The Burglar's Dilemma

The Burglar’s Dilemma (1912) - This early suspense crime film predates Alfred Hitchcock by over a decade, and deals with themes that the great director will explore all throughout his career. Written by Lionel Barrymore, The Burglar’s Dilemma is a neat little exploration of the "wrong man" theme. However, rather than using point-of-view shots to create a sense of audience identification, this film relies more upon acting to get the job done.

Barrymore himself co-stars in the film as "The Householder," a large, hale, good-natured wealthy man. He appears to be the source of support for his brother, labelled "The Weakling," played with nervous complexity by Henry B. Walthall (Dandy Jack of Friends, sans moustache here).

The mood seems to be established by body language (and body size) between the two actors. Barrymore is relaxed, gregarious and confident. Walthall is diminutive, withdrawn and edgy. As the film begins, the two brothers sit side by side in the older brother’s home library, reading and chatting.

Suddenly, a flurry of people arrive to toast the elder brothers birthday (among them, both the beautiful Gish sisters). An intercard informs us what we can already discern on the screen - the younger brother is jealous of his sibling’s friends.

As a matter of fact, everything about Walthall seems diminished next to the open, well-grounded Barrymore. This is definitely a film with a back story that the viewer must supply for himself. Why is the younger brother defined as "The Weakling?" It’s certainly not as if his smaller stature is preventing him from pursuing a worthwhile career due to his physical stature. We’re not exactly in the jungle here.

One gets the sense that Walthall has had to live in the shadow of his older, larger, more successful brother all his life, and now he is dependent upon him. We can read the resentment on his face, the envy, the lack of self esteem. Of course big-brother Barrymore is so generous and magnanimous that Walthall’s sense of guilt and resentment are grounded in his very being. It is his dependency on his older brother that makes him a "Weakling," not any physical characteristics.

One can speculate about the history of these brothers’ relationships, going back to infancy, but we can only infer so much. The film seems to want to glibly place all the guilt on the younger brother, and have the audience side against him. He is such a pitiful bundle of nerves, however, a crushed shell of a human being, that I cannot help but feel at least sad curiosity, if not pity, for what this man has gone through, both externally and internally.

Of course, we will never know precisely what Griffith or Barrymore intended here, but Walthall’s bizarre performance definitely speak loudly to bring in the suspicion of a deeply pathological situation - and perhaps the older brother’s smiling indulgence of his "weak" sibling keeps himself in a perpetually superior position, one that he perhaps uses as a prop for his own false self esteem.

It is impossible to arrive definitively at this proposed subtext of the film, but it is equally impossible to dismiss it, or keep from noticing that there is something definitely wrong with this picture. Psychologically, The Burglar’s Dilemma is a demanding, mysterious portrait of which conjecture can only take us so far.

Meanwhile, in the parallel story, which gives the film its title, we meet a fledgling young thief, played with a charismatic blend of innocent freshness and frank sexual allure by a 19-year-old actor by the name of Robert Harron. It is apparent right from the first shot that Harron is obviously a natural-born movie star - the beginning of a breed that would continue throughout Hollywood history in such remarkable incarnations as Montgomery Clift, Paul Newman, Marlon Brando and even the young Tom Cruise. It is impossible to point to a prototype for this kind of charactor/actor before the emergence of the popular cinema. Presumably, the theatre had always had handsome young charismatics that personified the irresistible charm of such "good/bad" boys, but it would take a medium the size, scope and penetration of cinema to create an authentic piece of American mythology from this type.

(All too unfortunately, and as if to cast a pale shadow of doom across his persona, young Bobby Harron died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound in 1920, whether accidentally or suicidally, no one can definitively say. Thus Harron was, tragically, a pioneer as well for the young, conflicted doomed martyr - a premonition of such great American myths as James Dean, River Phoenix and Heath Ledger. Before his death, Harron would continue as a leading figure in such Griffith blockbusters as The Birth of a Nation and Intolerance. Almost completely forgotten today, he laid down a very early pattern and mold for a certain type of anti-hero that Americans would embrace in their films and their culture up until this day.)

Harron is shown here as the apprentice burglar, being tutored and manipulated by the older criminal, played here by Harry Carey with his usual sense of ominous menace. Carey has plotted for Harron to break into Barrymore’s opulent home, and with a bit of threatening intimidation, convinces the hesitant boy to go through with it.

Meanwhile, Barrymore’s younger brother is becoming drunk on wine. The visitors leave, and Walthall approaches Barrymore for some cash. Though big brother good-naturedly rises to present him with some, Walthall insists on more, and finally, flying into a rage, knocks his older brother to the floor. In his drunken confusion, he believes he has killed him and begins to panic. Conveniently for him, however, Harron enters the house through a window, flashlight in hand and begins stalking through the house, looking for valuables. Walthall immediately grasps the opportunity to shift the blame for the accidental homicide onto the young intruder. He hurries into the street to summon the police for help.

Alone in the darkened library, Harron comes across Barrymore’s outstretched body on the floor and is horrified. Walthall returns with the police, who grab the now-hysterical Harron and apparently catch him just after the act of murder.

The scenes which follow are still terrifying to watch. Harron, the young, unseasoned apprentice, out on his first tentative job, has suddenly dropped into an inconceivable nightmare. He knows that he is innocent, but the fact remains that he is a burglar, and no one is going to believe in his denials of murder. He is trapped, with nowhere to turn, no one to believe him, and the real "killer" hugging nearby, unbeknown to every one but the members of the audience.

This, of course, is a device that Hitchcock would develop over and over again, to great and masterly affect - supply the audience with more information than the characters on the screen, then sit helplessly squirming as the hapless victim twists and turns in his apparently hopeless dilemma. Griffith, in 1912, had not developed the cinematic language that would cause the viewer to participate in the ordeal of the entrapped individual, thus vicariously sharing his plight. But the film is still very effective, and one wonders if the Great Master ever saw this short film, which might have inspired him with all of its rich suggestiveness.

Two plainclothes detectives arrive to interrogate the frightened boy. John T. Dillon and the menacing Alfred Paget (the villain/hero of The Lesser Evil) play one of the first recorded instances of "good cop/bad cop" on Harron while the guilty Walthall squirms in the background. The evidence mounts, as the detectives find a hammer and a blackjack in the boy’s jacket. They drag him back into the library, and Paget pushes him down to the floor to accusatively face his dead "victim." Meanwhile, in the next room, Walthall is going insane with fear, unable to sit or keep still, pulling compulsively at his hair. The entire scenario is frightfully intense and unnerving.

The medics arrive to look at the "body," while Harron is dragged back into the next room, the beefy detectives bookcasing him in a close, claustrophobic shot while he breaks down in tears and denial. Paget screams into his face threateningly, and one can almost hear Harron’s anguished cries of "I didn’t do it!" Dillon, the other detective, turns the boy around and attempts to calm him. Paget pulls him back, shouting at him abusively, waving the blackjack menacingly in his face. Dillon, the good cop, attempts to reassure him to get a confession, and Harron completely breaks down.

Griffith cuts back and forth from this scene to shots of Walthall alone, presumably watching, and fidgeting with Doesteyevsky-esque anxiety. This is as feverish a pitch as we have seen, emotionally speaking, in any film with which I am familiar.

Suddenly the tension is broken open by a tremendously powerful shot of enormous revelation. The library door suddenly opens, and out steps the "dead" Barrymore, his eyes dark and glazed. The police and the boy all turn with expressions of shock, as does his guilty brother, whom Griffith has just pulled into the far right of the frame, so that the two men are directly facing one another. Everyone expresses their great relief at his survival, except for the guilty brother, whose face goes to shock.

Questioned by the police, Barrymore exonerates Harron, all the while shooting the deadliest of gazes at his brother’s face, who finally turns away. Harron lights a cigarette in ecstatic relief. Barrymore continues his stare at Walthall who gazes away anxiously, waiting to be revealed.
The police carry the happy young burglar away, leaving the two brothers to face each other alone in a moment of incredible tension. Walthall finally looks to Barrymore, guiltily, sadly, then looks away. What will his injured brother do?

Returning to the library, Walthall sits down to await his fate. He shoves the glass of wine away that helped bring him to his rash action with a shamed sense of disgust. Back in the hallway, we can watch Barrymore’s searching face as he reflects on what to do. Slowly, he turns around and follows behind his brother.

Pausing at the door, he puts on a smile and tenderly touches his brother on the back. Walthall sits looking downward still, frightened and ashamed. Barrymore pities him, magnanimously shrugs off the incident, lights a cigarette and finally turns to shake hands with his very relieved brother.

This action happens so quickly that the modern audience is likely to disbelieve it. But Barrymore is so effective - we can actually observe him thinking and making the decision to put on a bright face to save his brother from suffering. It is a towering gesture of magnanimity, and we can equally see not only the relief reflected in Walthall’s reaction, but an honest glow of redemption, as he realizes that his brother loves and cares for him even at this level. We see all jealousy and animosity depart instantly from his face for the first time, as the camera fades on the scene.

Rejoining the parallel plot, we see that Harron, the young would-be burglar, is being released after serving time for breaking and entering. Walking down the street, he is quickly accosted by the elder crook, Harry Carey, who wants the boy back to do some other criminal mischief. Harron shakes his head emphatically and begins to back away. Quickly coming to his rescue is the "good" detective (Dillon) and another police officer who sternly warn Carey to stay away from the boy. Defeated, Carey stiffly adjusts his tie and departs. Harron smiles effusively, thanking the policemen for his new chance at life and departs.

Thus the film ends, both plot points completely resolved by the triumph of human concern and caring hearts. It is interesting to see just how dark Griffith can make a film, only to pull it back just at the end, based upon his belief in the inherent goodness of man. One can only imagine The Burglar’s Dilemma if it were left to be concluded by someone of Fritz Lang’s disposition.

This simplicity is indeed lovely, but it must be admitted that Griffith’s naivety and optimism tend to undermine the situations that he so effectively sets up. We begin to consider that this is the perhaps-fatal flaw that will doom his future work. But then again, we also remember that this is still only 1912, and we have just watched one of the most powerful dramas yet created by what is by this point, unquestionably the greatest film maker in the world.