I remember seeing the 1939 Charles Laughton version of "The Hunchback of Notre Dame" as a Million Dollar Movie in the late 1950's, watching it nightly for a week. This was my first viewing of the original Lon Chaney presentation and I was left remarkably impressed with the vision and humanity he gave to the Quasimodo character. Regarded as an inhuman freak by the citizens of fifteenth century Paris, Quasimodo achieves solace from the tolling of the cathedral bells.
The movie offers a rather large cast of characters, most of whom have a connection to Esmeralda (Patsy Ruth Miller), stolen as a gypsy baby and raised by Clopin, "King of Beggars" (Ernest Torrence) and enemy of kings. The socio-political landscape is a familiar one; King Louis XI (Tully Marshall) reigns over a severely fragmented populace pitting the aristocracy against the street rabble of 1482 Paris. The city comes alive annually for the Festival of Fools, with the ugliest man in Paris crowned as King of the Fools. That honor falls to Quasimodo, but his celebrity turns to disgrace when he kidnaps Esmeralda on behalf of Jehan (Brandon Hurst), brother of the arch deacon of Notre Dame. When Quasimodo is captured and tortured for his indiscretion, only Esmeralda shows pity and offers him some water, recognizing compassion and humanity beneath the grotesque exterior.
Esmeralda however is enamored of Phoebus de Chataupers (Norman Kerry), recently elevated to Commander of the Guard by the King. In a particularly intriguing scene, a spider is shown spinning a web, leaving one to wonder who was trapping who. When Jehan attempts to murder Phoebus, the blame falls on Esmeralda. It is only through Quasimodo's vigilance that she is rescued and brought to the safe confines of sanctuary in the cathedral. As the King plots to bring Esmeralda to justice, Clopin incites a Paris mob to come to her aid.
Director Wallace Worsley does an admirable job in portraying the mood and feel of fifteenth century Paris, particularly in capturing the squalor of city life. For his part, Lon Chaney endured a most difficult transformation into the bell ringer Quasimodo, outfitting himself with a specially constructed device to inflate his cheeks, a lens that blanked out one of his eyes, and a huge rubber hump weighing almost fifty pounds to affect the manner of the hunchback. All the while he imbues his character with a genuine touch of warmth and humanity that belies the almost horrific appearance, so much so that we feel a loss at the film's finale when the dying hunchback tolls his own death knell.
The movie offers a rather large cast of characters, most of whom have a connection to Esmeralda (Patsy Ruth Miller), stolen as a gypsy baby and raised by Clopin, "King of Beggars" (Ernest Torrence) and enemy of kings. The socio-political landscape is a familiar one; King Louis XI (Tully Marshall) reigns over a severely fragmented populace pitting the aristocracy against the street rabble of 1482 Paris. The city comes alive annually for the Festival of Fools, with the ugliest man in Paris crowned as King of the Fools. That honor falls to Quasimodo, but his celebrity turns to disgrace when he kidnaps Esmeralda on behalf of Jehan (Brandon Hurst), brother of the arch deacon of Notre Dame. When Quasimodo is captured and tortured for his indiscretion, only Esmeralda shows pity and offers him some water, recognizing compassion and humanity beneath the grotesque exterior.
Esmeralda however is enamored of Phoebus de Chataupers (Norman Kerry), recently elevated to Commander of the Guard by the King. In a particularly intriguing scene, a spider is shown spinning a web, leaving one to wonder who was trapping who. When Jehan attempts to murder Phoebus, the blame falls on Esmeralda. It is only through Quasimodo's vigilance that she is rescued and brought to the safe confines of sanctuary in the cathedral. As the King plots to bring Esmeralda to justice, Clopin incites a Paris mob to come to her aid.
Director Wallace Worsley does an admirable job in portraying the mood and feel of fifteenth century Paris, particularly in capturing the squalor of city life. For his part, Lon Chaney endured a most difficult transformation into the bell ringer Quasimodo, outfitting himself with a specially constructed device to inflate his cheeks, a lens that blanked out one of his eyes, and a huge rubber hump weighing almost fifty pounds to affect the manner of the hunchback. All the while he imbues his character with a genuine touch of warmth and humanity that belies the almost horrific appearance, so much so that we feel a loss at the film's finale when the dying hunchback tolls his own death knell.