Christian Science Monitor by David Sterritt
Wong has acquired a loyal cult following over the years, and Dupont's exquisitely filmed episodes show why.
✭ ✭ ✭ ✭ Read critic reviews
United Kingdom · 1929
1h 49m
Director E.A. Dupont
Starring Gilda Gray, Anna May Wong, Jameson Thomas, Cyril Ritchard
Genre Crime, Drama
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When Valentine Wilmot loses one of his dancers, Vic, business at his nightclub, the Piccadilly Circus, drops off dramatically. In an act of desperation, he hires Shosho, a Chinese waitress he had previously fired for distracting other dishwashers, to do a dance. She becomes an instant sensation, but her fame brings dark consequences.
Christian Science Monitor by David Sterritt
Wong has acquired a loyal cult following over the years, and Dupont's exquisitely filmed episodes show why.
Wong is sensationally expressive and projects a modern, coolly appraising sexuality. Visually eloquent and often dazzling, the movie is no less terrific. Piccadilly is both evidence of silent cinema at its rudely aborted peak and Wong's frustrated potential to have been among its greatest stars.
As casually insensitive and careless as you might expect from a film of this era, but it's also surprisingly crafty about finding ways to incite discussion
Chicago Reader by Jonathan Rosenbaum
This remarkable British silent (1929) is special in many ways.
Film students should be thankful that companies such as Milestone Film & Video have taken up the distribution and restoration of important silent films, and that universities and museums have decided to screen these obscure classics.
Chicago Tribune by Michael Wilmington
German emigre Dupont directs all this with the style, flair and tension he brought to his 1925 Emil Jannings classic, "Variety." But it is Wong, shimmering with charisma, who gives Piccadilly its unforgettable center.
Seattle Post-Intelligencer by William Arnold
I found it a surprisingly elegant entertainment: fast-paced, cogently written (by noted English author Arnold Bennett), well-cast (including a bit by a young Charles Laughton) and stylishly photographed on a gallery of stunning deco sets.
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