despite initial references to unconventional surgeries and deadly torture, Leni's film... is rather a sentimental romance and a political satire, with just a smidgin of rooftop swashbuckling thrown in near the end.

The Man Who Laughs is a truly great, a devastatingly beautiful film.

As usual in Hugo, love is measured in sacrifice, yielding a sincere and extravagant sense of romance.

I have never seen a better representation of the spirit of a novel in that the picture not only interprets the lusty romantic feeling of Hugo’s story, but it is sufficient unto itself and has no awkward turns or incongruous passages.