John Ford Retrospective - Upstream (1927)

UPSTREAM (1927)

Starring:  Nancy Nash, Earle Foxe, Grant Withers, Lydia Yeamans Titus, Emile Chautard, Raymond Hitchcock, Ted McNamara, Sammy Cohen, Jane Winton, Lillian Worth, Judy King

Writer:  Randall Faye (based on the story "The Snake's Wife" by Wallace Smith

Cinematography:  Charles G Clarke

Music:  SILENT (contemporary score by Donald Sosin)

B&W, 1h.  1.33:1 presentation

Released on:  January 30, 1927 by Fox Film Corporation

My experience:  YouTube

I had no idea what to expect with Upstream.  I knew nothing about it, other than the fact that John Ford directed it.  I wasn't familiar with any of the cast except Grant Withers when I checked IMDb, and had originally assumed it had something to do with boats, or rivers, or riverboats or some such thing.  Then I saw the poster which looked like something out of a German Expressionist horror film, and I got really confused.  Imagine my surprise when upon watching Upstream I encountered a comedy about theatrical actors.

Most of the action takes place in a New York City boarding house that caters to actors, dancers and other professional types of that ilk, run by Miss Hattie Breckenridge Peyton (Lydia Yeamans Titus).  Lodging in the house are knife thrower Juan Rodriguez (Grant Withers) and his target/partner, Gertie Ryan (Nancy Nash); Eric Brashingham (Earle Foxe), the dissipated black sheep of a famous theatrical family; Shakespearean performer Campbell Mandare (Emile Chautard); a song and dance team called Callahan and Callahan (Ted McNamara & Sammy Cohen); a sister team (Lillian Worth & Judy King), and finally, a narcissistic actor known to us only as the Star Boarder (Raymond Hitchcock) and his moll, the Soubrette (Jane Winton).  

Brashingham, Rodriguez and Gertie are in somewhat of a love triangle, but when theatrical producer Gus Hoffman (Harry A Bailey) approaches Brashingham with an offer to play Hamlet on the stage in London, to capitalize on his name, Campbell Mandare decides to take the younger actor under his wing and tutor him in Shakespearean performance.  Will Brashingham make a success overseas, and if so, how will it affect his relationship with the others?

I have to admit, I found this film quite humorous in its takedown of theatrical performers and conventions.  Coming from that world myself, I've known many of these personality types so a lot of it rang true for me. Perhaps it was this, or perhaps because I wasn't expecting a comedy, but I found this film to be quite amusing.  Some attempts at humor fell flat, but much of it still landed for me.  

Right off the bat the film plays with the tropes of actors changing their names.  In an era when actors were Anglicizing or even changing their original names to seem less exotic (Emanuel Goldenberg became Edward G Robinson, Lucille LeSeuer became Joan Crawford, Issur Danielovich became Kirk Douglas and Rodolfo Pietro Filiberto Raffaelo Guglielmi di Valentina d'Antonguolla became Rudolph Valentino), here we have Grant Withers' knife-throwing Juan Rodriguez of Castile, who is actually John Rogers from Iowa.  The Brashingham character is an obvious stand-in for John Barrymore, and even does the side-profile thing that Barrymore was famous for.  

There are some very humorous title cards introducing the characters poking fun at the "type" of personalities they represent.  And for a silent film, there are some pretty good verbal jokes in the cards, such as "The fact that you're a terrible actor doesn't make any difference; all I need is your name" and "It sure makes me proud that an American can get by in a foreign language like English."  And there's a running gag where, whenever Miss Peyton tries to get her rent from the boarders, they all unanimously act worried and ask, "Didn't you get the money I sent you from (insert city here)?"  Quite amusing.

There are also some pretty funny visual gags, including one in which Callahan and Callahan practice their routine in their room, which happens to be right overtop of the boarding house's dining room, and another one in which the two pose as a before and after for a cosmetic surgery advertisement.  One of the main sources of "hilarity" is that Callahan and Callahan are obviously one Irish and one Jewish person -- 1920s racial humor at its most obvious.  Ely Reynolds (from The Shamrock Handicap) appears in another Ford comedy, and this time his presence is hardly needed and sticks out like a sore thumb.  All the racial stereotypes of black people at the time are piled into his character and it really brings down the film, from today's perspective.  

If it weren't for his name on the IMDb credits, you would not be able to recognize this as a John Ford film in the way we understand them.  There are no photographic tricks that stand out (perhaps because his usual cinematographer, George Schneiderman, did not work on this film, being replaced on this project by Charles G Clarke).  The communality of the boarders is the closest to a "Fordian touch" that I could see.  In fact there's a backwards dolly shot in a wedding scene that is very unlike Ford, who never liked moving his camera unless he didn't have to.  

I'm sure this was just a programmer that was forced upon him by the studio that he did perfunctorily and with little fanfare.  That being said, while it had its cringey moment, I still found Upstream fairly entertaining.  The contemporary score by Donald Sosin really complements the comedy in the film.  Definitely worth it for Ford completists, but it's an outlier in his filmography for sure.

Six terrible thespians out of ten.

John Ford Retrospective - The Blue Eagle (1926)

THE BLUE EAGLE (1926)

Starring:  George O'Brien, Janet Gaynor, William Russell, Margaret Livingston, Robert Edeson, Philip Ford, David Butler, Lew Short, Ralph Sipperly, Jerry Madden

Writer:  Gordon Rigby (based on the story "The Lord's Referee" by Gerald Beaumont

Cinematography:  George Schneiderman

Music:  SILENT (uncredited piano score)

B&W, 58m.  1.33:1 presentation.

Released on:  September 12, 1926 by Fox Film Corporation

My experience:  YouTube

There's a good movie in here somewhere.  There are probably two good movies in here somewhere.  But when they've been jammed together in a film that runs less than an hour, it's a bit of a schizophrenic experience.

I don't think I'll give this film a proper review, as it is missing at least 10 minutes of footage (what would have probably been the most impressive footage of all -- a battleship duel -- which is tragic, as the rest of the film is shot in a fairly pedestrian way).  Print damage is also quite extensive, although when compared to the surviving print of Cameo Kirby, this is almost a 4K experience!

In The Blue Eagle, which starts off as a tribute to the United States Navy before shifting gears and going somewhere else entirely, George O'Brien and William Russell are George Darcy and Big Tim Ryan, respectively, two sailors in the Navy at the beginning of American involvement in World War I (November 1917).  The two have an antagonistic relationship due to them both being hot on Rose Kelly (Janet Gaynor), who encourages both of them.  The ship's chaplain, Father Joe (Robert Edeson) sets up a boxing match between them, hoping that a healthy sparring match will be helpful rather than hurtful but before that happens, their battleship comes under attack (this and who knows what else comprises the roughly ten minutes of the film that is lost to time).  Unfortunately one of their shipmates perishes in the battle.  

Back in New York City after the war, the two try to reenter society as cops.  George's brother Limpy (Philip Ford) seems to be using, and with their mother (and presumably father as well) having passed on, it's up to George to try and keep him on the straight and narrow.  Meanwhile Big Tim and his gang, including Nick "Dizzy" Galvani and Slats "Dip" Mulligan (David Butler and Ralph Sipperly, respectively), who are also friendly with George, are making life hard for George.  Meanwhile, Rose's father, Sergeant Kelly (Lew Short), launches an investigation into a gang that's peddling drugs, and the trail leads back to Limpy.  An offshore submarine full of drugs, a hidden cave full of explosives and a forced partnership between our two male leads ends up happily ever after, with one of our boys winning the hand of Rose and the other hooking up with Mrs Mary Rohan (Margaret Livingston), the widow of the friend who died, with Baby Tom (Jerry Madden) thrown into the mix for good measure.

If this all sounds confusing, it is.  That being said, while this movie is a mishmash of unbelievable events, it's still somewhat entertaining.   It'll pass the time for an hour if you're a classic film buff, that's for sure.  It occupies a strange place in history, as Fox had literally just released 3 Bad Men - at that time one of his more acclaimed features - in theatres just two weeks earlier, and in just twelve months Gaynor and O'Brien would star in what to me is one of the greatest Hollywood silents, FW Murnau's Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans.  In between those two milestones, however, that trio combined to produce an odd pastiche of military tribute, truncated war film, and pre-noir cop adventure, with a little bit of oiled up, brawling sailors and a half-hearted attempt at love wins all at the end.  Not a great film, especially from an artist like Ford, but it never becomes boring!

*** no star rating given due to this being an incomplete film ***

John Ford Retrospective - 3 Bad Men (1926)

3 BAD MEN (1926)

Starring:  George O'Brien, Olive Borden, Lou Tellegen, Tom Santschi, J Farrell MacDonald, Frank Campeau, Priscilla Bonner, Otis Harlan, Phyllis Haver, George Harris, Alec Francis, Jay Hunt

Writer:  John Stone (based on the novel "Over the Border" by Herman Whitaker

Cinematography:  George Schneiderman

Music:  SILENT (contemporary score by Dana Kaproff)

B&W, 1h 32m.  1.33:1 presentation.

Released on:  August 28, 1926 by Fox Film Corporation.

My experience:  Ford at Fox DVD box set

3 Bad Men is one of three versions of the same story made by John Ford in his career.  First there was Marked Men in 1919 (the film is now lost) with Harry Carey, J Farrell MacDonald and Ted Brooks in the title roles.  Twenty-nine years later, in 1948, he made 3 Godfathers, with John Wayne, Pedro Armendariz and Carey's son, Harry Carey Jr starring.  In between, in 1926, he made 3 Bad Men, a film which was to be his last western for thirteen years, until he basically revolutionized the genre with Stagecoach.

Having seen the 1948 version about 15 years ago, I expected it to follow roughly the same plotline, which involves three outlaws stranded in the desert looking after a baby.  Imagine my surprise, then, when there was nary a desert, and only fleeting glimpses of a baby to be seen!  Rather, our three titular gunslingers are in the hills of the Dakotas helping a woman get ready for the land rush.

The movie opens with Lee Carleton (Olive Borden) and her father traveling across the western prairies when their wagon loses a wheel.  Along comes free spirit horseman/harmonica player Dan O'Malley (George O'Brien), who helps them fix the wheel.  Sparks fly between Dan and Lee, but father and daughter are heading west for the 1876 land rush, and the parties soon disperse.  Later on, our titular bad men -- "Bull" Stanley (Tom Santschi), Mike Costigan (J Farrell MacDonald), and "Spade" Allen (Frank Campeau) -- who are horse thieves, are looking for some easy prey and come across the Carleton wagon.  Before they have a chance to make a move, they witness another party attack the wagon and kill Lee's father.  After dispensing of the intruders, Mike and Spade start making off with the horses, and Bull is about to dispatch the final victim, until it turns out to be Lee, in which he has an abrupt change of heart, and pledges his and his gang's loyalty to the broken hearted young woman until she gets some land.

The new Carleton contingent heads to a new temporary settlement that marks the starting point for the land rush.  The sheriff of the town, Layne Hunter (Lou Tellegen), has gotten tired of his girlfriend Millie (Priscilla Bonner), and treats her unconscionably.  He is also a terribly bad seed, and is in the tradition of a long line of Fordian characters who occupy positions of exalt or responsibility only to turn out unworthy of their places in society.  It's a running theme in Ford's pictures, the hypocrisy attendant in society.  Other characters in the town include newspaper editor Zach Little (Otis Harlan, the voice of Happy in 1937's Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs), local shopkeeper Joe Minsk (George Harris), the Reverend Benson (Alec B Francis), and saloon girl Lily (Phyllis Haver), who has set her eyes on Dan, who has wandered into the settlement and reconnected with Lee.

There are some fantastic things about 3 Bad Men, not the least of which is the cinematography by Schneiderman at the behest of Ford.  The photography just keeps getting better with each film, and the outdoor scenes especially are a wonder to behold.  The filming of the land rush is astonishing to behold, with the camera oftentimes being in the middle of the action, wagons and horses barrelling down on them and keeping us firmly in the action.  There are scenes shot from inside a burning building looking towards the outside that are magisterial, and leave one wondering how on earth they filmed it without anybody getting hurt, let alone how amazing it all looks.  The final shot of the film is filmed in such a way as to extract all the emotion possible out of the viewer, in a way that I'm saddened to say the film doesn't quite deserve.  More on that in a bit.  

3 Bad Men also has one of the funniest comedic set pieces I've come across in a Ford film so far, in which Mike and Spade are trying to find a man for Lee, and come across a bit of a dandy, who seems to get the wrong idea of how they're coming across.  Pretty funny stuff.  The performances are solid across the board, with MacDonald and the uncredited man playing the dandy standing out.  Also standing out is Olive Borden, a silent film star whose career went downhill after talkies came into vogue and sadly died penniless on skid row in 1947 at the age of 41.  In this film, she is radiant, and one is saddened that an actor with such attitude and expression ended up the way they did.  Still, her luminosity was captured on film forever in 3 Bad Men, and she is remembered by silent film fans almost a hundred years later.

All that being said, there are some things that just didn't connect with me in this film.  First and foremost is the casual racism thrown about in the film.  One of the intertitles refers to Italians as Dagoes like it ain't no thang, and another one has a character casually mention about including Chinese people in the gang, "Not a Ch**k, they get shot too easily."  The opening titles also downplay the fact that entire cultures were forced off their lands in order enable the land rush to occur.  It's mentioned, but more in the vein of, "we put them all on reservations, they're fine, fugeddaboutit!"  Didn't leave a great taste in my mouth, from a 21st century point of view.  

I also didn't quite get why Bull had the change of heart he did.  I could understand his not wanting to shoot Lee, as he has morals obviously.  But when he decides to devote himself and his gang to her services it seems a bit too much of an about face, especially for a trio who is wanted by the law in multiple states and countries and could easily be found if not constantly on the move.  And while *** SPOILER ALERT *** it's touching that the three men sacrifice themselves to save Dan and Lee, it just seems so unnecessary.  The ending, set three or four years later, is quite touching, as mentioned before.

While 3 Bad Men has a very good reputation, I'm wondering if Ford didn't like the roteness and naivete of some of the characters, and found himself stagnating in a genre he couldn't find himself able to push forward for the time being.  It did take him thirteen more years to make another western.  For me, while I believe the film has its moments, it also has its issues, and while I definitely recommend it, you may want to keep your expectations lowered.

Seven benevolent baddies out of ten.

John Ford Retrospective - The Shamrock Handicap (1926)

THE SHAMROCK HANDICAP (1926)

Starring:  Janet Gaynor, Leslie Fenton, Willard Louis, J Farrell MacDonald, Claire McDowell, Louis Payne, George Morris, Andy Clark, Ely Reynolds

Writer:  Peter B Kyne (story), John Stone (scenario)

Cinematography:  George Schneiderman

Music:  SILENT (piano solo score by Philip Carli)

B&W, 1h 06m.  1.33:1 presentation.

Released on:  May 2, 1926 by Fox Film Corporation.

My experience:  YouTube

The Shamrock Handicap is a smaller scale movie than John Ford's most recent work at the time, and while very simple in story (as many of his movies at the time were), it was far more entertaining than I had expected it to be.  It is, in fact, more of a comedy than anything Ford had done, at least since Bucking Broadway.  I believe this is the first story to indulge Ford's Hibernophilia.  Much like his previous surviving film, Kentucky Pride, it all comes down to a horse race.  The one here is easier to follow, thanks to insert shots that keep us in the race rather than watch at a distance.  More of which, later.

We begin our story in County Kildare in olde Eire (west of Dublin) where wealthy landowner Sir Miles O'Hara (Louis Payne) presides over his estate and employees, who include his handyman Con O'Shea (J Farrell MacDonald) and his wife Molly (Claire McDowell), and his horse trainer Neil Ross (Leslie Fenton), who has eyes for O'Hara's daughter, Lady Sheila O'Hara (Janet Gaynor).  Ross' feelings are reciprocated by the boss' daughter, but when wealthy American Orville Finch (Willard Louis) comes to town looking to buy some horses, Sir Miles (who is starting to owe money in estate taxes) has no choice but to sell some of them off, including his prize-winning favourite, Dark Roseleen.  He also offers Neil a job with him in America as a jockey.  While sorry to be parting, Neil promises Sheila he'll come back with money to help save the estate and win her hand in marriage, natch.  

Neil's time in America starts off with a bang, as he gets into a fight with a fellow jockey, Chesty Morgan (Andy Clark).  While that bout is successful, he subsequently breaks his leg in his very first race, and Sheila and her father come to America themselves (having sold their property in Ireland to afford the trip).  Con and Sir Miles get jobs digging ditches to earn money, while Neil mopes about feeling sorry for himself.  Finch comes back into the picture with Dark Roseleen, and everybody pools their resources to back the filly in the Shamrock Handicap, a $25,000 steeplechase race at 20 to 1 odds.  But when Dark Roseleen takes a fright and throws his jockey Ginsburg (George Morris) off, breaking the man's leg, it's left to Neil to man up and "win his feet," as the doctor said.

Reading the plot summary on IMDb and Wikipedia, I figured this would be a story about class, and that the title Shamrock Handicap would be about the struggles of the Irish.  While to an extent this is true, the title is effective on multiple levels.  Firstly, the main race is called the Shamrock Handicap.  As well, a handicap in horse racing is basically horses carrying different weights based on their rating.  But it also nods to Neil Ross' situation, in which he becomes not just physically but for a certain amount of time emotionally handicapped as well.  

Ford never needed any persuasion to indulge in his love of sentimentality.  We see this from the beginning, as all the scenes in Ireland are filled with pastoral simplicity and are shot suffused with hazy borders, as if in remembrance of a long-forgotten dream.  It's a nice set up into the world of the film, and a good contrast with the scenes in America, in which the full image becomes clearer and the scenery is much less romanticized.  The sentimentality remains fully present, however, and Ford mixes it very nicely with some fairly hilarious comedy.  Case in point:  a little girl who Sir Miles sponsored to come to America with her father when her mother passed away recognizes him as he's being insulted by a couple of goons at the worksite, and it's a truly heartbreaking moment -- leading to hilarity when her father (now a policeman) comes by and begins assisting Sir Miles and Con in putting those same goons in their place.  The stakes of comedy are then raised when the cop tells them there are a few family members who would love to say hi -- quick cut to Sir Miles, Con and the little girl surrounded by about twenty police officers, followed by a title card in which a half dozen names (O'Conor, O'Reilly, O'Flaherty, etc) come onto the screen in successive order.  It's a great way of incorporating title cards for comedic purposes.

Ford loved his secondary characters, and indeed throughout his filmography he sometimes seems more amused by what the sidekicks and supporting players are doing, rather than the leads.  In The Shamrock Handicap, while we get to see Leslie Fenton as Neil a lot (since he's at least in name the linchpin the story hangs on), he's pretty much a cypher, with only the most basic emotions; smile grandly, or look despondent.  The romantic lead, Janet Gaynor, is almost a nonentity in this one, which surprised me, as I am more familiar with her work in more meaty roles, such as The Wife in FW Murnau's Sunrise: A Tale of Two Humans and Esther Blodgett/Vicki Lester in William Wellmans' 1937 A Star is Born.  

While the leads in this one (and some of Ford's future endeavours) are somewhat nondescript, the supporting characters are given their moment in the spotlight.  Ford once again features one of his favourite (and mine) character actors, J Farrell MacDonald, who in this one keeps up a running gag with his pet gander Brian Boru (the name itself perhaps a reference to the famous Irish king, who saved the land from being invaded by the Vikings).  MacDonald is also given a little bit of room to stretch his dramatic muscles, and bounces back and forth between comedy and pathos with the greatest of ease.  

Another one of the supporting players is Ely Reynolds, who plays Virus Cakes (that name, though!), a member of Finch's entourage who becomes close with Ross.  While he is stuck in the type of stereotypical "darkie" role that was all too prevalent in classic Hollywood films, he is almost able to transcend that role with a performance that is both hilarious and somewhat eerie.  In fact, this is one of the earliest produced films I've seen that leaves the main story all together and follows the travails of a supporting black character.  We literally see things from his point of view for a portion of the film, and the scenes in the hospital and later in Roseleen's training montage (which culminates in Reynolds' character thinking up a brilliant way to train the horse in a true LOL fashion), while somewhat tangential to the plot, are literally about him and his experiences.  That is very rare for a film of this vintage, and while some of the mannerisms can be chalked down to a product of their time and age, and even though it's only for comedic effect and for a few minutes at a time, I still must commend Ford for attempting to put the audience in the shoes of a black man all the way back in 1926.  Historical note, however:  these scenes would have been drastically edited or entirely omitted in the Deep South.

The Shamrock Handicap is shot fairly straighforwardly, and while there are no grand, epic shots that knock you off your feet, each frame is painterly in the positioning of its characters within the scenery.  I have mentioned the hazy effect around the borders in the Ireland-set scenes of the film, but there is a beautiful shot when Ross and Sheila are saying their farewells shortly before he leaves for America that is glorious in its pastoral romanticism.  The two lovers are positioned against a waist-high brick wall, framed on either side by the low-lying limbs of an oak tree, while sheep roam a field in the background.  The aforementioned scene in the hospital with Virus Cakes features firstly some experimental darklight photography, leading into some blurred visuals, followed by an extended shot in slow motion, in which the camera would have been cranked at twice the speed as usual to achieve the effect.  There is another innovative use of title cards when the Jewish jockey Ginsburg falls off his horse and the title card appears in Hebrew.  A judicious use of swearing, perhaps?  I'm not familiar with the language so I can't say (please feel free to comment if you do know the language), but surely it would have gotten a laugh in 1926.

The race itself was filmed with inserts of the riders, which allows us to become more personally involved in the race instead of standing back watching horses run around from afar.  Ford would take this lesson and in his future Westerns use it to great effect.  It's funny that Kentucky Pride and The Shamrock Handicap, released eight months apart, featured horse racing as their theme.  Perhaps Ford was going through a bit of an obsession with equestrian sport, or perhaps his intent was to tell a similar story from two sides of the same coin (the former from the horses' point of view, the latter from the humans').  Either way, I found The Shamrock Handicap quite a bit more entertaining than I had expected, and would recommend it heartily.

Seven frenetic fillies out of ten.

John Ford Retrospective - Kentucky Pride (1925)

KENTUCKY PRIDE (1925)

Starring:  "Us Horses" -- Virginia's Future, Negofol, Morvich, Confederacy, Man O'War, Fair Play, The Finn.  Also starring:  "Those Creatures Called Humans" -- Henry B Walthall, Gertrude Astor, Peaches Jackson, J Farrell MacDonald, Belle Stoddard, Winston Miller, Malcolm Waite, George Reed

Writer:  Dorothy Yost

Cinematography:  George Schneiderman, Edmund Reek

Music:  SILENT

B&W, 1h 10m.  1.33:1 presentation.

Released on:  September 6, 1925 by Fox Film Corporation

My experience:  YouTube

Following The Iron Horse, this is a decidedly minor entry into the John Ford oeuvre.  Still, I found it quite entertaining in its own way, and while perhaps not quite as artful as other films in the Ford constellation, it's not phoned in by any means, and indeed Ford's big idea was to tell this story from the point of view of a horse!  Sounds silly, I know ... but darned if the film didn't win me over by the end.

The story, such as it is, remains fairly simple -- but not as straightforward as you might expect.  We are introduced to Virginia's Future, a young foal born into the racing stable of Mr. Beaumont (Henry B Walthall), a raffish gambler whose second wife (Gertrude Astor) seems to have taken up with their neighbour Greve Carter (Malcolm Waite).  Beaumont's horse trainer, Mike Donovan (J Farrell MacDonald) develops a special connection with Virginia's Future, which comes in handy after she breaks her leg in a race.  Mrs. Beaumont, all but twirling a moustache, orders Donovan to kill the horse, and officially takes off with Carter.  Donovan of course doesn't have the heart to do this, and manages to keep her from the glue factory.  Virginia's Future gives birth to Confederacy, who has been gifted the speed of his mother.  By this time, however, Beaumont (thanks to his gambling problem) has lost his money, his wife, and his reputation.  Obliged to sell his property, including the horses, at auction, he disappears, leaving his daughter Virginia (Peaches Jackson) in the care of Donovan and his wife (Belle Stoddard).  

Cut to a few years later.  Virginia's Future has been mistreated by her new owner, a junk dealer, and becomes a pack horse.  Donovan, in the meantime, has moved to the city and become a police officer.  Beaumont is still down on his luck and making sad attempts to gamble his way back into fortune.  The former owner and trainer reconnect in a meet-cute that could have easily gone the other way, and find out that Confederacy will be racing in the Futurity, a stakes race for trotters, with Donovan's son Danny (Winston Miller) as jockey.  They pool their money and place it all on Confederacy.  At the same time, a chance encounter alerts them to the whereabouts of Virginia's Future.  Will things end happily ever after for all involved?  Have you ever seen a movie?

There aren't very many reviews of this film online, but those that exist make much of the fact that the film, supposedly told from the point of view of Virginia's Future, contains scenes that the horse couldn't possibly be privy to.  To which I say, so what?  One can't expect a children's film from the 1920s to live up to the realistic standards we seem to want to impose on all our movies nowadays.  And that's just what this is: a children's story.  The narration by the horse is a clever gimmick to a) make the film stand out a little bit more from the rest, and b) keep the children watching engaged during some of the more grown-up centred parts of the film.  To their arguments, I say this:  Balderdash!!!

That's not to say that Kentucky's Pride is perfect.  Far from it.  There is some cringeworthy stuff in here, not the least of which is a stereotypical black butler (George Reed) who shuffles and bows and smiles as big as he can, all whilst the title cards outline his dialogue in the most racist way possible.  I realize that this may sound a little hypocritical coming after the previous paragraph, but I've seen hundreds if not thousands of films from the classic Hollywood era, and this is right up there with the cringiest stuff.  This stuff would have been considered over the top even in 1925 -- at least in more, shall we say, cultured circles.

While Ford the artiste takes a back seat to Ford the hired hand in this one, there are still a few things that caught my eye.  There is an interesting effect used for the moment Virginia's Future is born and begins to see, as the image starts out blurry and then becomes less so as the seconds tick by.  It's also noteworthy for its POV shot, as the camera -- in a rarity for a John Ford film -- is not locked in place but is supposed to be representing the horse moving her head around trying to look at things.  There is also some great cutting during the Futurity race; and even though in the print I watched there was no sound, I found myself caught up in the action, and even mesmerized at times.  

J Farrell MacDonald once again steals the show here with some really great acting: less over the top as compared to The Iron Horse, but some really heartfelt scenes.  I'm recalling specifically the scene in which Mrs. Beaumont orders him to kill Virginia's Future.  The emotions that he displays on his face are truly heartbreaking.  

Kentucky Pride is definitely a lesser work by a renowned master of his art, but that doesn't mean it shouldn't go unseen.  While the complete absence of a soundtrack may put many people off, the print is very good, and the film moves quickly enough that if you've trained yourself to watch silent movies, it's less of a task than might first be thought.

Five galloping geldings out of ten.

John Ford Retrospective - The Iron Horse (1924)

THE IRON HORSE (1924)

Starring:  George O'Brien, Madge Bellamy, Charles Edward Bull, Cyril Chadwick, Will Walling, Francis Powers, J Farrell MacDonald, Jim Welch, George Waggner, Fred Kohler, James A Marcus, Gladys Hulette

Writers:  Charles Kenyon & John Russell

Cinematography:  George Schneiderman

Music:  SILENT (contemporary score by Christopher Caliendo)

B&W, 2h 30m (international cut); 2h 13m (US cut), 1.33:1 presentation.

Released on:  August 28, 1924 by Fox Film Corporation

My experience:  Ford at Fox DVD box set

"When the legend becomes fact, print the legend."

So goes one of the more famous quotes from classic cinema, uttered by Carleton Young in Ford's own elegiac 1962 film The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance.  And that is precisely what Ford does in 1924's The Iron Horse.  He takes a historical setting and brings it to life; and while he plays with facts (as did almost all movies of that age), it is done in service of a mythologizing of the then-recent past, the Old West that had just begun fading into history.  

The film is an attempt to portray the moment in time when America became united, both as a people and geographically.  The former by Abraham Lincoln, whose goal was to bring the North and South together, the latter by the Union Pacific and Central Pacific railroads, who created a cross-continental train system.  Nowadays, we are aware of how this displaced hundreds of thousands of Native Americans and in the process destroyed countless valuable cultures.  At the time, however, it was a great engineering feat, and was considered part of America's "Manifest Destiny."  I am going through these films chronologically and trying to view them through the lens of their era, but it's hard not to notice certain jarring idioms of the past that no longer play.

At the beginning of the film we are plunked down in Springfield, Illinois, where surveyor David Brandon (James Gordon) dreams of forging a path through to the Pacific Ocean, scoffed at by his friend the businessman Thomas Marsh (Will Walling).  Brandon's son Davy (Winston Miller) and Marsh's daughter Miriam (Peggy Cartwright) are going through a little bit of puppy love, aided by local shopkeeper/future president Abraham Lincoln (Charles Edward Bull).  The two Brandons head west, but the elder Davy perishes at the hand of an Indian ambush led by two-fingered white man Deroux (or Bauman, depending on the print), played by Fred Kohler.  

Skipping a decade and a half or so, we find Lincoln in office as president, and Thomas Marsh now a fervent believer in uniting the country by rail (or at the very least, a fervent believer in profiting from it).  Miriam (now played by Madge Bellamy) is now engaged to one of Marsh's engineers, Jesson (Cyril Chadwick).  Out west, the railroad is being built by numerous Chinese workers and three Oirish Americans, who are what the film decides to focus on.  These men are formerly of the United States Army:  Sgt. Slattery (Francis Powers), Cpl. Casey (J Farrell MacDonald), and Pvt. Schultz (MacKay in the international version), played by Jim Welch.  There is also a traveling saloon keeper/judge named Haller (James A Marcus), a barmaid named Ruby (Gladys Hulette), who may or may not be a member of the world's oldest profession, and historical personalities such as Buffalo Bill Cody (George Waggner) and Wild Bill Hickok (Jack Padjan).  Chief John Big Tree, whose profile was used for the American Indian Head nickel, also appears uncredited as a Cheyenne chief (even though he was really Seneca ... but we'll get into Hollywood and racial casting at a later date).  He would later appear in Stagecoach, Drums Along the Mohawk and She Wore A Yellow Ribbon for Ford.

And then Davy, now grown (and played by George O'Brien) comes into the picture.  Deroux/Bauman is a land speculator who wants the railway to go through his property, and Davy knows of a pass through the mountains which can shave 200 miles off, which his father told him about shortly before his untimely demise.  Deroux/Bauman asks Jesson to make Davy disappear, but Davy survives the attempt.  What will happen next?  Will America be united?  Will Davy and Miriam be united?  Find out in ... The Iron Horse!!!

John Ford was now 30 years old and had dozens of short films and features under his belt by this time, but this was truly a step up for him.  He had done Westerns in the great outdoors, but this film is truly where his career really took off.  It is the type of film that you think of when you think of epic:  historical, fantastic landscapes, but keeps you engaged with the personal stories going on. 

There are two different versions of the film, the US theatrical cut, and the International version, which went out to Britain and the rest of the world.  The American cut is a quarter of an hour longer, although I couldn't think of any scenes that were out and out deleted.  Rather, Ford was emphatic about editing his films in camera, meaning he wouldn't let the studios fudge up his vision.  Therefore much of the international cut is made out of alternate takes and lesser footage.  So we have fewer of the insert shots that makes Ford films truly Fordian, and the establishing and linking shots are a lot shorter as well.  

Another thing I noticed is the naming of some characters, and what they signify.  The villain, played by Fred Kohler, is named Deroux in the US cut, and in the international cut he's called Bauman.  This plays in to the inherent racism (and their subtle differences) in the United States and elsewhere.  The American cut names its villain Deroux in the time-honoured tradition of derogating what was then called the half-breed.  A major stereotype of that time was the half-indigenous, half-caucasian, who often had a French last name, because of course he did (actually, it was probably because the French had done much of the discovery of the interior of the continent).  The international cut, however, gives the semitic name Bauman to its villain, perhaps in an attempt to tap into the subconscious (or in many cases at that time, the quite conscious) prejudices towards Jewish people.

The most noticeable change is that the American version worships at the altar of Abraham Lincoln.  The film is dedicated to him (in the international version it's dedicated to George Stephenson, known as the "father of the railways" in Britain), and there are numerous intertitles espousing his genius and brilliance.  

The story as a whole, however, remains unchanged.  After prostrating itself in the opening titles before the American God that was Abraham Lincoln, we are introduced to him somewhat innocuously, as an average man in Springfield, enjoying the interplay between two young people.  No mention, aside from his name, is made of what he would be in the future, and indeed even when we meet him later, we see less of him as a majestic presidential personality but rather as a normal man.  In fact, the international version has Lincoln walking through the White House in a ramrod straight manner, with people standing by respectfully as if he were a monarch; the American version has him shuffling, wiping his forehead, and people talking to him as he goes by, much in keeping with him as a man of the people.  In fact, when Miriam introduces him to her fiance Jesson, the side-eye and shade Lincoln throws him is epic.  It's like we just walked into an episode of Abraham Lincoln's Train Race!

The Iron Horse is chock full of John Ford's signature visual flourishes.  There is a beautiful use of closeups when Davy and Miriam part as children.  When the railroad builders are ambushed by the natives, the carnage is silhouetted on the side of a railcar.  And this is the film in which Ford perfected his storytelling.  We see a funeral by the side of the tracks, with a widow crying, but the camera is a fair distance away, and shows behind the woman the people of the temporary town picking up and moving on.  Life goes on, he seems to say, even while he indulges in sentimentality.  Again, Ford's duality is at play here.

The contemporary score on the Fox DVD is by Christopher Caliendo, who takes a page out of the master's books and peppers his score liberally with folk tunes of the ilk Ford would use in his later sound films, such as "Oh Susannah" and "Blow The Man Down."  The orchestrations are subtle in intimate scenes and rousing in the epic battle scenes.  It's a great modern-day score of a classic silent film.

As for the performances, two of them stood out for me.  This was a star-making turn for George O'Brien, and while he would continue to develop as an actor, both as a lead (FW Murnau's brilliant Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans) and a character actor (including many of Ford's later films), the energy he brings to this role is infectious.  And I cannot conclude this review without mentioning J Farrell MacDonald, who plays Corporal Casey.  It's a wonderful performance, ranging the gamut from rubber-faced comedy to tearful sentimentality.  Every time he was on screen I couldn't take my eyes off him.  The scene in the barbershop -- which could easily have been cut out of the film without changing anything -- is right up there with Chaplin and Keaton.  Apparently he did 25 films with John Ford, so I'm looking forward to seeing him in future Ford endeavours.  

There are so many wonderful moments in this movie that I'd still be writing tomorrow if I discussed them all.  Suffice it to say, this is the film that made John Ford a household name, and for good reason.  While parts of it have definitely dated over the past 98 years, it is as gripping and entertaining as it must have been a whole century ago.  For any film lover worth their salt, this is a must-see, not just for entertainment's value but to see a true master hit his stride.

Nine and a half exhilarating engines out of ten.

John Ford Retrospective - Cameo Kirby (1923)

CAMEO KIRBY (1923)

Starring:  John Gilbert, Gertrude Olmstead, Jean Arthur, Alan Hale, Peter Burke, Phillips Smalley, Eugenie Forde, Eric Mayne, Richard Tucker, W.E. Lawrence, Jack McDonald

Writer:  Robert N. Lee (based on the play by Booth Tarkington & Harry Leon Wilson)

Cinematography:  George Schneiderman

B&W, 1h 10m.  1.33:1 presentation.

Released on:  October 21, 1923 by Fox Film Corporation.

My experience:  YouTube

I don't think I can honestly give a proper review for this film, as the only transfer I could find of this film was of horrendous quality.  It looks like a VHS rip of a copy of the film that would have been shown on Portuguese (Brazilian?) television in the 1980s or 1990s.  On top of that, there is no soundtrack to be heard, so believe me when I say it was a chore to sit through.  

The story as far as I could tell has John Gilbert as the title character, who is unfairly accused of killing Colonel Randall (Eric Mayne), and with the help of his assistant/friend Moreau (Alan Hale), must convince the family of the deceased of his innocence before wooing his love (and the victim's daughter), Adele Randall (Gertrude Olmstead).  Jean Arthur, who would become a star in the 1930s, plays a judge's daughter in a small (perhaps overbilled) role.

Like I said, the film was really hard to watch.  I caught moments that would have been quite impressive to see on the big screen in 1923 (namely a race between four steamships, which looks like it was shot for real, and not using miniatures, and some nice camera trickery involving a wishing well).  But I can't honestly say that this was worth the 70 minutes it took to watch.  I won't give it a review, as I think the degraded elements of the print and lack of any kind of soundtrack affected my concentration and hence judgment of the film.  For completists only.