Shadows (1922)

Lon Chaney and Harrison Ford in a Thoughtful and Heartwarming Christian Story

A great part of the thematic content of Shadows, at least at the outset, appears much too Victorian for the film to be exceptionally good as a 1922 feature, let alone survive more than viewable into 21st century. What makes the film longevous, in the end, is its sufficiently profound ethical crux. Good performances help.

This time chameleon Lon Chaney portrays a wise and humble Chinaman (I will argue that the character is indeed not "Chinese" but a flesh-and-blood Chinaman) Yen Sin, or "the heathen", yet to be convert by an eager and idealistic minister John Malden (Harrison Ford), who is himself blackmailed by his wife's ex-husband, who is though dead. The content revolves around Malden's moral worries about himself, his wife and his congregation. In addition, converting a morally upright heathen proves a difficult task in which any progress appears frustrated.

The content suffers from Oriental stereotypes in Yen Sin's character, without which, however, the story could not function the way it does. Yen must be an essentially moral being possessing a reserve of non-Occident wisdom that will be crucial in reaching the conclusive solution of the film's major problem. Chaney's exaggerative manners accentuate the character's categorical distance from the village society and the Western Christian culture.

Final scenes are heart-warming and the film ends in a touching allegory that redeems the heavy-handed melodrama. A nice Jungian reading seems to be available, besides the more evident Christian faith-promoting surface story. The essential and personal question Shadows presents us, in Platonic terms, is this: is our morality based on mere shadows or is it concerned with truer things behind them? The straightforwardly Christian reading is nevertheless somewhat challenged by the need of exterior input in the form of oriental wisdom, even though ultimately the prevailing ideology is deemed superior - a move that serves to emphasize the core of the faith.

Shadows is a beautiful, inspiring and pleasantly thoughtful, albeit slightly dated, Christian drama - an interesting morality play worth watching even disregarding Chaney's yet again outstanding performance.

My rating of Shadows: