Underworld (1927) marked the beginning of a new genre which was to truly thrive in the thirties, the gangster film.

The drama of two gangsters - “Bull” Weed (George Bancroft) and Rolls Royce (Clive Brook) - and the woman they both love, Feathers McCoy (Evelyn Brent) is the film's central concern; “that they are gangsters or how they become so is of no consequence... more important is (Bull's) discovery that the love between his girl friend and his rival is stronger than any of his own needs.... The room becomes unrealistically filled with smoke; the furniture is all over-turned; the lighting creates an extraordinary live effect; the atmosphere is heavily charged with feeling. ‘Bull's' words in the final titles express a belief found throughout Sternberg's personal films: ‘There was something I had to find out - and that hour was worth more to me than my whole life.'”