Behind That Curtain

As others have noted, this film is very dull. This is largely due to the extremely slow delivery of actor Gilbert Emery, who plays Sir Frederic Bruce of Scotland Yard. You can almost sense the impatience of the other actors whenever he's onscreen. If you're only curious about Charlie Chan, skip to the last 10 or 15 minutes.

According to THE FILMS OF BORIS KARLOFF, by Richard Bojarski, this was released in both sound and silent versions (a common practice during the early years of sound films). It would be interesting to see if the silent version, running at a faster film speed, is less dull.

An international orientalizing romance mystery from the pen of Earl Derr Biggers, author of the Charlie Chan mysteries. Chan is not really in this movie, except indirectly—instead there is a British-explorers-in-the-East theme, India and Persia and Tehran and pith helmets. Eve Mannering (Lois Moran) has married the wrong man, Durand (Philip Strange), who is a bounder and who has killed an agent, Hillary Galt, to prevent Eve's uncle from finding out. A watchman, blackmailing him, writes to Eve in India, and she confronts her husband, who hurts her and acts threatening, so she disappears into the desert with dashing, dependable Col Beetham (Warner Baxter) who has been longing for her all his life. Meanwhile, the urbane Scotland Yard detective Sir Frederick Bruce (Gilbert Emery) pursues the mystery with a clue provided by Chan, and the story winds up in San Francisco will all wrinkles ironed out. A very early sound movie, this one is marred not so much by the spotty sound recording as by the stagy acting style: thrilling and plummy tones ("ohhhhhhhhh Erik!") from Moran and Baxter. She's sometimes quite winsome, and Boris Karloff has a tiny part as Beetham's oriental servant. Later films focus on Chan, but not this one. Interesting use of title phrase, first to indicate why explorers explore, and then to preface Beetham's film-illustrated lecture at the denouement.

Author Earl Derr Biggers (1884-1933) was among America's most popular writers of the 1910s and 1920s and many of his works, such as 'Seven Keys to Baldpate', were translated to stage and screen with great success. About 1919 Biggers encountered stories about Hawaii's celebrated Chang Apana (1887-1933), a police officer of Chinese heritage who was noted for his fearlessness in dealing with criminals engaged in the opium trade. Apana, who carried a whip as his weapon of choice, was more noted for courage than detective skills--but he proved the inspiration for Charlie Chan.

Between 1925 and 1932 Biggers wrote six Chan novels. HOUSE WITHOUT A KEY and THE Chinese PARROT were filmed as silents in 1926; the first sound film to feature Chan was BEHIND THAT CURTAIN. But although it is generally based on the Biggers novel, the film takes a very strange direction: instead of presenting the mystery novel that Biggers wrote, it dispenses with mystery and presents the story of a runaway wife as a melodrama pure and simple, and Chan (played here by E.L. Park) is only a cameo role tacked on at the film's finish.

The cast sports several notable actors of the era, most particularly Warner Baxter, who had a distinguished career, and it offers an early and very brief role to Boris Karloff in his pre-FRANKENSTEIN era. But the cast struggles a great deal with the new technology of sound and they read as stiff and mannered. The direction and cinematography are only serviceable, and even for an early sound film BEHIND THAT CURTAIN feels extremely slow and heavy-handed.

BEHIND THAT CURTAIN is not presently available to the home market in the form of a studio release, nor is it likely to be so at any time in the near future. Although it is generally credited as "The First Sound-Era Charlie Chan Film," it is not really a part of the series that would become so popular between 1931 and 1942. Hardcore Chan fans will want to see the film at least once, but once will be more than enough.

Gary F. Taylor, aka GFT, Amazon Reviewer

Hey, it's an old movie in a bygone style but I took it for what it was and had a good time watching. Being of English heritage may have helped. Eve, damn it, I love you! Fun! Nice to see Boris Karloff too and some nice location shots.

Behind That Curtain is based on the third Charlie Chan novel written by Earl Derr Biggers. The book was fun pulp with Charlie outsmarting three rival detectives in solving the murder of a Scotland Yard detective and in turn solving two 15 year old mysteries.

The film, however, is interested in the two 15 year old mysteries and re-works the plot, so the film ends up being about Biggers' back story rather than the Chan story. Fox must not have been confident in the Chan character, perhaps because this was the first real year of sound film or they felt the audience would be more interested in the lovers and not a Chinese detective. Indeed, there is little romance in the book and the film takes liberties in changing 3 non-romantic characters in the book into a love triangle in the film.

It is rather sloppily done and the film really would be of no interest at all today, if it did not have small appearances by Boris Karloff and the Charlie Chan character. It is unfortunately a typical early sound effort and is cinematically uninteresting. Therefore the plot, which is not a mystery as the killer is revealed in the beginning, is all about the overdrawn lovers. It was probably even boring in 1929, but it qualifies as a curio today and should be viewed as such. It is interesting to see E.L. Park play Chan, albeit for five minutes and Karloff looks as menacing as ever. What cruel irony though, that no one can find "The Chinese Parrot", by the brilliant Paul Leni, nor the 4 missing Warner Oland Chans, and this is the one missing Chan that was found!!! Fate works in strange ways.