The Trap contains Lon Chaney's least interesting character nd most uninspired performance. It's a disappointing film in the master's filmography. Chaney was the premier character actor of his time but this character is simplicity it's self and it doesn't showcase his talents or catch the interest of the audience. I find it hard to believe or follow Chaney as Gespard, an illiterate mountain miner. It begs me to ask if Lon Chaney really wanted to play this type of character and how much input he really had into the scenario of The Trap and the creation of the character Gespard.
The draw to this picture is the fact that Chaney is credited as one of the writers of this picture and I can see traces of his personality in this story. Chaney was clearly an outdoors man and the backdrop of the The Trap is the terrain of French Canada's wilderness with Gespard trapping and fishing. The class conflict between the rich and the poor. I see Lon there but I just don't like the character he is playing. I don't know if I feel it is too easy for him or if having a simple minded miner is insulting but I don't like this character at all. Lon Chaney doesn't give a bad portrayal and there are tender moments between Gespard and the boy but I don't think you can build a film around Gespard. For one thing his illiteracy and simple mindedness are played to the extreme to the point where they add it to the titles and it becomes hard to even understand what is being said. Luckily Chaney's pantomime is unmatched and even in the horrible print of the film I had we could see his mastery. I guess my problem is this, How could a character like Gespard create such an elaborate plan for revenge? And what has this character lost? The film takes no time to develop it's characters. Wouldn't this story have more potency if we saw ourselves in Gespard, a poor man who works hard for a living. This character is more of a farce than anything. I realize that a person in Gespard's situation would not be educated or well versed but The Trap plays it to the extreme. We aren't able to invest ourselves in this character. Chaney's performance is fine but I wish he did more to make this character more human. Gespard is not a representation of the normal man which is what I imagine Chaney was trying to convey if he wrote the picture's character development.
The draw to this picture is the fact that Chaney is credited as one of the writers of this picture and I can see traces of his personality in this story. Chaney was clearly an outdoors man and the backdrop of the The Trap is the terrain of French Canada's wilderness with Gespard trapping and fishing. The class conflict between the rich and the poor. I see Lon there but I just don't like the character he is playing. I don't know if I feel it is too easy for him or if having a simple minded miner is insulting but I don't like this character at all. Lon Chaney doesn't give a bad portrayal and there are tender moments between Gespard and the boy but I don't think you can build a film around Gespard. For one thing his illiteracy and simple mindedness are played to the extreme to the point where they add it to the titles and it becomes hard to even understand what is being said. Luckily Chaney's pantomime is unmatched and even in the horrible print of the film I had we could see his mastery. I guess my problem is this, How could a character like Gespard create such an elaborate plan for revenge? And what has this character lost? The film takes no time to develop it's characters. Wouldn't this story have more potency if we saw ourselves in Gespard, a poor man who works hard for a living. This character is more of a farce than anything. I realize that a person in Gespard's situation would not be educated or well versed but The Trap plays it to the extreme. We aren't able to invest ourselves in this character. Chaney's performance is fine but I wish he did more to make this character more human. Gespard is not a representation of the normal man which is what I imagine Chaney was trying to convey if he wrote the picture's character development.