Josef von Sternberg (director) (Lost film) THE DRAG NET [1928] Photo archive

[Los Angeles: Paramount Pictures, 1928]. Set of 5 vintage original 8 x 10″ (20 x 25 cm) black-and-white photos, one trimmed for publication, one (the portrait of Evelyn Brent) with chipping and a long tape repair on verso, one with mimeographed text on verso, and one a linen-backed keybook photo. Overall very good or better.

The Drag Net is a lost gangster film from Josef von Sternberg. These photos provide a tantalising glimpse into what once existed.

Film historian John Baxter provides a synopsis:

Captain Timothy ‘Two Gun’ Nolan (George Bancroft) is appointed head of the New York detective force, and as his first act, rounds up every criminal in town – the ‘drag net’ of the title. Gang boss ‘Dapper’ Frank Trent (William Powell) stands bail for all of them, including ‘The Magpie’ (Evelyn Brent), as independent minor gang-leader [with complex alliances]. Nolan is particularly impressed by the girl, who affects caps of black-and-white feathers, and is attended by her own bodyguard of gunmen. She and the detective have a number of sexually charged encounters before her release. Setting out to get Trent, Nolan moves in on his hideout, assisted by his friend ‘Shakespeare’ (Leslie Fenton). Trent, armed with a machine gun, kills Shakespeare, but makes Nolan believe it is his shot that has done so. Nolan, for motives as obscure as those which motivated the futile round-up of the gangs, resigns his commission and becomes a drunk. Found unconscious by Trent, he is offered as the pièce de résistance at a gangland banquet which ‘The Magpie’ attends. Pitying the humiliated man, she discovers that he did not kill his friend, reveals the fact to him, and is reformed (and wounded) in the downfall of Trent, killed by Nolan in his steel-shuttered apartment.