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It is both painfully honest and laugh-out-loud funny at the same time.

Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

Strong acting helps the film overcome an uncertain premise and create characters that hold our attention absolutely.

If you like to be scared, if you like to laugh, and if you like to learn a thing or two at the movies, this absolutely cannot be missed.

"Suspense" is an American 10-minute short film from 1913, so this one is also easily over a century old and most people talking about it today do so because a female writer, director and lead actress weren't too common back then. Lois Weber is all that, but the real credit she deserves is not for her gender, but for this being a movie that was very good at times. It's a bit of a pity she is forgotten today pretty much despite how prolific she was. There are some really well-done camera shots in here, the keyhole early on and then the camera looking down repeatedly at the bad guy. The tramp in here is not at all the Chaplin equivalent whose only danger stems from his clumsiness, but a gruff knife-swinging badass. Weber included some character stereotypes that are very common today even: the violent criminal, the helpless victim, the savior (standing out from the police force) and the unsuspecting minor character that leaves the film early on right here. All in all, this was a good watch that had the exact runtime for being focused, yet never too long for its own good. I don't need to think twice whether or not give this one a thumbs-up. The answer is yes. Go check it out.

Sometimes the simple approach works best, and in 1913 filmmakers were still working out the basics of what this thing called film-MAKING was and is all about. Suspense is the kind of movie that was at or around the same time of Griffith, who pioneered the use of inter-cutting between different stories. With this film, co-directed by Lois Webber (called in the film places I just looked up the first American woman director), it's a story in a quick ten minutes: after the maid decides to walk out on a mother and her infant (the husband is off at work), a "Pursuer" (aka a vagrant, a bum, a good old criminal) sees the maid leave and prowls around the house until he sees it's time to break in.The title comes from what Hitchcock often described what suspense in cinema is all about: following what happens when we can see one story unfolding and another is taking place concurrently, but the bomb doesn't go off right away - it needs to take time, and the suspense all comes from when it will go off. In this case the bomb is the Pursuer, acting more like a wild animal than a rational human being (Douglas Gerrard as the Pursuer fills the role to the point of being terrifying most of all in the few close-ups that happen, which is just enough), and it's only a matter of time before it goes off.There's so much creative direction here from Weber and Phillips Smalley, and it's impressive still today as a mini-masterpiece of filmmaking, where the structure is air-tight and yet there's enough time for set-up (showing this mother, her child, and the husband off in his office, and then the prowler as he goes up the property and through the windows), and then what happens when things escalate. All the shots matter, and yet there's a lot of experimenting with form: there's a moment where you see three subjects - the wife, the husband, the pursuer - all in the frame, and separated by triangles showing what's going on (this shows us why the phone line gets cut at a crucial moment). And even something as simple as a shot through a "keyhole" seems revolutionary for the time.For younger people who have been raised on online video it may not seem like much. It even may be just slightly contrived around the fact that the husband's car is stolen literally under his nose. But that adds to the 'what will happen next', and the filmmakers keep the pace so quick and tight that there's barely a moment to think about the particulars. When you see an overhead shot of the Pursuer coming up to the door, it's quite terrifying just by the framing and how the actor fills it all like some hobo-demon. The fact that it comes from a woman director doesn't matter in a way - clearly Weber could direct with the best of any of her counterparts, including Griffith (and this is supposedly a remake of one of his own films, with some added visual tricks). It feels like such a simple story and yet so universal that it should probably be shown to any film student first day of class to say 'THIS is how it's done.'

In 1909 Edwin S. Porter left Edison studios to found Rex but it's most famous film "Suspense" was probably directed by it's two leading players - Lois Weber and Phillips Smalley. Smalley was a Griffith devotee who while trying to make a film along the lines of "The Unseen Enemy" included all his master's innovations - close ups, travelling shots, high camera angles, then hit on an innovation of his own - the triptych!!A servant leaves - refusing to stay in such an isolated place, through the keyhole the mother is seen playing blissfully with the baby. Later, finding the maid's note she looks out of the window and down at the face of a tramp (Douglas Gerrard) who stares menacingly into the face of the camera. She rings her husband who appears as part of a triptych - the other image shows the tramp entering the house.The husband is having troubles of his own - while desperately trying to get to his wife and baby, his car is stolen and while the stolen car is the main focus of the scene, the police and husband in pursuit can be seen on the dim horizon. In another unusual camera shot, the husband can be seen gaining ground through the stolen car's rear view mirror.According to Thomas Gunning "no film made before World War 1 shows stronger command of film style and even out does Griffith for emotionally involved film making"!!!

I viewed a print of 'Suspense' in the National Film Archives, in London. Phillips Smalley is credited as director, but the film was probably co-directed by Lois Weber. Women film directors have always been a rarity, although Alice Guy Blache was also directing films in early silent days. Lois Weber's career is especially interesting because (unlike Mme Guy Blache, who directed from behind the camera), Weber played the lead roles in her own films, directing herself.'Suspense' reminds me of a couple of early DW Griffith films in which a young woman (or a pair of young women), alone in an isolated location, is in jeopardy. We have a similar situation here. Lois Weber plays a young wife in an isolated house. She and her infant are unexpectedly left alone by her husband when the maid has abruptly given notice, leaving her latchkey under the doormat. A passing tramp discovers the situation and tries to break in. When the woman rings her husband (are there no police?), the distress call is terminated when the tramp cuts the 'phone line. The husband, rushing home to rescue his wife and child (are there no police?), steals a motorcar. NOW there are police, as a cop nabs the husband for grand theft auto. Rather than explaining that his wife is in danger, he gives the cop the slip.SPOILERS NOW. The tramp, meantime, has found the maid's latchkey and he lets himself into the house. Just when things look grimmest for Wifey and her child, the cops arrive ... not to nick the tramp, but because they've been pursuing the husband all the way here. Only when the tramp is safely nabbed does the husband finally explain himself.I was eager to view 'Suspense' partly because I'm very interested in Lois Weber's career -- she proves herself a decent actress (by silent standards) and a fine director (ditto) -- but my primary interest in this film is because I was told that the tramp in this film was played by an actor who *might* be Lon Chaney. After viewing 'Suspense', I determined that the villainous tramp in this brief film is definitely NOT the Man of a Thousand Faces. However, there is a brief appearance by another tramp during the chase sequence: this actor wears realistic beard growth and an application of grime, and does indeed appear to be Chaney.'Suspense' is well-acted, quite well-directed and brilliantly edited, with some impressive cross-cutting and even a triptych split-screen effect. It's a shame that the plot line is so contrived, but despite some plausibility issues 'Suspense' is most definitely suspenseful. I'll rate this movie 8 in 10, and I wish that Lois Weber were better known.