Underworld (1927) on Netflix
Bull Weed, a gangster kingpin, sobers up Rolls Royce Wensel, a former lawyer fallen into alcoholism, whose intelligence serves Weed's schemes. Wensel falls for Weed's girlfriend, Feathers McCoy.
- Netflix4.1/5
- IMDb7.5/103,959 votes
- Rotten Tomatoes89%
Plot summary
Bull Weed, a gangster kingpin with a territory of his own in a city of the Prohibition era, takes in Rolls Royce Wensel, a onetime lawyer sunk into alcoholism, and sobers him up. Wensel's intelligence goes to work in Weed's schemes, and the two become confidants. Weed's girlfriend, Feathers McCoy, is part of that circle, and she and Wensel form an attachment. Buck Mulligan, a rival gangster who keeps a flower shop as a front for his operations, wants a share of Weed's ground and looks for a way in; Meg is his girl, and he has henchmen behind him.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about Underworld (1927)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- Von Sternberg recalled that Underworld opened at ten in the morning to avoid press reviews, and three hours later a crowd blocked Times Square and forced the theater to stay open all night, inaugurating the era of gangster films and round-the-clock screenings.
- George Bancroft's gangster "Bull" Weed was modeled on "Terrible" Tommy O'Connor, an Irish-American mobster who gunned down Chicago Police Chief Padraig O'Neil in 1923 but escaped three days before his execution and was never apprehended.
- Paramount hired Josef von Sternberg in 1926 on the humbling condition that he serve as an assistant director, but after his reshoots of Frank Lloyd's Children of Divorce impressed the studio it gave him a project of his own, Underworld.
SPOILER
The film's phony flower shop and the killing of "Bull" Weed's rival "Buck" Mulligan drew on the real 1922 murder of kingpin Dion O'Bannon by the Tony Torrios mob, an influence from journalist Ben Hecht.
