Mike's Movie Matinee Underworld 1927

Underworld is a 1927 American silent gangster film directed by Josef von Sternberg and starring Clive Brook, Evelyn Brent, and George Bancroft.

Sternberg accepted a contract offer from Paramount Pictures in 1926, with the humbling condition that he was demoted to the role of assistant director. He was quickly assigned to reshoot portions of director Frank Lloyd's Children of Divorce. His work was so outstanding that the studio awarded him with a project of his own. The result was his most famous film to date, Underworld. The film would "establish Sternberg in the Hollywood system."

The gangster role played by George Bancroft was modeled on "Terrible" Tommy O'Connor, an Irish-American mobster who gunned down Chicago Police Chief Padraig O'Neil in 1923 but escaped three days before execution and was never apprehended.

Paramount Pictures, initially cool towards the production, predicted the film would fail. The initial release was limited to only one theater, the New York Paramount. The studio did not provide advance publicity. Writer Ben Hecht requested (unsuccessfully) to have his name removed from the credits due to the film's dismal prospects.