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White Tiger is a 1923 American silent crime film directed by Tod Browning starring Priscilla Dean and featuring Wallace Beery in a supporting role.[1][2][3]
| White Tiger | |
|---|---|
 Lantern slide | |
| Directed by | Tod Browning |
| Written by | Tod Browning Charles Kenyon |
| Starring | Priscilla Dean Matt Moore Wallace Beery |
| Cinematography | William Fildew |
| Distributed by | Universal Pictures |
Release date |
|
Running time | 86 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | Silent (English intertitles) |
Cast
- Priscilla Dean as Sylvia Donovan
- Matt Moore as Dick Longworth
- Raymond Griffith as Roy Donovan
- Wallace Beery as Count Donelli / Hawkes
- Alfred Allen as Mike Donovan
- Emmett King as Bishop Vail, Chessplayer (uncredited)
- Lillian Langdon as Party Hostess (uncredited)
- Eric Mayne as Party Host (uncredited)
- Robert Page as Policeman at Mike Donovan shooting (uncredited)
Theme
In White Tiger, Browning, a former magician, provides an exposé of the “mystifying mechanics” of the famous chess-playing automaton widely exhibited in late 18th and early 19th century Europe and America.[4] The automaton fashioned to represent a Turkish chess master was an often convincing—though entirely fraudulent—representation of artificial intelligence: the device was actually operated by a human chess expert concealed within the cabinet below the chess board.[5] Browning, a great admirer of Edgar Allan Poe, combined Poe’s famous 1836 essay on the hoax with the author’s fascination with tales of mystery and the macabre.[6][7]
The protagonists in White Tiger use the “baffling” device to gain entrance to a wealthy estate and execute a jewel heist.[8] In exposing the fraud, Browning violates a precept of the magician's code of ethics; to never reveal the mechanics of an illusion.[9]
Footnotes
- "Progressive Silent Film List: White Tiger". silentera.com. Retrieved May 6, 2008.
- The Library of Congress American Silent Feature Film Catalog: White Tiger Retrieved November 3, 2014
- The AFI Catalog of Feature Films: White Tiger Retrieved November 3, 2014
Sobchack, 2006 p. 24: “The White Tiger is essentially a remake of Outside the Law (1920).” - Solomon, 2006 p. 50-51: “...prior to his career as a director, Browning was a magician...a 1914 movie fan magazine described him...as a sideshow artist...” And p. 51: “A number of Browning films of the 1920s contain striking reproductions of theatrical- or quasi-theatrical- illusions that are staged not only for spectators within the films, but for contemporaneous viewers of the films themselves.”
- Solomon, 2006 p. 55: Scenes from White Tiger provide “correspondences with Poe’s published expose (accent) Maelzel’s [automaton] chess-player.”
- Solomon, 2006 p. 56: “During his career as a director Browning was compared to Poe [by Joan Dickey in Motion Picture Magazine, March 1928, See footnotes]...In a studio biographical survey in the late 1930s Browning listed Poe as his ‘favorite classical author’”
- Eaker, 2016 : “In 1836, Poe wrote an expose of the touring “Mechanical Chess Player” Automaton. In the expose Poe revealed that inside this mechanical chess player was a concealed, quite human operator. Poe’s article was the seed for Browning’s film…”
- Solomon, 2006 p. 51: “In White Tiger (1923) it is the false chess-playing automaton which the protagonists use to gain entrance to-and burgle-high society homes.”
- Solomon, 2006 p. 52: “...Browning’s films explicitly violate the magician’s professional code, which stipulates that stage illusions [remain] concealed to the spectator...Browning did not hesitate to expose the methods of magic tricks on screen.”
Eaker, 2016: “After a jewelry heist in a mansion, utilizing the Mechanical Chess Player, the trio hole up at a claustrophobic cabin in the mountains. The final quarter of the film casts a Poe-like eye on imagined (and real) enemies.”
References
- Eaker, Alfred. 2016. Tod Browning Retrospective Retrieved 26 February 2021.
- Sobchack, Vivian. 2006. "The Films of Tod Browning: An Overview Long Past" in The Films of Tod Browning, editor Bernd Herzogenrath, 2006 Black Dog Publishing. London. pp. 21–39. ISBN 1-904772-51-X
- Solomon, Matthew. 2006. "Staging Deception: Theatrical Illusionism in the Browning Films of the 1920s" in The Films of Tod Browning, editor Bernd Herzogenrath, 2006 Black Dog Publishing. London. pp. 49–67 ISBN 1-904772-51-X
External links
- White Tiger at IMDb
- Synopsis at AllMovie
- White Tiger lantern slide plate (Wayback Machine)
- Film stills and lobby card at silentfilmstillarchive.com
- White Tiger (1923) on YouTube (81 min. version)
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