The Penalty is an American crime film starring Lon Chaney and originally released in 1920 by Goldwyn Pictures. The movie was directed by Wallace Worsley, and written by Philip Lonergan and Charles Kenyon, based upon the pulp novel by Gouverneur Morris. The supporting cast includes Charles Clary, Doris Pawn, Jim Mason, and Claire Adams.
Chaney refused to use trick camera angles in this film. Instead, he wore an apparatus to simulate amputated legs, which consisted primarily of two wooden buckets and multiple leather straps, was complex and incredibly painful. Chaney’s knees sat in the buckets, while his lower legs were tied back. Studio doctors asked that Chaney not wear the device, but he insisted on doing so, so that his costume would be authentic.
To assure audiences that Chaney was not an amputee, the original release of the film reportedly included a short epilogue clip showing Chaney out of character. This clip does not survive in the existing prints but in the movie itself, in the scene where Blizzard (Chaney) imagines his gang of anarchists carrying the loot from the Mint Building, Chaney is seen directing the heist unamputated.
By Wallace Worsley (YouTube) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons
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