The Mystic
A fantastically atmospheric but rarely seen missing link in the development of Tod Browning’s artistry, set amid his favored milieu of shadowy sideshows and clever criminals, The Mystic provides a striking showcase for silent-era diva Aileen Pringle, who sports a series of memorably outré looks (courtesy of art deco designer Erté) as Zara, a phony psychic in a Hungarian carnival who, under the guidance of a Svengali-like con man (Conway Tearle), crashes—and proceeds to swindle—American high society. Browning’s fascination with the weird is on full display in the eerie séance sequences, while his subversive moral ambiguity extends surprising sympathy to even the most seemingly irredeemable of antiheroes.
Available In
Collector's Set
Collector's Set
Cast
- Aileen Pringle
- Zara
- Conway Tearle
- Michael Nash
- Mitchell Lewis
- Zazarack
- Robert Ober
- Anton
- Stanton Heck
- Carlo
- David Torrence
- James Bradshaw
- Gladys Hulette
- Doris Merrick
- DeWitt Jennings
- Inspector of police
- Carrie Daumery
- Woman at séance
- Joseph Hazelton
- Sideshow spectator
Credits
- Director
- Tod Browning
- Story by
- Tod Browning
- Scenario by
- Waldemar Young
- Settings by
- Cedric Gibbons
- Settings by
- Hervey Libbert
- Photography by
- Ira H. Morgan
- Assistant camera
- Willard Sheldon
- Film editor
- Frank Sullivan
- Assistant director
- Errol Taggart
- Titles
- Joe Farnham
- Costumes
- Erté
A scene from The Mystic
