The Shadow of Silk Lennox

In The Shadow of Silk Lennox Lon Chaney, Jr. play Silk Lennox, a nightclub owner who is actually a murderous mobster. Dead cops don't matter much to this guy if he can get away with it. When one of his goons tries to take off with a stack of Silk's cash he and the boys get payback in blood.

Silk and the boys leave witnesses so the cops think they've finally got the mob boss dead to rights. Silk is confident he'll beat the rap, though. While in jail he meets the best safe cracker in town. This city is in for it now.

This isn't really a Mafia movie, but it's kind of in that same vein which I mention because those are movies that I don't tend to enjoy much in general. This one just doesn't have much in the way of a solid story. Maybe I'm just too dependent on aliens and ghosts to keep me interested in a movie. Crime capers generally aren't that interesting to me unless there's some mystery to it.

Besides that the performances in this are weak. Even Chaney who has done some decent work elsewhere lacks. I didn't recognize or care about any of the other actors. I did notice that one of the actors is the same guy responsible for the music so he's obviously multi-talented, but I don't much like music from this era either. Speaking of which we spend too much time on the musical numbers that take place in the nightclub.

The editing in this thing is horrendous and probably affects everything else that I see as a negative. The music cuts in and out in a jarring manner, the dialogue feels choppy which is worsened by clipped lines, and the movie as a whole doesn't have a good flow to it.

MORALITY:

There are scenes with a lot of shooting, but the violence amounts to people just falling over. We still get the concept of death, but it's not bloody.

There is no sex, nudity, or strong language which is typical of these old black and white movies.

SPIRITUALITY:

Unless we spend time talking about the motives of criminal types there isn't much to look at as far as spirituality.

FINAL THOUGHTS:

I would recommend seeing this only if you really like crime flicks from the 30's, however even Chaney enthusiasts have been known to say this isn't worth the time.

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