The Shock is a 1923 in film film directed by Lambert Hillyer and starring Lon Chaney, Sr. as a cripple named Wilse Dilling. The film was based on a story by William Dudley Pelley. This is one of the rare Lon Chaney films where he gets the girl.

Cast

• Lon Chaney, Sr. as Wilse Dilling
• Virginia Valli as Gertrude Hadley
• Jack Mower as Jack Cooper
• William Welsh (actor) as Micha Hadley
• Henry A. Barrows as John Cooper, Sr.
• Christine Mayo as Ann Cardington, AKA "Queen Anne"
• Harry De Vere as Olaf Wismer
• John Beck (B-movie actor) as Bill
• Walter Long (actor) as The Captain
• Bob Kortman as Henchman

Plot

Wilse Dilling, a crippled brute living in the savage streets of Chinatown, receives a coded message to go to the home of his boss, Ann Cardington, known as Queen Ann, a powerful crime boss feared in the underworld. When Wilse meets with her, she sends him to the town of Fallbrook, where he is to await her instructions in dealing with a former lover of hers, a banker named Micha Hadley, who had betrayed her. Being practically wheelchair-bound has not stopped Dilling from committing a lengthy series of crimes, but to his surprise, he finds that the small town atmosphere makes him feel differently about everything. He finds a good friend in Hadley's daughter Gertrude, whom Wilse not only falls in love with but she helps him believe that he can make a fresh start. But Wilse's new-found contentment is soon shattered by a series of new developments which includes trying to stop Queen Ann's plot towards Hadley and Gertrude being killed.

Production

The working title of the film was Bittersweet.

Preservation status

A print of the film is maintained in an archive.< name="SilentEra"/>



Category:1923 films
Category:Black-and-white films
Category:American films
Category:American silent feature films
Category:Films directed by Lambert Hillyer
Category:Universal Pictures films
Category:1920s horror films