Joker for some reason. Harley Quinn has always been my favorite, but I do deeply love this "clown-like" character with no sense of evil or mischievousness. He is just such a sweetheart.Warning - Possible Spoiler: I am overjoyed that this film did not keep with the original ending written by Victor Hugo. What a miserable man.

Matthew Luke Brady Where people say that smiling is the best cure for sadness, there's never been a story like this that takes a nice and joyful smile that everybody loves to see and make into a curse for a man for the rest of his years. Based on Victor Hugo's 1869 novel L'Homme qui Rit, The Man Who Laughs starred German import Conrad Veidt as Gwynplaine, a carnival freak doomed to live life wearing a perpetual grin carved on his face by Dr Hardquannone (George Siegman because his father, Lord Clancharlie (Allan Cavan), had offended England's King James II (Sam De Grasse). Taken in as a child by Ursus, a mountebank (Cesare Gravina), Gwynplaine grows up alongside the beautiful but blind Dea (Mary Philbin). They fall in love but Gwynplaine refuses to marry her because his hideous face makes him feel unworthy. Queen Anne (Josephine Crowell), meanwhile, has ascended the throne and when she learns from her predecessor's evil jester Barkilphedro (Brandon Hurst) that the recalcitrant Duchess Josiana (Olga Baclanova) is in possession of Lord Clancharlie's estates, she decrees that the royal femme fatal must marry Gwynplaine, the rightful heir. Josiana, who has caught Gwynplaine's act incognito and arranged a rendezvous, is at the same time sexually attracted to and repelled by the "Laughing Man," but Gwynplaine, who realizes that the duchess' attraction has legitimized his right to love Dea, renounces his title and follows his heart to the new World. We have seen many movies and stories where we have seen different kind of extraordinary people and the usual people give out a smile, good or bad, like a superhero users a smile to welcome people of the city and show that he comes in peace, but a villain gives out a smile when his doing something wrong or just loves playing bad. But what about a story about man that has a very usual gift that he views it as a curse, that not everybody as thought off before, even I didn't thought of it. His not a bad guy and his not a hero as well, his just a guy trying to make the best out of life but the smile that sticks on his face that courses all this attention really gives Gwynplaine (Main character) a hard and difficult life. The Man Who Laughs is a silent film that very cleverly get's it's message and it's story across very well and this a silent film with no sound at all and I still felt emotional for the character's in the film.Conrad Veidt played Gwynplanie and through out the film he had a lot of make-up on his face for the effect of the big smile for his character; it must have been really difficult for him to show any emotion by all that make-up, but he nailed it by showing as much emotion as he can by simply his eyes which people say "The eyes are the windows to the soul", and I felt it all that in his eyes, just like Bane from The Dark Knight Rise who had a mask that covered half of his face and still can be scary and the kind of guy that nobody mess with, all by his eyes and Conrad Veidt also did the same thing.All the cast did a great job in their roles and Olga Baclanova can play a right nasty bitch but she did it really well. The directing is really good allowing some really impressive and heart felt moments that the cast and the director got right.My only my problems with the film is that at times it dragged a little bit in some parts, and that's really it for problems.Overall The Man Who Laughs is a freaking fantastic movie with scenes that really played with my heart strings.

loribrom Thank heavens for Amazon.com that's where I FINALLY found a copy of "The Man Who Laughs". This film is brilliant, and Conrad Veidt as 'Gwynplaine' is just unforgettable. I've not been so glued to my TV since I watched John Barrymore in "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde". Mr. Veidt has been quoted as saying with the make-up he had on, he had to communicate with his eyes in this role....and BOY does he ever. The rest of the cast is just as marvelous. I've read some of the other reviews for this film and agree with most of them. I was so focused on 'Gwynplaine' that I almost didn't pay attention to the story, so NOW that I'm familiar with the story I plan on watching it again. Make-up artist Jack Pearce did this film, and boy can you tell it. I next plan to get "Beloved Rogue" not only because Barrymore is in that, but also Veidt went into that after "The Man Who Laughs". I also loved seeing the dog, 'Homo', but then, I'm an animal lover too. What an experience watching this film, whew!!!

n_r_koch An extravagant production, with multiple sets and locations and lavish period costumes. This is one of the highest examples (like THE SCARLET LETTER, PANDORA'S BOX, and LA PASSION DE JEANNE D'ARC) of what got killed off when smarts replaced beauty at the cinema after 1927. Like SUNRISE it is basically a Weimar Misfit film shot in Hollywood. Like those '20s German films it dwells very long on the scenes of humiliation. The story is old-fashioned, yet the movie is cinematically advanced, with moving camera and a huge range of shot types and compositions, and does not suffer by comparison with today's camera work. There is a lot of simply pictorial work, which for some reason is underused in most movies. Veidt is playing not only without words but essentially in a mask-- without a mouth. Somehow he carries the movie (it wouldn't work without him). Mary Philbin (she's like a Griffith character) is the blind beauty who loves him for what he is. The charismatic, intriguing Baclanova is the fun-loving duchess who comes between them.One DVD edition aimed at the horror crowd has packaging that shows Veidt tinted a hideous green-- which does not appear in the movie itself. This packaging is basically what the movie itself is attacking.