If anyone's seen The Best of Everything and wondered if Mr. Shalimar could have ever been young, go out and rent the silent movie thirty years earlier: Underground. In my opinion, Brian Aherne looks exactly the same. He's still tall, handsome, charming, dashing, and adorable. In this movie, he plays a worker on the underground (London's version of the subway system). He falls for Elissa Landi at first sight, and they enjoy a very sweet meet-cute where she drops her glove and he rides up the escalator in the wrong direction just to hand it back to her. Wouldn't you fall for Brian Aherne if he smiled at you while standing on the wrong escalator and holding out your glove? Elissa agrees, and she floats on the same cloud the rest of the day as she dreams of her true love.
Where's the fly in the ointment? Cyril McLaglen plays a pool playing, beer drinking scoundrel who hits on Elissa on the train. She's not interested, but he's just as convinced she's his true love as she is about Brian. So begins a riveting love triangle with more twists and turns than you'll be prepared for. Anthony Asquith's direction is extremely surprising, and if you didn't know any better, you'd think the movie was made twenty or thirty years later as a tribute to silent pictures. Most silent film directors stick to static shots, brightly lit close ups with only the star in the frame, and simple compositions. Asquith fills up his frame with extras who are all moving and conducting their own business, even during the leads' close ups. He's clearly ahead of his time, and it's a pleasure to watch his films. It's also great fun to watch Brian Aherne before audiences knew he had a lovely speaking voice! As a bonus, you'll hear a beautiful music score written for the remastered version-hats off to Neil Brand.