Volume II: Filmography

A MESSAGE FROM NIAGARA

February 23, 1912 (Friday)

Length: 1 reel

Character: Drama

Cast: William Russell

Location: Niagara Falls

Note: This film was produced by the "Northern Company" of Thanhouser, headquartered at Niagara Falls, according to an advertisement in the February 10, 1912 issue of The Moving Picture News, which noted that the "Home Company" was in New Rochelle, and that the "Southern Company" was in St. Augustine at the time.

ARTICLE, The Moving Picture World, February 17, 1912:

"While the 'Southern stock' is hard at work in balmy Florida and the New Rochelle company busy with Nicholas Nickleby, the Thanhouser Niagara Falls Company released A Message from Niagara on Friday, February 23, making it the star Thanhouser effort of the week. This is the contingent that was sent to the falls with plots that called for plenty of exterior scenes, to play them with 'the world's greatest cataract' as a backdrop. The message with which the present story deals was placed in a bottle and the bottle was whirled through the American Falls, Prospect Point, and Whirlpool Rapids until finally it reached the hands of him for whom it was intended. And he, through the message, rescued the sender of it, who, as you will guess, was a girl. The story is an all action one, and good photography abounds."

SYNOPSIS, The Bioscope, February 20, 1913:

"A girl learns that a certain man is in the habit of smuggling drugs to her father, a widower, at their home at Niagara Falls. She refuses to let her father have dealings with the man, and the former in his rage falls dead. The girl tracks the smugglers to their hut, but is captured and imprisoned. She writes a note explaining her predicament, encloses it in a bottle, and throws it into the Falls. Her lover finds it, rescues her, and captures the smugglers."

SYNOPSIS, The Moving Picture News, February 10, 1912:

"A widower and his only child, a daughter just budding into womanhood, lived at Niagara Falls. The man had retired from business with enough to live in comfort, but his lonely, purposeless life led him into evil habits and he became a drug fiend. He kept the secret from his daughter, and for a long time she did not suspect him. Then a chance meeting with the man who supplied him with the drug revealed everything to her, and she labored earnestly, but unsuccessfully, to reform her father. About this time she met a young artist from New York, and he immediately fell in love with her. The girl liked him, but because of her sorrow and anxiety did not respond to his passion. When the smuggler again appeared at her home, the girl refused to permit her father to have dealings with him. The old man stormed and raged, and in his weakened condition his emotion was fatal to him. Frantically endeavoring to reach the drug he craved, he staggered, and fell dead.

"Over the body of her father the girl vowed vengeance on the man she blamed for his death, and swore she would bring him to justice, if not for the crime, at least for some other misdeed. Her sweetheart found her still obdurate, she declaring that no love could enter her life until justice had been done. A chance encounter and an overheard conversation put the girl on her enemy's track, and she trailed him to a lonely hut on the river bank above the falls, where the smugglers had their rendezvous. Listening at a window, she soon discovered their secret, and realized that she had the evidence to put her enemy and his pals in jail for long terms. Unfortunately for her, one of the gang, arriving late, surprised and captured her. The smugglers locked her in an upper room of the hut, intending to detain her until all danger to them was past. The window was too small for her to escape, and the room downstairs, the only other exit, was filled with her enemies. There was one chance to get word to the outside world, and the girl took it. She wrote a note telling where she was a captive, and put it into a bottle, corking it. She knew that a bottle might be overlooked, so she tied her light hat to it. Then she hurled this unique message into the swiftly rushing river, knowing that it would be speedily carried away. The message went down the upper river, over the falls and through the rapids, and lodged against a rock in the placid water beyond. There it was found by the artist, who was out rowing, and aid came on without delay. The smugglers, preparing to depart, were overpowered and led away to prison, while the girl at last listened to the pleadings of her lover, who had come to her aid in response to a plea for help sent over Niagara Falls and through the Whirlpool Rapids."

REVIEW, The Morning Telegraph, February 25, 1912:

"One more notable production to the ever increasing list. It combines a travelogue series of views of Niagara with a most exciting romance bordering on the melodramatic, but in a logical way that is indeed original in every sense. An artist meets a pretty girl at the Falls. Her father is an invalid who is given opium by a member of a band of opium smugglers. The girl protests. The father dies from an overdose. The girl is captured by the band when she has discovered their lair. She is locked in an attic but frees herself by writing a note with a burnt match, placing the note in a bottle and hurling the bottle into the river above the Falls. The bottle is picked up by the lover below the Falls, and he soon rescues her with the aid of officers of the law. Just see it. You'll join in the vote."

REVIEW, The Moving Picture World, March 2, 1912:

"The story was chosen to make the great scenic background humanly interesting. The pictures of the falls are taken in summer and are extremely beautiful. The story is fresh, but melodramatic and not very convincing. It is, however, well handled and the acting is intelligent and, taken as a whole, it gets over as good entertainment. The falls make a big background to play a picture against. One scene showed them full-faced and they killed the action in that scene. One of the most successful scenes shows a bit of the falls and the heroine's message going over; this is in a bottle and is attached to her hat. It is not quite a feature."

REVIEW, The New York Dramatic Mirror, February 28, 1912:

"In spite of the rather lurid melodrama of the tale involved, the film is a decidedly gripping one, because it has been so finely presented and acted with rare good taste and discretion, with the wonderful scenery of Niagara as a background. Yet one cannot help wishing that the story had been less a series of striking situations with characters made to fit in to suit the occasion. An opium smuggler incidentally caused the death of the girl's father by supplying him with the drug. The girl became possessed with the desire for revenge, and found the smuggler's den. She was discovered, however, and confined in the back chamber of a cabin that overlooked the falls. She sealed a note in a bottle, threw it into the river, and it was carried over the falls to her artist lover, who came to aid her with officers who captured the smugglers. It is a novel and unique film, even if the story is built on the broad mechanical and implausible lines that are fast fading from our stage and literature."

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