Lost films: ‘London After Midnight’ (1927) should really be #1

Thanks to TCM, I’ve seen a number of Lon Chaney silents. A case could be made that he is the finest movie actor of all time. There are probably a few film buffs who wouldn’t hesitate to literally kill someone to get their hands on one copy of London… And I would probably watch it — feeling maybe a little bit guilty, mind — if they did.

Inexplicably absent from the list is Greed, the complete 6- and/or 10-hour version of which is lost.

Von Stroheim was the victim of many studio “edited versions” of his pictures, leading him to utter one of my favorite insults, this time regarding The Merry Widow (1925):

“The man who edited my film had nothing on his mind but a hat.”

It is especially effective if you imagine von Stroheim (an Otto Dix painting come to life) actually saying it, which is easily done if you’ve seen Sunset Blvd. (1950)