The movie was the second film made in Hollywood by Danish director Benjamin Christensen and stars Chaney as a Siberian peasant who aids a countess (played by Barbara Bedford) who is threatened by the encroaching insurgency.

Countess Tatiana Alexandrovna, who is carrying dispatches for the White side, hails him, gives him food, and persuades him to escort her to the nearby town, Novokursk, and protect her from anti-aristocrat fighters by saying she is his wife.

A troop of White soldiers, led by handsome Captain Dmitri, shows up and rescues the two; Tatiana, moved by Sergei's loyalty to her, has him conveyed to the hospital in Novokursk and oversees his recovery.

She looks long at Sergei and the scars on his chest from the brutal whipping he took for her sake in the hut, and tells Dmitri he was loyal to her and stayed to protect her.

Mockery received mixed reviews when it was first released[6] and is still regarded as one of Chaney's weaker films of his MGM period (1924-1930).

A good melodrama held up to a keen edge of intensity by Lon Chaney's highly effective character playing."

--- Photoplay "Lon Chaney is put through a routine of pug-ugly mugging, but even this flops, as somehow he hardly achieves the ferocious power of facial characterization he has often managed to convey in other productions...It lowers the star's batting average considerably."

---Variety "Given a new character and a story with infinite possibilities, Lon Chaney achieves but a moderate success because the author-director has fallen short in both capacities.

---Moving Picture World Film historian Jon C. Mirsalis opined "MOCKERY was one of Chaney's weakest MGM entries, a dreary melodrama in which he does little more than lumber about the set.

Mr. Chaney again does wonderful work...he is presented as a peasant, filthy in body and dull in mind; and no one can feel sympathy for such a person.... Not for the family circle, and particularly not good for the children."