Suspense.
About Suspense.
A maid quits a lonely house, leaves her key under the mat, and a tramp sees her go. The wife, alone with a baby, finds the note and telephones her husband, who is working late. He hears the break-in until the tramp cuts the line. The husband steals a car. The owner and the police chase him. He hits a man in the road and stops, then races on. The wife has locked herself and the baby in a room. The tramp drives a knife through the door. The husband reaches the house with the police still shooting. He takes the tramp at the front door, and the police grab the man. Upstairs, the couple hold each other.
Cast & crew
More about Suspense.
Lois Weber wrote the scenario and plays the wife. She and Phillips Smalley directed. Valentine Paul plays the husband, Douglas Gerrard the man who chases the stolen car, and Sam Kaufman the tramp. Rex made it for Universal, which released it on July 6, 1913. It runs about 10 minutes.
Themes
Making
Weber is both the writer and the woman barricaded with the baby. Smalley shares the direction.
Reviews
Russell Merritt called Suspense the best nickelodeon film ever made.
Technique
The phone call is a split screen. The stolen-car pursuit is cut as a chase, and the knife comes through the locked door in close view.
Preservation
An original print is at the BFI. Selected for the National Film Registry in 2020.
Notes
- A split-screen shot carries the telephone call.
- The claim that Lon Chaney plays the tramp is rejected by current credits. Sam Kaufman is the tramp. Wikidata still lists Chaney.
- The British Film Institute holds an original print.
- In 2020 the Library of Congress added the film to the National Film Registry.
Scenes
- The tramp cuts the phone line while the husband is still listening.
- A knife blade comes through the door of the room where the wife and baby are locked.
