Where East Is East is a 1929 American synchronized sound drama film starring Lon Chaney as an animal trapper in Laos. While the film has no audible dialog, it was released with a synchronized musical score with sound effects using both the sound-on-disc and sound-on-film process. The motion picture is Chaney's penultimate film without dialogue and the last of his collaborations with director Tod Browning. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer used the Western Electric sound-on-film process to record the soundtrack for the film.
Theatrical release poster
Lobby card
Leonidas Frank "Lon" Chaney was an American actor and makeup artist. He is regarded as one of the most versatile and powerful actors of cinema, renowned for his characterizations of tortured, often grotesque and afflicted, characters and for his groundbreaking artistry with makeup. Chaney was known for his starring roles in such silent horror films as The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1923) and The Phantom of the Opera (1925). His ability to transform himself using makeup techniques that he developed earned him the nickname "The Man of a Thousand Faces".
Chaney during the production of The Miracle Man (1919)
Chaney with his personal makeup kit in 1925
Chaney as Erik, the Phantom of the Opera
Ethel Grey Terry and Chaney in The Penalty (1920)