The Informer

This newly restored 1929 silent film is based on Liam O’Flaherty’s successful novel and boasts a new, Irish folk–themed score by acclaimed violist/composer Garth Knox. Set in the newly independent Ireland of 1922 it tells the story of a group of revolutionaries whose loyalty is compromised when one of their own grasses up on a fellow member who killed the police chief – culminating in ever more deaths and personal tragedy.

When a meeting of revolutionary terrorists turns sour, courtesy of the police arriving, one of the gang members called Francis McPhilip (Carl Harbord) kills the police chief in the ensuing shoot-out. Worried for their safety, the remaining gang urge Francis to go on the run and hide in surrounding countryside. Despite having obvious feelings for pretty colleen Katie Fox (Lya De Putti), Katie’s heart seemingly belongs to fellow gang member Gypo Nolan (Lars Hanson). When the police inquire as to Francis’ whereabouts no one want to know a thing but realising that he cannot hide out in countryside forever, Francis decides to board a ship to America and leave Ireland for good. Before he does so, he returns to Dublin to bid farewell to his mother and to Katie, despite the obvious risks involved. Katie hides him in her flat but when Gypo arrives some time later, he immediately sees that the table was set for two and that a fresh cigarette stump is still glowing in the ash tray. Worried that the hot-tempered and jealous Gypo might get the wrong idea, the not overtly-bright girl attempts to secretly usher Francis out of her flat instead of explaining to Gypo is to why Francis is in her room. Alas, all goes wrong when Gypo sees Francis leaving Katie’s premises via a mirror on the wall… and now he really gets the wrong idea! Accusing Katie of being unfaithful, the ensuing argument – further heightened thanks to ‘Oh Danny Boy’ playing on the old gramophone (a stroke of genius courtesy of the film’s restoration department) – leads to friction and results in Gypo grassing up his previous best friend to the police, simply out of jealousy. Just as Francis is about to bid farewell to his old mother in her shop/house, the police close in on him. Trying to escape across the rooftops, he is hit by a bullet and falls to his death.

Hearing upon Francis’ death in a pub, Gypo begins to feel slightly guilty but not guilty enough to refuse to generous ward the police hand the informer. The devastated Katie also has as yet no idea that it was Gypo who informed the law of Franci’s whereabouts. Only when a wad of cash falls out of his pocket during a meeting and a local prostitute claims to know that it was Gypo who denounced his friend, the gang then turn against him and now it’s Gypo on the run. At a train station he saves an unfortunate girl from a miserable and underpaid job, as a ‘thank you’ she gives him a signed photograph of herself – presumably she is a show girl fallen on hard times. It’s precisely that photo which is about to seal Gypo’s fate in the nerve-wracking and tense climax…

Brilliantly shot by Werner Brandes and Theodor Sparkuhl, you would never know that the street scenes were shot in a studio and not in Dublin. Both Lars Hanson and Lya De Putti are great in the leads and this being a silent film it doesn’t matter that he is Swedish and she is Hungarian. The Dual Format Edition also offers the sound version of the movie, though it should be pointed out that this means (obviously) no still no dialogue but merely sound effects such as gunshots.