The Unholy Three

Tod Browning and Lon Chaney's most commercially successful collaboration — a deliciously twisted crime caper about three carnival sideshow performers who form a criminal conspiracy. A ventriloquist (Chaney, in old-lady drag, throwing his voice with sinister precision), a strongman, and a dwarf open a pet shop as a front for their burglary operation, using the ventriloquist's skills to throw suspicion in all directions. Chaney is remarkable in dual performance: the smooth-talking criminal mastermind and the cackling old woman persona he hides behind. Browning's carnival background gives the film an insider's authenticity, and the sideshow world's casual amorality — where performance and deception are the same thing — becomes a wickedly entertaining metaphor for crime itself. A hugely entertaining film that Chaney would remake as his only talkie in 1930.