Volume I: Narrative History Volume I: Narrative History
In March the twice-a-week Falstaff comedies began with Maud Muller Modernized, a satire on John Greenleaf Whittier's 19th century poem in which he told of a sweet country maiden who becomes enamored of a respected judge who stops by her farm to water his horse. The attraction is mutual, and as the man of law rides away he wistfully contemplates Maud's beauty and charm. As her memory lingers he realizes that his world of society and wealth is too different from hers to be reconciled. He weds a lady of fashion and power, and Maud takes a poor, unlearned man for a husband. As the years go by, Maud and the judge separately contemplate: "For of all sad words of tongue or pen, the saddest are these: 'It might have been.'" In the Falstaff parody Maud drives a car, runs over the judge, and frightens him away. Split at the end of the reel was a filler, Jungle Life in South America, which pictured venomous reptiles and various small mammals.
The Falstaff schedule continued in March with Oscar the Oyster Opener, followed by Ambitious Awkward Andy, Theodore's Terrible Thirst, Rupert's Rube Relation, Pansy Post Protean Player, Pedro the Punk Poet, Paul's Political Pull, and The Snow Shoveler's Sweetheart, most of which were filmed in Jacksonville.
The Cruise of Fate, released as a Than-O-Play on March 8th, showcased the beauty of Valkyrien. The Flight of the Duchess was issued as a five-reel Mutual Masterpicture, DeLuxe Edition on March 11th. Edwin Thanhouser must have appreciated this review in the most discerning trade publication of the time, Variety:
Virginia Hudson Tyler [sic; should be Virginia Tyler Hudson] took Robert Browning's poem, The Flight of the Duchess, and adapted it for picture purposes, and the Thanhouser Company has turned out a delightful five-part Mutual Masterpicture, which was produced under the direction of Eugene Nowland. The original wording of the poem furnishes the material for the leaders, and the story unfolds naturally on the screen.
The duke and his mother have spent years on the continent and on their return to their English estate the duke, enthused by reading a volume that contains the history of his illustrious ancestors, decides that he is going to move the clock of time back several hundreds of years and resume the medieval form of living. All of the costumes of the times of his forefathers are to be resurrected, and the entire menage is instructed they will have to adapt themselves to the attire of yesteryear and act as did the servants of those days.
Imbued with the idea that he is as hardy and as resourceful as were the dukes of other days, he sends a message forthwith to the earl of a neighboring estate that he would marry the earl's ward. The message received by the earl is transferred to the lady in question, who is a pupil at a convent. She takes the journey to the duke's estate, but on the way meets a gypsy caravan and, as her horse has cast a shoe, the party has the gypsy blacksmith reshoe the animal. In the meantime the little ward's fortune is told by the blacksmith's mother, and she informs the girl her future contains a few surprises. On her arrival at the castle the ward is much amused by the manner of the masquerade, but does not fancy the duke. The next day, after a humiliating scene, she decides to elope with the gypsy blacksmith, and the close of the picture shows the two wending their way, arm in arm, along a winding path following the caravan.
Miss Hulette in the role of the ward is a most charming and fascinating creature. The cast is fully adequate and the photography really beautiful. In picking the exterior scenes some very appropriate locations were selected. The interiors are also very well done, and Mr. Nowland deserves a word of praise for his direction of a picture that could have been easily overdone. Altogether, The Flight of the Duchess is a charming feature that will please. - Fred.
The Whispered Word was released in two reels on the 15th. Then followed A Bird of Prey, a five-reel Mutual Masterpicture, DeLuxe Edition released on the 16th, starring John Lehnberg and Kathryn Adams. The film was favorably reviewed in most quarters. Interestingly, The Morning Telegraph found that "the scenario is well constructed and it is put on so that the interest of the spectator will not lag," while The Moving Picture World felt that "toward the end of the picture there is evident considerable padding."
Wid's Film and Film Folk Note gave a detailed critique of A Bird of Prey:
While a good bit of this story was rather elementary in construction, there were a few good twists to it, and as a whole it will register very nicely all the way. In some parts the action was rather slow and some of the scenes were entirely too long, but we had about a reel of snow stuff which was as pretty as anything I have seen in a long time, and this part of the film really brings it up out of the ordinary feature class. There were one or two particularly beautiful scenes in this snow stuff, two of them showing ice-covered trees outlined against the clouds, and to show how these things are appreciated, it might be mentioned that these two scenes were applauded while no enthusiasm was expressed by the audience over the remainder of the offering.
The first of the story had to do with a miner and his wife and a wicked "willun" [sic; villain] who stole the wife and swindled the husband partner out of his mine. The "willun" then married the wife, after she secured a divorce, and prospered in the city until the authorities got "next" and sent him to jail. Meanwhile the miner sold some timber land in order to give him enough money to bring him back into the story, and he journeyed to the home of his divorced wife and stole her child, after an unsuccessful attempt to shoot the "willun." This unsuccessful attempt was quite a weak incident, because we are shown a party of society folk gathered in a room, standing fairly close to a window, and the miner-husband raised this window fully two feet without anyone noticing a draft of cold air. Since the snow was a foot deep outside, this was, of course, very unconvincing. Even at this distance of only a few feet the miner was such a bad shot that he missed the "willun," firing at him with a rifle.
Another bad inconsistency was the careless manner in which the miner traveled through New York City and on trains back and forth to the Adirondacks, accompanied by two collie dogs. Anybody who knows anything about New York understands that he cannot run loose in the city with unmuzzled collie dogs not on leash, and you surely cannot ride with them on the coaches of railroad trains. These are little points but are quickly picked up and criticized. The situation of having the child lose its memory when stolen by the miner and then having the child's mother apply to her first husband for a position as housekeeper was very far-fetched and it seemed improbable.
When we found the wicked "willun," who had last been seen in jail, standing outside the house calling to the housekeeper, it was quite a shock, because the title explaining that he had broken jail and had traced her to this home did not come until later. This gave us rather an interesting situation, however, which was nicely cleared up by an obliging officer who kindly shot the second husband as he left the house. In a number of places in the film we found some unusually fine camera work, and for the most part the photography was very fine. The snow stuff was particularly pleasing.
In one place where a newspaper insert was shown and then a hole was burned in the center of this newspaper, with a scene shown as the hole widened, it gave me rather a shock, because when I saw that newspaper insert start to burn, I could not help but feel the same "thrilly" sensation that I always get when a film catches on fire and starts to burn with the burning showing on the screen. This was a very unusual effect, however, and decidedly well handled.
Taken as a whole, I would say that this offering is one of the most interesting that we have had in recent weeks from the Mutual organization, and it really has enough good stuff in it to justify it being classified as worthwhile. It has many weak spots, but it also has some splendid moments.
The Fifth Ace, issued on the 22nd, was in the two-reel format. Fear, a Than-O-Play released on March 29th, treated the psychological aspects of fear.
Copyright © 1995 Q. David Bowers. All Rights Reserved.