While London Sleeps

For the 1922 film often known by this title, see Cocaine (film).
While London Sleeps

Still from While London Sleeps.
Directed by Howard Bretherton
Written by Walter Morosco
Starring Rin Tin Tin
Helene Costello
Walter Merrill
Cinematography Frank Kesson
Production
company
Distributed by Warner Bros. Pictures
Release dates
 November 27, 1926
Running time
 63 minutes
Country US
Language Silent (English intertitles)
Vitaphone

While London Sleeps is a 1926 Warner Bros. film about a police-dog, Rinty, who helps Scotland Yard defeat a dangerous criminal organisation known as the Mediterranean Brotherhood that operates out of the Limehouse district of London. Walter Morosco wrote the screenplay and the film holds the distinction of being the first of many films directed by Howard Bretherton. The film was one of several created for Rin Tin Tin, a German Shepherd dog used in films during the 1920s and 1930s. The film was also released with a Vitaphone sound-on-disc soundtrack with a music score and sound effects.[1][2]

Plot

Inspector Burke of Scotland Yard concentrates all his forces on the capture of London Letter, a notorious criminal leader in the Limehouse district who possesses both Rinty, a splendid dog, and a man-beast monster that ravages and kills at his master's command. Burke almost apprehends the gang in the midst of an attempted theft, but Rinty's uncanny perceptions foil Burke's coup, and Foster is killed for betraying the gang. When Rinty loses in a fight against another dog, Burke's daughter, Dale, rescues Rinty from London Letter's abuse, and he becomes devoted to his new mistress. At the criminal's order, the monster kidnaps Dale and imprisons her. Burke and his men wound London Letter while on his trail, and Rinty finds him dying. In a ferocious battle Rinty kills the monster.

Cast

Preservation status

No prints of this film are known to survive suggesting it is lost.[3] It is on the Lost Film Files list for missing Warner Bros., but the soundtrack survives intact on Vitaphone disks in the UCLA Film and Television Archive.[4]

References

  1. ↑ Soister, John T. (2004). Up from the Vault: Rare Thrillers of the 1920s and 1930s. Jefferson, NC: McFarland Publ. pp. 50–56. ISBN 978-0-7864-1745-2.
  2. ↑ While London Sleeps at Silentera.com
  3. ↑ The Library of Congress/FIAF American Silent Feature Film Survival Catalog:While London Sleeps
  4. ↑ While London Sleeps at Arne Andersen's Lost Film Files: Warner Brothers – 1926
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