The Man Who Laughs

In seventeenth-century England, a nobleman falls out of favour with King James II and is put to death. His young son, Gwynplaine, is taken and deliberately mutilated, leaving his face fixed in a permanent grin. Abandoned and alone, the boy rescues a blind infant, Dea, and both are taken in by Ursus, a travelling showman. Years later, Gwynplaine performs as a fairground attraction billed for his disfigurement, and he and Dea fall in love. The discovery of his aristocratic origins draws him into the world of the court, where the jester Barkilphedro and others seek to use him, forcing him to choose between his title and the life he has built with Ursus and Dea.

Paul Leni directed the film, his second after Waxworks, from a screenplay by Charles E. Whittaker, Walter Anthony and Marion Ward, produced by Carl Laemmle for Universal Pictures. Conrad Veidt plays Gwynplaine, with Mary Philbin as Dea, Cesare Gravina as Ursus, Brandon Hurst as Barkilphedro, Olga Baclanova as Duchess Josiana and Sam De Grasse as King James II, among a credited cast of forty-three. It runs 110 minutes.

The film was released in November 1928 and continues to be watched; on IMDb it holds 7.6/10 from around 9,200 votes, while on TMDB it stands at 7.3/10 from a much smaller 228 votes. A critics' rating of 8.4/10 from 24 reviews places it somewhat above those audience scores.