thehorsesheadblog

#695) The Flying Ace (1926)

#695) The Flying Ace (1926)

OR “Caper Planes”

Directed & Written by Richard Norman

Class of 2021

The Plot: Captain Billy Stokes (Laurence Criner) is a former fighter pilot (nickname “The Flying Ace”) returning home to Mayport, Florida to resume his job as a detective for the Florida East Coast Railway. Billy is immediately assigned to investigate the disappearance of Blair Kimball (Boise De Legge), the railroad’s paymaster who was kidnapped upon his arrival in Mayport, along with his briefcase containing $25,000 in payroll. The prime suspect is station master Thomas Sawtelle (George Colvin), though his daughter Ruth (Kathryn Boyd) insists on his innocence. Billy is also suspicious of Finley Tucker (Harold Platts), a local pilot whose marriage proposals to Ruth have been repeatedly turned down. But this mystery is more or less an excuse to shoehorn in some ’20s aviation, and to showcase the talent of – as the opening credits put it – an “Entire Cast Composed of Colored Artists”.

Why It Matters: The NFR calls the film itself “a fairly straightforward romance-in-the-skies drama” but praises its “compelling cast and good production values.” They also consider the film “an excellent example” of the kind of race films Richard Norman was making.

But Does It Really?: As a movie, “Flying Ace” is fine; not incredible, but an interesting viewing experience. More interesting to me, however, was the history of Norman Studios, the company behind this film. While founded and operated by a White man, Norman Studios was known for race films, cast entirely with Black talent, made for a Black audience, and devoid of the harmful stereotypes still prevalent in other films of the day. “Flying Ace” is all that survives from Norman Studios’ output and makes the NFR for its representation of an all but forgotten era of filmmaking.

Everybody Gets One: Richard Norman started his film career in the 1910s making “home talent” films: travelling from town to town, filming local talent, splicing that footage into a pre-existing film, and screening the results at their local theater (not unlike “The Kidnappers Foil“). By the early 1920s, Norman recognized the untapped potential in the country’s Black moviegoing audience and pivoted to race films. He moved to Jacksonville, Florida and purchased Eagle Film Studios, renaming it Norman Studios. Norman made five films throughout the 1920s, all of them utilizing the talents of local Black actors. The only one of these race films to survive in its entirety is “The Flying Ace”.

Wow, That’s Dated: The lost profession of railroad detectives. Back when railroads were the most modern form of transportation, stations had difficulty staffing enough of their own police and security to prevent crime, so detective agencies would often loan out their members. Even by the time “Flying Ace” was made, railroad detectives were on their way out, mainly due to railroad companies beefing up their own police units, but also in part because of the decline in commercial railroad travel. Oh the irony of this movie having a railroad detective who is also a pilot and making his own job obsolete.

Other notes

“The Flying Ace” was filmed in Florida primarily at and around Norman Studios in Arlington, a region of Jacksonville, as well as the nearby community of Mayport. This movie contains one tell-tale sign that all movies shot in Florida share: you can see actors genuinely sweating on-screen. Not fake movie sweat applied right before a take, but honest-to-goodness perspiration from the Florida sun. This aggressive act of human biology also crops up in a lot of films from the late ’80s/early ’90s when the likes of Disney and Universal tried to turn their movie studio theme parks into working movie studios. Turns out you can truly never beat the heat.
This film was partly inspired by Bessie Coleman, the famous aviator who five years earlier had become the first African American woman to hold a pilot license. Coleman had corresponded with Richard Norman about making a movie together, but sadly Coleman died in a plane crash just a few weeks before “Flying Ace” started filming. Whether or not Colman was supposed to be in the film is lost to time, but she definitely had an influence on the character of Ruth and her fascination with airplanes.
Most of the cast were talent from local theaters. Lawrence Criner and Kathryn Boyd were members of the Lafayette Players, Sam Jordan (seen here as the dentist Dr. Maynard) was part of a vaudeville team, and Lions Daniels (Constable Splivins) was – according to the film’s press release – “better known on stage as ‘Skunkum Bowser’.” I have no idea what that means, but I assume it’s offensive.
Adjusted for inflation, the $25,000 stolen payroll would be about $440,000 today.
“Contrary to women’s customs, Ruth was on time.” Boooooooo.
Thanks to Finley’s detailed instructions to Ruth, I feel very qualified to pilot a biplane should that situation ever arise.
With so much of the movie centering around planes, I was hoping for some fun flight scenes. Disappointingly, all the flying scenes are clearly shot on the ground with a dummy plane and presumably a fan to simulate the wind. There is a single shot of a plane in flight, filmed on the ground, and probably tacked on from an entirely different movie. “Wings” this ain’t.
Billy just got home from the war? It’s 1926, the Armistice was eight years ago. Where the hell has he been?
Billy’s assistant Peg is played by Steve Reynolds, a Norman Studios regular who in real-life had lost his right leg in a work accident. Reynolds is credited here as Steve “Peg” Reynolds, which is just adding insult to injury in my book. Though I guess it’s still better than going through life as “Skunkum Bowser”.
Something I noticed about Billy: he always points with both his index and middle fingers. Did he work in customer service?
Up until this viewing I was unfamiliar with cane guns, such as the one that Peg has hidden in his crutch. I was also unaware of the extra-long barrel cane guns have, which made for an unintentionally hilarious reveal as Peg pulls out an absurdly long handgun. We won’t see a gun this long again until the Joker in the 1989 “Batman”.
The scene where Billy sums up the solution to the crime highlighted something interesting for me: detective movies can’t really work in a silent film. As expected, Billy has a long monologue where he points out all the clues and determines who did it, which means a lot of expository intertitles breaking up what is already a visually uninteresting scene.
[Spoilers] One of the kidnappers is Constable Splivins! A corrupt cop as the bad guy in your movie? Better get that in before the Production Code shows up.
Once Billy solves the case, the bad guys make their getaway under the cover of broad daylight, despite the previous scene establishing it as nighttime. This is where color tinting your film comes in handy.
I just watched a one-legged man open fire on a car with his comically long handgun while pursuing the criminals on his bicycle. That’s gonna be the most impressive thing I see for a long while.
The movie’s climax is a chase scene between Billy and Finley in their respective planes, which has got to be a cinematic first (take that, “Sky High“). While this flight scene is still very much an earthbound production, Norman and his crew get creative with their shots, such as rotating the camera to make it look like Finley’s plane is flying upside down.
Wait, Billy and Ruth end up together? There was zero hint at a romance before this ending; you can’t just sneak one in at the last minute. No fair!
So when does Snoopy show up in this to take down the Red Baron?

Legacy

By the late 1920s film had all but converted to sound. Although Richard Norman had invested in a “sound-on-disc” system, the rival “sound-on-film” format quickly became the norm. This misstep, mixed with the film industry’s relocation to Hollywood, as well as Florida politicians launching an anti-film campaign, led to the decline of Norman Studios. While his feature film output ended with 1928’s “Black Gold”, Richard Norman continued making industrial shorts up until his death in 1960.
After Richard Norman’s death, his wife Gloria used the studio as a dance school before finally selling it in 1976. Over 20 years later, Jacksonville resident Ann Burt discovered that the buildings that once housed Norman Studios were still standing, albeit in terrible condition. Burt spearheaded a decades-long restoration and preservation effort, with Norman Studios being added to the National Register of Historic Places in 2014. Today, Norman Studios is a non-profit organization celebrating the building’s history and is the only surviving silent film studio in America.

In the last decade, restored prints of “The Flying Ace” have made the film festival rounds, including the San Francisco Silent Film Festival, which I do not highlight on this blog as much as I should. “Flying Ace” can also be found online thanks to a print from the Library of Congress.

#694) Cat People (1942)

#694) Cat People (1942)

OR “Black Panther: Philophobia Forever”

Directed by Jacques Tourneur

Written by DeWitt Bodeen

Class of 1993

The Plot: While admiring a panther at the Central Park Zoo, Irena Dubrovna (Simone Simon) has a chance encounter with Oliver Reed (Kent Smith), and the two begin a courtship. Irena tells Oliver of her belief that she is descended from a group of Serbian cat-worshipping witches who were all but eradicated by King John in the 1500s. She also believes that if she ever becomes sexually aroused, she will turn into a black panther herself. Oliver encourages Irena to see psychologist Dr. Louis Judd (Tom Conway), who dismisses these beliefs as childhood trauma. Oliver and Irena marry, but the marriage is never consummated, which leads to Oliver spending more time with his young assistant Alice (Jane Randolph). At the same time, Alice starts getting stalked by a black panther that has appeared seemingly out of nowhere. But I’m sure that’s totally unrelated to Irena’s ancestral claims in this classic from RKO’s horror movie unit.

Why It Matters: The NFR calls the film “a spine-tingling horror movie”, though admits that “[t]he film’s tension outweighs its thin story”. An essay by film critic Chuck Bowen looks at the film’s subtext and symbolism.

But Does It Really?: I really wanted to like “Cat People”, but it just didn’t work for me. I will admit, however, that this is partially my own fault: I went into “Cat People” thinking it was going to be a cheaper, schlockier B picture. Turns out these filmmakers were going for clever and subtle, which is great if you know that going in, but I found “Cat People” to be too subtle to the point of being uninteresting. Still, it has its supporters, and is one of the more influential and iconic movies in the horror genre. “Cat People” might have made the NFR a little too early (it got in before “Dracula“!), but I won’t argue with its inclusion as a significant American film.

Everybody Gets One: Born Volodymyr Leventon in Yalta (now Ukraine), Val Lewton emigrated to America when he was a child, and started his writing career as an author and journalist before getting hired at MGM’s publicity department. A script treatment written for David Selznick never materialized but did get Lewton hired as Selznick’s editorial assistant (during his tenure, Lewton declared the novel “Gone with the Wind” unfilmable). In 1942, Lewton left Selznick to head RKO’s new B movie horror unit, with the stipulation that the final films be cheap, short, and based on a title selected by his supervisors. Lewton used his Selznick connections to hire his team, including Jacques Tourneur and DeWitt Bodeen, to work on the first of RKO’s proposed titles: “Cat People”.

Wow, That’s Dated: A lot of fun ’40s movie staples like Oliver wearing a full suit while lounging around his own apartment! Significantly less fun: Oliver surprises Irena with a kitten placed in a very small box with air-holes. That may be the scariest thing in this movie.

Seriously, Oscars?: No Oscar nominations for “Cat People”. RKO fared better at the 1942 Oscars with “The Magnificent Ambersons“, and two films they distributed but did not produce: “Bambi” and “The Pride of the Yankees”.

Other notes

Accounts vary on how exactly “Cat People” came to be, but we know that Val Lewton and his team were given the title and a budget of $135,000 (cheap by RKO standards, but slightly better than the Poverty Row studios). The film almost became an adaptation of the short story “Ancient Sorceries” before that was nixed in favor of an original screenplay with a modern setting. Lewton, Tourneur, Bodeen, and editor Mark Robson all collaborated on the storyline, though only Bodeen gets a writing credit.
The film opens with a quote from the book “The Anatomy of Atavism” by Dr. Louis Judd. If that name sounds familiar, that’s because you just read it in the plot description. It’s a fake quote from a fake book by a character in this movie. Come on!
Simone Simon was born and raised in France and was of French and Italian heritage; and here she’s playing a woman from Serbia, which is nowhere near France geographically or culturally, but clearly no one at RKO noticed or cared.

I’ve already forgotten about Kent Smith’s performance in this movie, which isn’t necessarily his fault. Honestly the most memorable thing about his character is that his name is Oliver Reed, like the British actor from the ’70s. I’m sure Kent was better with alcohol consumption and respect towards women than the other Oliver Reed, though admittedly that’s a low bar.
Tom Conway has a Basil Rathbone vibe to him, which served him well playing a wide variety of British gentlemen throughout his career. Fun Fact: Tom’s younger brother was fellow actor George Sanders (Tom’s birth name was Tom Sanders).
I don’t know why, but I love any scene in a movie set in a psychologist’s office where the main character is lying down on a couch while their doctor is putting them under some kind of hypnosis. We’re a long way from cognitive behavioral therapy.
I’m enjoying Jane Randolph as your standard issue wise-cracking Girl Friday. Randolph only made about 20 movies, but she’s got two on the NFR: this and “Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein“.
Oh my god, why is this so slowly paced?. By the time something happens in this movie, it’ll be over.
No offense to Simone Simon, but as far as cat women go, she’s no Julie Newmar/Eartha Kitt. Heck she’s not even Halle Berry.
Despite my issues with this movie, it does have one very good scene going for it. When walking down the street in the dark, Alice becomes increasingly aware that someone or something is following her. There’s a delightful build of suspense as she quickens her pace, culminating in the sudden sound of a nearby city bus applying its air brake, which sounds suspiciously like a cat hissing. This abrupt end to the sequence was later dubbed “The Lewton Bus” and was one of the first modern jump scares in a horror movie.

So Irena turns into a cat when she wants to torment Alice? I’m beginning to think these filmmakers may have had issues with women. And while we’re on the subject, I thought Irena only turns into a cat when she’s aroused. Does the thought of her husband’s possible adultery get her hot and bothered? No kink-shaming, I just want to make sure I understand cat people rules.
The second “Irena stalks Alice” scene takes place at a community pool, which is suspenseful, but compared to the previous bus scene it treads a lot of the same water (Please forgive the pun…Wait, come back!). Also, why is Irena trying to freak out Alice in a pool? I thought cats hated water.

Today I learned that there is such a thing as too much restraint. I get that not showing Irena as a panther is intentional, not only to build suspense but also to keep production costs down, but if you hold out for too long it deflates the tension (not unlike my feelings about “The Shining“). This kind of restraint would be later perfected in “The Birds” and “Jaws“, but here it just feels like a missed opportunity.
[Spoilers] Based on the film’s Criterion DVD cover, I was ready to see Simone Simon in some cat-human hybrid makeup for her big reveal. Nothing incredible, but something fun. Turns out Irena’s cat form is just an actual black panther shown fleetingly during the climax. Kind of a letdown after an hour plus of waiting to see her in cat form.

Legacy

“Cat People” was released in December 1942, and while critical reception was mixed, the film was a box office hit. The film’s final gross total is disputed, but it made at least 10 times its production cost. Val Lewton produced 10 more films for RKO, including such pre-approved titles as “I Walked with a Zombie” and “The Leopard Man”.

Another film from the RKO Lewton unit was 1944’s “The Curse of the Cat People”. While advertised as a sequel to “Cat People” and starring all three original leads, “Curse” has a very tenuous connection to the first film (there’s not even a cat!). On a positive note: “Curse” marked the directorial debut for one of its co-directors: Robert Wise.

Speaking of before-they-were-famous directors: the editor of “Cat People” was Mark Robson, who Lewton promoted to director on another of his unit’s films: 1943’s “The Seventh Victim”. Robson’s subsequent filmography includes “Champion”, “Peyton Place”, “Von Ryan’s Express”, and “Valley of the Dolls”.

Lewton’s time at RKO abruptly came to an end in 1946 following the death of RKO vice president and Lewton supporter Charles Koerner, with Koerner’s less supportive successors shutting down Lewton’s unit. Although Lewton eventually landed at Columbia, his ill health (exasperated by two heart attacks) led to his premature death in 1951 at age 46.
While Val Lewton has gone on to be reappraised and celebrated by film critics and scholars, his reputation among his peers wasn’t the best. Case in point: Lewton is one of several Hollywood figures (including his old boss David Selznick) who served as the basis for Jonathan Shields, Kirk Douglas’ despicable movie producer character in “The Bad and the Beautiful“. Look no further than one of Jonathan’s first movies within the film: “Doom of the Cat Men”.

Like many a classic, “Cat People” has gotten the remake treatment. Directed by Paul Schrader, the 1982 version ramps up the violence and sexuality, but follows some of the scarier scenes more faithfully to its 1942 counterpart. While not as well-regarded as the original “Cat People”, any movie where David Bowie sings the theme song can’t be terrible.

#693) Tol’able David (1921)

#693) Tol’able David (1921)

OR “Alpha Mail”

Directed by Henry King

Written by King and Edmund Goulding. Based on the short story by Joseph Hergesheimer.

Class of 2007

The Plot: In the hills of rural West Virginia, teenager David Kinemon (Richard Barthelmess) dreams of being seen by his family as a responsible adult and not just as tolerable (or “tol’able” as the intertitles say). Life on the family farm takes a turn when the Kinemon’s neighbors Grandpa Hatburn and his granddaughter/David’s crush Esther (Forrest Robinson and Gladys Hulette) take in their fugitive cousins (Walter P. Lewis, Ernest Torrence, Ralph Yearsley), who terrorize everyone in sight. When the Hatburn cousins injure David’s older brother Allen (Warner Richmond), which leads to the fatal heart attack of their father (Edmund Gurney), David takes over Allen’s job as the town mailman and becomes the family’s sole source of income. As the Hatburns continue to wreck havoc, David must gain the courage needed to stand up to those goliaths (get it?) and become a man. Because nothing says responsible adulthood like violent vengeance.

Why It Matters: The NFR calls the film “a powerful drama” that “was tremendously influential on subsequent filmmaking.” An essay by silent film expert Fritzi Kramer is mostly a recap of the movie, but also takes time to praise the contributions of both Henry King and Richard Barthelmess.

But Does It Really?: This is definitely on the “historical significance” side of things. “Tol’able David” was a nostalgic crowd-pleaser in its day, but over 100 years later it was a real slog for me to get through. There’s nothing inherently wrong with the movie, but there was a barrier between me and the film that I could never penetrate. Part of that is the film’s sluggish pacing, but part of that is also the casting of Barthelmess as David (more on that later). As one of the best received films of 1921, “Tol’able David” is as worthy of its NFR induction as any other silent film, but any modern viewing should be reserved strictly for film buffs.

Wow, That’s Dated: I had never heard of a “hack” before, which everyone refers to regarding the mail position David covets so much. Short for Hackney carriage, hacks were rentable horse-drawn carriages; the first ride-share, if you will.

Seriously, Oscars?: Obviously there were no Oscars when “Tol’able David” was released, but the film did win the second ever Photoplay Medal of Honor award for Picture of the Year: the first major American movie award. Also of note is that when the Oscars finally did come around, Richard Barthelmess was one of the first Best Actor nominees for his performances in the crime drama “The Noose” and the WWI drama “The Patent Leather Kid”.

Other notes

“Tol’able David” was a passion project for Henry King and Richard Barthelmess, produced under their newly formed independent production company Inspiration Pictures (though neither is credited as a producer in the final cut). The film was originally to be made by D. W. Griffith as a vehicle for Barthelmess (one of his contract players), but he sold the rights to King and Barthelmess for $7500 (about $130,000 today). Henry King had grown up in Virginia, and filmed most of the movie in Crab Farm, not too far from where he was raised. Many locals, including the mayor of Crab Farm, appear as extras in the film.
Here’s my main issue with this movie: David is a teenage boy, but Richard Barthelmess is a 26-year-old man. Sure, with a shaven face and a clean haircut Barthelmess has a boyish quality to him, but he’s still clearly an adult playing a teenager. It gives the film a borderline “Clifford” vibe, without the advantage of being played for laughs. Also, I initially assumed that I had never seen Barthelmess in a movie before, but my research reminded me that I have seen him in yellow face as the star of “Broken Blossoms“. Yeesh.
Shoutout to Gladys Hulette as Esther. A stage veteran since she was three, Hulette is also too old to be playing a teenager (she was 25) but given her limited screentime it’s much less distracting here than it is with her co-star. Hulette also pops up in the NFR as one of the fairies in that truly bizarre “Princess Nicotine” short I covered some years back.
This movie is filled with people who kind of look like other people. Esther reminds me a bit of Laura Linney, Luke Hatburn looks like Al Bundy on a particularly bad day, and Mr. Galt has a resemblance to an older Charles Nelson Reilly. When I’m not invested in the movie I’m watching, I guess I just start looking at faces.
The Hatburns waste no time being the bad guys, threatening a cat and killing a dog! Is there an orphanage they can burn down while they’re at it?
Speaking of the dog, why is a dog in 1921 named Rocket? Turns out the earliest known rockets (powered by gunpowder) were being used in China in the 1200s, and the earliest concept of a rocket being used for space travel dates to the 1860s. Shows what I know.
This movie oscillates between nothing happening and then everything happening. Part of that is the adaptation of a short story into a feature film, which means lots of padding and dramatic pauses. There was a point where I was begging the movie to do something, and then they killed off two characters and I thought “That’s too much, movie. Reign it in.”
Oh good, the movie’s comic relief is a drunk with an eye-patch. He’s the guy who initially takes over “the hack” from Allen but is fired for his drinking problem. It’s not unlike the drunk Santa at the beginning of “Miracle on 34^th Street“. “A man’s gotta do something to keep warm…”
Wow, that finale gets pretty violent (well, violent by 1921 standards), with lots of gunplay and some on-screen blood! Did Sam Peckinpah’s dad direct this?
After a bit of foreshadowing during the opening, the finale shouts the “David & Goliath” comparisons louder for the people in the back. I mean come on: His name is David and the guy he’s fighting is like a full foot taller than him, it’s obvious where this is going. The only thing missing is the Claymation dog preaching morality and Lutheran values to children.
It amuses me that David’s main goal at the end of the movie is to deliver the mail that was stolen by the Hatburns. Neither rain nor sleet nor hillbilly outlaws will keep David from his appointed rounds. The USPS won’t get another advertisement this good until “The Postman Always Rings Twice”.
So, the moral of this movie is that true manhood is defined by courage and vengeance? I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: Toxic masculinity sucks.

Legacy

“Tol’able David” was a major hit upon its release in December 1921, receiving praise from the film critics, as well as from such artists as Mary Pickford and John Ford.
The NFR write-up mentions the “subsequent filmmaking” that was influenced by this movie, but I’m not finding anything concrete to back that up. A few resources mention V.I. Pudovkin and Humberto Mauro as artists inspired by the film, but I can’t find anything on how exactly this film influenced their work.
Henry King’s directing career went well into the sound era of film, giving us such movies as “In Old Chicago”, “The Song of Bernadette”, “Love Is a Many-Splendored Thing”, and fellow NFR entries “State Fair” and “Twelve O’Clock High“. Co-writer Edmund Goulding would also go on to a prolific directing career, helming, among others, Best Picture winner “Grand Hotel“, which coincidentally made the NFR the same year as “Tol’able David”.

Between “Tol’able David” and D. W. Griffith’s “Way Down East”, Richard Barthelmess’ film career hit its peak in the early 1920s. As the 1930s started and Barthelmess was aging out of his boyish leading roles, he pivoted to supporting turns in sound films. We’ll see Barthelmess again when I get around to covering “Only Angels Have Wings”.

Like many a classic silent film on this list, “Tol’able David” was remade with sound in 1930. Twenty-year-old Richard Cromwell played David (which is a little better I guess) and the cast includes a very young John Carradine.
The one bit of pop culture that gets brought up in almost everything I’ve read about “Tol’able David”: It’s featured prominently in the third act of “The Tingler”, a 1959 William Castle horror movie with his infamous “Percepto” gimmick. The titular tingler is let loose in a revival movie house, and guess what movie is getting revived?

The National Film Registry Class of 1992: Baby Got Back

December 3^rd, 1992: After receiving its first renewal the previous June, the National Film Registry is back with another 25 movies, reaching the important milestone of 100 movies! Having just finished watching the last of this group, it’s time for me to take a look back. Here again is the National Film Registry Class of 1992, along with my previous write-ups:

The Birth of a Nation (1915) (“[It’s] even worse than you think it is.” “totally indefensible.”)
Within Our Gates (1920) (“the earliest surviving film to be directed by an African-American”, “a powerful reminder of…what filmmaking from different voices can accomplish.”)
The Big Parade (1925) (“not the greatest movie ever made, but it is an undeniably important film”, “the silent film medium at the height of its artistry”)
The Gold Rush (1925) (“the first essential in Chaplin’s filmography, but his best work as an artist was still ahead of him.”)
Big Business (1929) (“[Laurel & Hardy] are hilarious throughout this short, but I miss hearing them speak.”)
Morocco (1930) (“Am I missing something with [von Sternberg]?”)
Footlight Parade (1933) (“too much backstage/not enough musical”)
The Bank Dick (1940) (“the most polished of [W.C. Fields’] inducted films”)
Double Indemnity (1944) (“filmdom’s quintessential film noir entry”)
Detour (1945) (“the best of the B [movies]”)
Letter from an Unknown Woman (1948) (“an enjoyable classic Hollywood melodrama and a fine representation of Max Ophuls.”)
Adam’s Rib (1949) (“the ‘two steps forward, one step back” of feminism in film, but Tracy and Hepburn’s natural chemistry help smooth over the rough patches.”)
Carmen Jones (1954) (“a testament to the career of Dorothy Dandridge.” “Preminger, you’ve done it again!”)
Salt of the Earth (1954) (“the only blacklisted movie in film history.”, “a message that still rings true…70 years later”)
The Night of the Hunter (1955) (“quite bizarre, but admittedly it’s that bizarreness that has helped it endure”)
Paths of Glory (1957) (“has ‘minor classic’ written all over it, but it’s fun to see where Stanley Kubrick got his ‘start’.”)
What’s Opera, Doc? (1957) (“one of the most revered and influential pieces of classic animation”)
Psycho (1960) (“a game changer for the thriller genre”, “I’ll be damned if this movie still can’t scare the crap out of me every time.”)
Dog Star Man (1961-1964) (“One hell of an experimental trip”, “a sort of cinematic Rorschach test.”)
Ride the High Country (1962) (“a well-made, character-driven western enhanced by [Sam Peckinpah’s] unique perspective.”)
Castro Street (1966) (“I could not get into [this movie], but it’s my own fault for not doing my homework.”)
Bonnie and Clyde (1967) (“helped define a new era of filmmaking, and is a no-brainer for NFR inclusion.”)
Salesman (1969) (“the subject matter is fascinating…but I just couldn’t get into this one.”)
Nashville (1975) (“a bit slow by today’s standards, [but] there are enough dynamic characters and performances to hold your interest.”)
Annie Hall (1977) (“a great film…[a]s difficult as it is for me to separate the art from the artist”)

Other notes

The big NFR news at the time was that in June 1992, the National Film Preservation Act got renewed by Congress for an additional four years, guaranteeing more movies being added to the Registry through 1996, bringing the total to an even 200 movies. Also noteworthy is that with this renewal, films added to the Registry are no longer required to have been shown in a theater, opening the door for more unconventional entries like “Dog Star Man” and “Castro Street” (and later on the Zapruder film). Reports on the renewal also claim it lifted its feature-length requirement, allowing shorts to be inducted, but that announcement contradicts such previous short entries as “Meshes of the Afternoon” and “Gertie the Dinosaur“.
My first takeaway from seeing this list again was, “Man this a good group”. Every movie on this list is either an untouchable classic or iconic enough to make the cut regardless of my opinion. You also get the beginnings of the NFR’s ongoing game of “Who isn’t on the list yet?” (Robert Altman! Marlene Dietrich! Bugs Bunny!). While not every movie on the list is one I feel should have cracked the top 100, each of them has a solid enough legacy to make their inclusion inevitable.
At the time of the Class of 1992 induction, future NFR entries “Malcolm X” and “Unforgiven” were playing in theaters. Also playing at the time that I have dogeared for eventual NFR induction: “Aladdin”, “The Bodyguard”, and “Reservoir Dogs”.
While we’re on the subject of 1992: I mean, of course “Annie Hall” should be on the list, but only a few months after the whole Soon-Yi thing? If you ask me, that was too soon…Yi.
Shoutout to Variety’s article about that year’s induction: “Diverse pix mix picked“. What does that even mean?
This year’s group of double-dippers is lower than in previous years (a trend that will continue as each year’s selection covers a longer timespan). For 1992, we have actors Shelley Duvall, Jeff Goldblum, and Adolphe Menjou, composer Miklos Rozsa, and title sequence designer Saul Bass.
Thematic double-dippers: ’40s film noir, tragic romances, World War I, films told entirely in flashbacks, Cross dressing, Depression era career pivots, opera music with new lyrics, bank robberies, mining for gold, thoroughly misguided patriotism, Christmas in Los Angeles, criminals trying to sell their cars, and Jeff Goldblum with minimal dialogue.
Favorites of my own subtitles: You’re in Good Hands with…Murder!, You Can Kill Me Al, Let’s Get Bizet, Rev! Run!, Oedipal Arrangements, Grumpy Gold Men, Brother Can You Spare a Crime?, Jesus Schlept, and What’s It All About, Alvy? Special shoutout to my alt “Double Indemnity” subtitle: Like a Good Murder, Stanwyck is There.
And of course, points to the NFR for inducting Oscar Micheaux’s “Within Our Gates” the same year as “Birth of a Nation”. The inclusion of “Birth of a Nation” on a list of significant American films was unavoidable, and I appreciate that this NFR roster permanently links it with a rebuttal by America’s most prominent Black director of the time. Librarian of Congress James Billington even pointed out in his Registry announcement that “Birth” is one of the films on the list that highlight “unpleasant or even reprehensible points of view.” Though to be fair he may have been referring to “What’s Opera, Doc?” and Elmer Fudd’s pro-wabbit kiwwing agenda.

Well that was fun. On to 1993! Stay safe, keep taking care of each other, and happy viewing!

Tony

#692) Ride the High Country (1962)

#692) Ride the High Country (1962)

OR “Grumpy Gold Men”

Directed by Sam Peckinpah

Written by N.B. Stone Jr. (with uncredited re-writes from Peckinpah and William Roberts)

Class of 1992

The Plot: At the turn-of-the-century in a much less wild west, aging lawman Steve Judd (Joel McCrea) is hired by a bank in Hornitos, California to transport gold from the mining camp Coarsegold in the Sierras (the high country, if you will). Aware of the trek’s potential hazards, Steve enlists the help of his former partner Gil Westrum (Randolph Scott), who in turn recruits his young assistant Heck Longtree (Ron Starr). What Steve doesn’t know is that Gil plans to double-cross him and take the gold for himself. En route, they meet Elsa Knudson (Mariette Hartley), who joins them on their travels to escape her oppressive father (R.G. Armstrong) and marry her fiancé Billy Hammond (James Drury), currently mining near Coarsegold. Once everyone arrives in Coarsegold, things do not go as expected in this rumination on morality in a changing world and only the second feature film from Sam Peckinpah.

Why It Matters: Unusually for an early NFR pick, there is no major superlatives in the film’s write-up. Instead we get a detailed plot synopsis, and reference to the film’s “poignant finale.” An essay by Peckinpah expert Stephen Prince is much more praising, highlighting the film’s uniqueness among Peckinpah’s later filmography.

But Does It Really?: I liked, but didn’t love, “Ride the High Country”. Admittedly my issues with the movie were my own genre bias, as well as a few other factors we’ll get to, but overall, it’s a well-made, character-driven western enhanced by a young director’s unique perspective. While I don’t object to the film’s NFR induction, I do question how it got on the list in only the fourth year. If you want Sam Peckinpah on the list, why not “The Wild Bunch”? If you want older actors revisiting their western days, why not “The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance” or “Rio Bravo”? I’ll designate “Ride the High Country” as Peckinpah’s steppingstone film; the movie that was successful enough to get him the creative freedom that would lead to his better-known work. “Ride the High Country” is worthy of NFR preservation, but at the very least it should have switched places with “The Wild Bunch”, which had to wait another seven years before finally making the cut.

Everybody Gets One: Upon arriving in Los Angeles in 1927, Randolph Scott started out in the movies as a bit player and very quickly worked his way up to leading man status. Although he acted in a variety of genres, Scott’s domain was the Western: first in the 1930s in a series of movies based on the work of Zane Gray, and in the ’40s onwards as various lawmen trying to tame the west (I suspect this is the reason he is so revered in “Blazing Saddles“). Initially cast as the more law-abiding Steve Judd in “Ride the High Country”, Scott agreed to switch roles with Joel McCrea to play against type. Scott also successfully secured top billing over McCrea by winning a coin toss while the two were at lunch with Sam Peckinpah.

Title Track: N.B. Stone Jr.’s original screenplay went by the name “Guns in the Afternoon”. Among the numerous improvements Sam Peckinpah made in his re-write was the title “Ride the High Country”, an apt allegory for Steve’s morality. Composer George Bassman co-wrote a title song with lyricist Ken Darby that doesn’t appear in the film but was released as a single.

Seriously, Oscars?: No Oscar nominations for “Ride the High Country”, although the BAFTAs nominated Mariette Hartley for Most Promising Newcomer to Leading Film Roles. The only non-Brit in a category with Terrence Stamp and Sarah Miles, Hartley lost to Tom Courtenay for “The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner”. Home court advantage, I guess.

Other notes

By the early 1960s, screenwriter N.B. Stone Jr. had fallen on hard times but had a screenplay he had written years earlier about two older men in the west that he wanted to see produced. His friend, fellow screenwriter William Roberts, gave the script to producer Richard Lyons, who declared it “awful” but liked its general concept. William Roberts did a full re-write but chose to remain uncredited out of respect for Stone (this is one of two westerns on the NFR that Roberts substantially re-wrote). Once Sam Peckinpah signed on as director, he exercised his contractual obligation for another re-write (a right he insisted on after losing creative control of his first film “The Deadly Companions”). Peckinpah spent four weeks re-writing most of the dialogue, infusing the character of Steve with many of the traits he admired from his own father, David. In addition, Peckinpah gave the film its new title, and made a major alteration to the film’s ending (more on that later).
Admittedly, the timing of my “High Country” viewing didn’t help my overall enjoyment. I watched this shortly after watching “Bad Day at Black Rock“, another MGM-Cinemascope movie with aging movie stars demonstrating their sustained virility against a Sierra Nevada backdrop. While still very different movies, there’s enough shared DNA that gave “High Country” a feeling of sameness to “Bad Day”, which is no one’s fault by my own.
In the 20 years since we last saw him in “Sullivan’s Travels“, Joel McCrea worked almost exclusively in Westerns, and was equally famous for turning down work to spend more time on his ranch (he considered himself a rancher who acted as a hobby). I’m glad McCrea signed on for “High Country”, because the straight-forward Steve fits him like a glove (though the idea of him initially playing Gil is intriguing; potentially a Henry Fonda “Once Upon a Time in the West“-style subversion).

Even in his later years, McCrea continues to look like William Holden dubbed by Gary Cooper. He’s also still very tall, which is tough in a widescreen movie when he shares a shot with significantly shorter actors. Things improve when he’s paired with the equally tall Randolph Scott, and once they hit the Sierras everyone else can stand on a higher elevation level to match them.
This is Mariette Hartley’s film debut (she even gets the “Introducing” credit in the opening). It’s a capable performance where she more than holds her own against her two established leads. And although Mariette Hartley’s film career never really took off, you can see her star quality that would make you believe that career path was possible. Elsa’s presence in the movie reminds me of McCrea’s great line in “Sullivan’s Travels”: “There’s always a girl in the picture. What’s the matter, don’t you go to the movies?”
One line that made me laugh out loud comes from Gil, after watching Steve and Mr. Knudson tensely exchange Bible verses over dinner: “You cook a lovely ham hock, Ms. Knudson, just lovely. Appetite, Chapter One.”
Ugh, I don’t need to see Joel McCrea or Randolph Scott in long johns! Make it stop!
No offense to Ron Starr, who as of this writing is still with us, but he is not great in this. Starr’s acting career petered out within a decade of “High Country”, and hopefully he moved on to better things in another venue. Thankfully, his car navigation and safety systems seem to be much more effective.
Another issue with this movie that is also my fault: I have no history with either McCrea or Scott. Aside from “Sullivan’s Travels”, I’ve never seen either of them in anything else, unlike someone my age in 1962, who would have watched their careers happen in real time and understand their history with westerns that’s baked into the film’s subtext. The closest thing I can equate this to is watching De Niro and Pacino all my life and then watching them revisit the gangster genre in “The Irishman”.
Once everyone arrives in Coarsegold, I got massive flashbacks to my grade school field trip to Columbia, California, which is partially preserved in its gold rush aesthetic. Good times.
Gah! Enough close-ups of the Hammond brothers! They’re all so off-putting. Side note: Henry Hammond is played by Warren Oates, aka GTO from “Two-Lane Blacktop“. If Henry is the kind of underdeveloped character Oates played in every Western, I see how the critics took notice of his work in “Two-Lane”.
In one of my least favorite recurring themes on this blog, the whole Elsa & Billy wedding sequence is uncomfortable (though admittedly that’s the point). It leads to another round of unpleasant close-ups of the guests, particularly the Hammond brothers as they creepily leer at their new sister-in-law. All right cinematographer Lucien Ballard, you’ve lost your close-up privileges. Give me your keys.

The last third of the movie takes its time, but we get some solid morality debates between Steve and Gil, the kind of gray area that started to crop up more and more in westerns. This all leads to the final showdown, which made me appropriately tense as I waited to see how it would all end.
[Spoilers] In the original N.B. Stone draft, Gil was killed during the climactic shootout as an act of sacrificial redemption, but Peckinpah switched it so that Steve is killed, and Gil redeems himself by taking the gold to the bank. It’s a real downer of an ending, but also a surprising and more complex one. Even though I wasn’t fully engaged with the movie by then, I was genuinely saddened to see Joel McCrea slowly slink to the ground as the credits roll.
I think the moral of this movie is don’t trust anyone under 50.

Legacy

Although “Ride the High Country” tested well, MGM didn’t have faith in its box office potential and put it on the bottom half a double bill: first with the Italian swords-and-sandal epic “The Tartars”, and later with the sex comedy “Boys Night Out”. Reviews were mostly positive, with the film making it on a few year-end top ten lists (Newsweek even declared it the best film of 1962). This critical praise, aided by news that audiences preferred “High Country” over the top half of the bill, convinced MGM to re-release the film as a standalone feature in early 1963.
After “Ride the High Country”, Randolph Scott felt he couldn’t top his performance and, after years of shrewd investments, retired from acting. Joel McCrea went back to his ranch after “High Country” but was occasionally talked out of his semi-retirement for a few more westerns before hanging it up for good in 1976.
Although Mariette Hartley has a few more notable films on her resume (“Marnie”, “Marooned”, “Encino Man”), her best work was in television. Hartley has spent over six decades on various TV projects, including a run in the late ’70s/early ’80s where she got six Emmy nominations in five years (winning for a guest spot on “The Incredible Hulk”). And for the last time: No, she is not James Garner’s wife!

Sam Peckinpah’s next film was 1965’s “Major Dundee” starring Charlton Heston, who hired Peckinpah based on his work in “High Country” (Side note: Heston also tried to remake “High Country” in the late ’80s starring him and Clint Eastwood, but nothing came of it). Although the production of “Dundee” was a disaster (not helped by Peckinpah’s chronic alcoholism), Peckinpah bounced back with his next and most famous film: “The Wild Bunch”.