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Tod Browning, Universal, 1923, from the Colton and Andrews play. Priscilla Dean is Cassie Cook, an American running opium in China under the eye of Captain Jarvis (Matt Moore), who is not the mining engineer he claims. Wallace Beery is her partner Jules Repin. Anna May Wong is Rose Li, the doctor’s daughter. Screenland complained the play’s Cassie had been cleaned into a virgin who still moves the drug; the titles barely say opium. A week of locations in Truckee. Wong is already the face the camera finds when Dean is busy.
In two programmes
Browning again, Priscilla Dean running opium, and Wong as the doctor's daughter with more screen time than the billing implies. Watch the camera drift toward her when Dean is out of frame. Browning noticed. The billing did not.
Dean running opium in a China built at Universal and a week in Truckee. Matt Moore's mining engineer is not a mining engineer. The disguise is the plot, and Browning spends more care on the cover story than on the drug. Wong takes the frame whenever Dean lets go of it.
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