Watches
June 14, 2022
Another mother of all gangster films. There seem to be a couple of films around were given that badge of honor, I usually come to a very similar conclusion watching them: I'm not a huge fan of classic gangster films, so I'm not really all that impressed with the early blueprint of those films.
Underworld serves a very basic rise and fall story of Weed, your typical gangster. Together with his buddy Wensel he slowly rises to the top, until he gets caught in a feud with Mulligan. Mulligan ends up dead, Weed ends up in prison. Wensel is tasked to get Weed out, but he has fallen for Weed's girlfriend, which puts him in a difficult position.
Even though Underworld is a true silent, it already feels pretty focused on the narrative. Maybe it just comes with the genre? The cinematography was pretty bland, the score forgettable and the performances rather basic. The plot is a real bore and even though the film is quite short, having seen a trillion versions of this story already makes the 80-minute runtime at least 40 too long.