The Cat and the Canary (1927)
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83% of critics liked it
(6 reviews) -
71% of users liked it
(1,081 ratings)
Frank Willard's barn-storming stage melodrama Cat and the Canary was filmed four times over a fifty-year period. This silent 1927 version stars Laura LaPlante as one of several potential heirs to a huge fortune. Brought to a foreboding mansion on the 20th anniversary of their eccentric… More Frank Willard's barn-storming stage melodrama Cat and the Canary was filmed four times over a fifty-year period. This silent 1927 version stars Laura LaPlante as one of several potential heirs to a huge fortune. Brought to a foreboding mansion on the 20th anniversary of their eccentric benefactor's death, the heirs must sit in silence as the lawyer (Tully Marshall) recites the terms of the will. The legacy hinges upon three sealed letters, each to be opened at a strategic point in the evening. Also crucial to the inheritance is the insistence that all the heirs spend the night in the creepy old mansion. Nervous Creighton Hale appoints himself LaPlante's protector--a far from simple job, given the many hidden panels and revolving doors which festoon the house. When the lawyer is murdered, LaPlante is the principle suspect. Cat and the Canary was remade as The Cat Creeps in 1930, and under its own title in 1939 (with Bob Hope and Paulette Goddard) and 1979. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
- Directed By
- Paul Leni
- Genres
- Horror, Mystery & Suspense, Classics
Unrated,
- In Theaters
- Sep 9, 1927 Limited
- On DVD
- Nov 13, 1998
- Studio
- Universal Pictures
Critic Reviews
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Michael W. Phillips, Jr., Goatdog's Movies
Not exactly a horror film, at least by any strict definition. But it is a great deal of fun.
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Dennis Schwartz, Ozus' World Movie Reviews
Stylishly well-executed old-fashioned horror-suspense thriller that's laced with a macabre humor.
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Thomas Delapa, Boulder Weekly
Transposing the expressionist panache of Weimar cinema, Leni responded with one of the most influential classics of the Hollywood horror genre.
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Ken Hanke, Mountain Xpress (Asheville, NC)
The sort of creepy movie that is perhaps best thought of as spooky fun -- and 85 years have not changed that.
See more critic ratings and reviews on Rotten Tomatoes
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Cast
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Laura La Plante
as Annabelle West
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Creighton Hale
as Paul Jones
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Forrest Stanley
as Charles Wilder
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Tully Marshall
as Roger Crosby the Lawyer
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Gertrude Astor
as Cecily Young
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Arthur Edmund Carewe
as Harry Blythe
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Flora Finch
as Susan Sillsby
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Martha Mattox
as Mammy Pleasant
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Lucien Littlefield
as Dr. Patterson
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George Siegmann
as Hendricks
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Joe Murphy
as Milkman
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Billy Engle
as Taxi Driver
- Arthur Edmund Carew
- Geo. Seigmann
