Gretchen the Greenhorn (1916)

Originally posted to Facebook on 8/17/2016

Gretchen the Greenhorn was the fourth film we watched from 1916. It clocked in at under an hour, which was a welcome change of pace after the twelve-part serial Judex and the three-plus hours of Intolerance. It starred Dorothy Gish -- whom we’d previously seen in Judith of Bethulia, along with Lillian Gish, though both of them had tiny parts -- and several other actors whom we’d seen just previously in Intolerance, including Elmo Lincoln, who would later become the first screen Tarzan. The main villain, when he finally shows up, is played by Euguene Pallette, who is not a household name, but who appeared in small parts in hundreds of films, including many classics, up through the forties.

It was directed by Sydney and Chester Franklin, each of whom went on directing well into the sound era, Sydney more prominently than Chester. This film was much more pedestrian than some of the films we’ve been seeing lately -- it uses none of the visual pyrotechnics of Intolerance, for example -- but it is well-made, and probably more typical of the sort of film that was being shown at the time. It is the story of a Dutch immigrant, Gish, joining her father in America, where he works as an engraver. (Ben asked what a greenhorn was -- I told him it was an old-fashioned word for newbie.) It has some superficial similarities to The Italian, from 1915, which we watched several weeks ago. But that movie was much more melodramatic and serious. This film is not a comedy per se, but it is the kind of movie where you can be relatively sure that everything winds up well in the end. It also subscribes heavily to the melting pot idea of America -- the neighbors in their New York tenement are Irish and Italian, with various other ethnicities appearing as well. (Needless to say when people from various ethnicities begin appearing in century old films, there is always the potential for disaster, but luckily nothing rose to the “pause the film and contextualize for the children” category.) In addition to this backdrop, there is a counterfeiting plot, some gunplay, and a romance as well.

Our next film will be The Matrimaniac, our fifth and final movie from 1916. It will be the first film in which we’ll see Douglas Fairbanks as the male lead. The link to our upcoming films, as always, is here: https://bit.ly/2lZtfmT

Judith of Bethulia (1914)

Originally posted to Facebook on 4/13/2016

This week we watched our first film from 1914: Judith of Bethulia. It was D.W. Griffith’s first feature length film, and starred Blanche Sweet in the title role. Lillian and Dorothy Gish were also in the film, but in very small roles. Unfortunately the copy we saw played a little faster than it should have, which was a bit distracting, and in addition was not the greatest print in the world. The movie itself was a biblical epic, somewhat in the vein of The Last Days of Pompeii, but on a slightly smaller scale. The story involved the town of Bethulia besieged by the Assyrians, and Judith (of Bethulia) deciding to go to the enemy camp and somehow trick or convince Prince Holofernes (the military leader of the Assyrians, played by Henry B. Walthall) to relent. The movie lasts about an hour, but still feels padded. Judith, for instance, somehow acquires feeling for Holofernes (although nothing on screen makes that particularly plausible) and spends some screen time agonizing on whether to “betray” him. Also, two secondary characters -- Naomi and Nathan, played by Mae Marsh and Robert Harron -- are introduced, and then basically disappear for most of the film. There is also lots of ostensibly (but not very) decadent dancing before Holofernes, which after about the third appearance got a little tedious. Of course, it is quite possible that the film we saw is a somewhat butchered version of the original, but judging on what we viewed, it is not anywhere near as good as the shorts we saw from Griffith a few months ago, nor as good as some of the other features we’ve been seeing recently. The kids were a little surprised by the climactic scene (which I won’t spoil, in case someone is right in the middle of the Septuagint), so at least that moment still has something to recommend it. The kids also didn’t ask any questions when the prince assigned his “chief eunuch” to Judith, and I didn’t volunteer an explanation.

Next week we’ll watch The Perils of Pauline, which was a serial from 1914. It’s not quite as long as Fantomas though, and we hope to cover it in a single weekend. The list of our upcoming films is here: https://bit.ly/2lZtfmT