Review of Broken Blossoms or The Yellow Man and the Girl (1919) by Maarrk H — 22 Sep 2009

A few sticky racist issues aside, the story is tender and engaging, the subject matter is admirable, the text of the intertitles is lovely and poetic, and the tragedy is touching. However, it's all a bit simplistic and the characters are so one-dimensional they might as well be straight out of a Popeye cartoon.

I found the cinematic style rather uninteresting except for a few close-ups. Mostly it's the kind of thing that might have been impressive for its time, but seems a bit ho-hum nowadays.