West of Zanzibar

 

CAST

Lon Chaney (Phroso/Dead Legs), 

Lionel Barrymore (Crane), 

Mary Nolan (Maizie), 

Warner Baxter (Doc), 

Jacqueline Gadsden (Anna)

Directed By: 

Tod Browning 

Written By:

Elliot J. Clawson. 

Based on the play Kongo by Chester De Vonde

Run Time: 65 min.

West of Zanzibar was released on November 24, 1928 and turned out to be the second to last of the famous Chaney/Browning collaborations, which had begun to grow stale with critics. Donald Beaton wrote in Film Spectator, “There are a lot of people who are getting sick of seeing Chaney gulp over some girl half his age who is ungrateful enough to love someone else or set his jaw while another girl who doesn't know she is his daughter tells him that he is a low form of life . . . Chaney's once considerable acting ability has been atrophied by the parts he has to play until he has about three expressions left . . .” ¹

The film opens with a performance by the magician Phroso Flint (Lon Chaney). He is in the midst of his famous revolving secret door coffin trick. Phroso's assistant is his beautiful wife, Anna (Jacqueline Gadsden). From the very beginning we get the sense that theirs is a doomed relationship. Especially after we find out Anna is having an affair with a man named Crane (Lionel Barrymore), who is an ivory merchant in Africa. During the rest of the circus performances, a popular setting for Browning's films, Crane tells Phroso that he and Anna are running away together. A fight between Phroso and Crane ensues and Phroso is pushed off a balcony, becoming paralyzed from the fall.

Months later, Anna returns with a child. Anna is near death and Phroso meets with her in a church. When Phroso arrives, Anna is too weak to speak and soon in dramatic fashion dies, leaving Phroso grief stricken and vowing to get revenge on Crane by using the child that is now in his custody.

Eighteen years later—West of Zanizbar. Phroso Flint is now living in an outpost going by the name Dead Legs. When the local tribal king pays him a visit there is a great deal of classic racist and colonial attitudes on display, which were still very much apart of the accepted attitude of Hollywood films in the late 1920's. And is still accepted in Hollywood period pieces because this is how people probably thought and acted at the time. Dead Legs uses parlor tricks to convince the uncivilized and naïve natives that he has great magic and they need to fear him. Then one night while the local tribesmen are carrying elephant tusks back to the outpost of a local ivory merchant, a man sent by Dead Legs dressed up in a Voodoo costume scares the tribesmen and steals the tusks. We learn that Dead Legs is doing this in order to steal all the ivory from a local trader, who happens to be Crane.

After antagonizing Crane by stealing his ivory, Dead Legs decides it's time to put part two of his plan into action. Dead Legs sends word to the brothel he stashed Anna's daughter, Maizie (Mary Nolan), 18 years ago. In those years she has become a desperate alcoholic. Maizie is under the impression that she is being taken to finally meet her father. When she arrives at the outpost, she finds Dead Legs men sloppy drunk and acting crazy and Dead Legs himself, slithering across the floor like a serpent. Dead Legs pulls himself into his wheelchair to greet her, and Maizie asks him if he is her father. Dead Legs informs her that he is not. Maizie wants to know why she was brought her instead of to her father. While this is going on the natives have gathered outside of the outpost for a funeral ceremony. While Maizie is demanding an answer, Dead Legs puts on a terrifying ceremonial mask and joins the tribe for the funeral. Maizie watches the ceremony which involves the cremation of the deceased as well as having his wife and daughters burned alive with his body. Maizie becomes hysterical and tries to flee but is quickly recaptured.

Maizie and Doc (Warner Baxter), the alcoholic doctor who treats Dead Legs, develop a bond based initially on the fact that they are both in a sense prisoners of Dead Legs. Then news comes that Crane is coming to pay Dead Legs a visit now that he knows Dead Legs is the one behind the ivory thefts. The scene between Crane and Dead Legs is fantastic. As Crane enters the outpost, Dead Legs comes crawling out. At first, Crane doesn't realize the true identity of Dead Legs that is until Dead Legs shows Crane the coffin with the skeleton inside which he used to use in his act when he was still Phroso. Initially Crane finds the revelation hilarious. Then Maizie enters the room strung out. At this time Doc reveals that he is in love with Maizie. Crane is amused by the drama happening before him, then Dead Legs informs him that Maizie is Anna's daughter. Crane appears devastated by the news until he reveals to Dead Legs that Maizie is actually his daughter because Anna never ran away with Crane after she found out what he had done to Phroso/Dead Legs. The shot of the tortured Dead Legs trying to grasp what he has just learned is phenomenal. The emotion Cheney could convey with a single expression in a close up has never been matched.

Dead Legs and Anna are now left alone to deal with the nightmarish life he has inflicted upon her. Dead Legs tries for reconciliation, offering to take her anywhere in the world she wants to go. Soon a group of natives returns to the outpost with Crane, who is near death after being shot on orders from Dead Legs. Dead Legs realizing that Maizie will be burned alive if Crane dies, orders Doc to save him. Unfortunately, Crane is too far gone and Doc can do nothing. 

When Crane dies, the tribesman begin to prepare for the funeral. As is local custom Maizie is to be burned with Crane because everyone is under the impression that she is Crane's daughter. Dead Legs reveals to Doc that he is in fact her father. Doc can't bear to tell Maizie that Dead Legs is her real father, so he lies, telling Maizie her real father died years ago. When the men come for Maizie, Dead Legs tells them that he will bring her out himself. Doc and Dead Legs plot a way to save Maizie so she can avoid this terrible fate. 

 

Dead Legs decides to try a little 'White Man's Magic' to save Maizie from burning. With the natives watching, he puts her in the same wooden coffin with a secret exit that he used to use in his show. He closes it, then when he reopens it, there is a skeleton inside. Meanwhile, Doc, Maizie and the others flee by boat. However, the natives do not believe Dead Legs claim that an evil spirit has taken Maizie. The screen fades to black as the natives close in on Dead Legs. Later, a native fishes the same medallion that had hung around Dead Legs neck from out of the ashes.

West of Zanibar is a dark spectacle that seemed a perfect adaptation for Tod Browning. Unfortunately, Browning was no longer the director he had been and his creative relationship with Chaney had grown somewhat stale. West of Zanibar lacks the humanity that early Browning/Chaney films like The Unknown or The Blackbird . The sense that Phroso/Dead Legs had fully transformed to a cold-hearted animal is wonderfully conveyed in the way Chaney slithers along the floor near the end of the film. But the attempt to make him a redeemable figure in the end by having him sacrifice himself for Maizie felt a little too late. And even though Chaney still showed his ability to completely morph into someone else both body and soul and certainly looked tortured and anguished, his performance wasn't anywhere near as strong as it had been in films like Laugh, Clown, Laugh or his two most famous performances in, The Hunchback of Notre Dame and The Phantom of The Opera. Overall a good film to watch to experience the full arc of the Browning/Chaney collaborations.

1David J. Skal, Elias Savada. Dark Carnival: The Secret World of Tod Browning . (Anchor Books/Doubleday 1995)