WHAT SILENTS & PRE-CODES HAVE YOU SEEN LATELY?

[charliechaplinfan]

Janet Gaynor had an incandescent quality, best shown in Sunrise, it was pretty hard to compete with her on screen. I think I'd read that he had invested his money wisely in real estate and although he wanted to carry on in films he didn't need to, he left the industry quite comfortably off.

[JackFavell]

I thought Farrell could have been a lot better in Liliom, but I did not care for the film at all. I don't think it was Farrell's fault, especially in retrospect after watching the masterful Lang/Boyer version a week or so later (which I highly, highly recommend).

I liked what Farrell was trying to do in the role, and I appreciate his singularly vulnerable quality - it brings out something in the role that I truly like. I don't want to say he was badly miscast, however, Borzage should have attempted (and I think he could have) to camouflage Farrell's weak voice and lighter character traits. Borzage could have turned Farrell's boyishness into a real asset in Liliom, but I got the impression that he didn't really "see" Farrell's performance at all and was consumed with lighting and artistic gimmicks. One of the few Borzage films I don't enjoy.

[pvitari]

Farrell grew up in Onset Bay, Massachusetts and I love that Cape Cod accent of his. He did invest in real estate and was an extremely big cheese in Palm Springs, where he and Ralph Bellamy founded the Racquet Club, the social center of the town for several decades, and where he also served as mayor. (He eventually bought out Bellamy's share.) According to Sarah Baker's book, Lucky Stars, there's a statue of him at the airport -- I'd sure love to see a photo of it, but I haven't been able to find one.

He did a TV show after My Little Margie -- The Charles Farrell Show, which apparently took place at the Racquet Club and lasted for two seasons. After that he retired from show business for good.

A great article about Charles Farrell and The Racquet Club from the April 15, 1963 issue of Sports Illustrated: http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/vault/ ... /index.htm

[drednm]

Onset Bay is apparently part of Wareham.

[pvitari]

You can tell I've never been to Cape Cod!

Oh, for the Janet Gaynor fans -- I just screencapped John Ford's 1926 silent The Shamrock Handicap and there are some really sweet close-ups of her in that film. http://paulasmoviepage.shutterfly.com/5281

[Ann Harding]

Sorry to intrude on the Farrell discussion.
I have been watching -again- a French silent called Finis Terrae (1928, J. Epstein) shot entirely in the most western island of Brittany called Ouessant. The local people were used as actors. The film could have been a marvellous documentary with its stunning seascapes but the director decided to add a tenuous narrative where one seaweed fisherman gets an infection while cutting his thumb. This is a shame as he didn't seem to know how to handle amateur actors nor a narrative. The 80-min film feels like 120 min as it drags on.... Jean Epstein is highly regarded as a theorician of cinema in France; but as a director I find his work rather underwhelming. What is left is some super images of Brittany with its wild rocky coastline. Unfortunately the superior Pêcheur d'Islande (1924, J. de Baroncelli) never gets broadcast on TV....

[drednm]

A final word on Charles Farrell.... I have to admit that the closing scenes of Seventh Heaven with Farrell running up the stairs and calling DIANE (to Janet Gaynor, of course) is one of the most emotional and memorable scenes in silent films.

I haven't been to the Cape in decades but as I remember it, Wareham is not part of the Cape. But what do I know

[charliechaplinfan]

I thought Farrell could have been a lot better in Liliom, but I did not care for the film at all. I don't think it was Farrell's fault, especially in retrospect after watching the masterful Lang/Boyer version a week or so later (which I highly, highly recommend).

I liked what Farrell was trying to do in the role, and I appreciate his singularly vulnerable quality - it brings out something in the role that I truly like. I don't want to say he was badly miscast, however, Borzage should have attempted (and I think he could have) to camouflage Farrell's weak voice and lighter character traits. Borzage could have turned Farrell's boyishness into a real asset in Liliom, but I got the impression that he didn't really "see" Farrell's performance at all and was consumed with lighting and artistic gimmicks. One of the few Borzage films I don't enjoy.

I saw Lang's Liliom first and didn't like Charles Boyer's Liliom as much. I think it say more about me, I want to believe there is good in Liliom and find it easier to believe it of Charles Farrell's Liliom than Charles Boyer's.

Thanks for that excellent article pvitari, I really enjoyed reading it., I'm hoping to get Lucky Stars sometime this year.

[charliechaplinfan]

I've just watched Men In White a Gable precode. He stars as a doctor who works hard and is dedicated to his profession and is engaged to Myrna Loy who doesn't understand his need to work so many hours. Jean Hersholt is a surgeon who is also Gable's mentor, Gable intends to go to Vienna with Hersholt to finish his training. Elizabeth Allen stars as a nurse who visits Gable to get some revision notes from him, both are feeling lost and forlorn, he because Myrna has decided not to see him that night after he suddenly gets a night off and she because she nearly lost a patient and is very new to nursing, she also witnessed Gable save a patient that afternoon, the seen is set and the nurse goes away with more than the books. It's a precode and the nurse becomes a patient after going somewhere else to procure an abortion. Gable vows to marry the nurse and make up for his misdemeanour but never gets the chance. Gable really can act and this is a film that proves it, he also looks good in a white coat. Its' a delight to watch Jean Hersholt inthe role of the surgeon/mentor. Myrna is the rich girl who can't quite understand her fiance's dedication to his job, she shines as always even though her role is somewhat unsympathetic . I love the lines ans style of this movie too. Worth catching on TCM.

[moira finnie]

A final word on Charles Farrell.... I have to admit that the closing scenes of Seventh Heaven with Farrell running up the stairs and calling DIANE (to Janet Gaynor, of course) is one of the most emotional and memorable scenes in silent films.

I haven't been to the Cape in decades but as I remember it, Wareham is not part of the Cape.

I love that part of 7th Heaven too! Wareham is just at the bottom of the South Shore on the Cape Cod Canal as it meets the Atlantic. I lived about 20 minutes north for the better part of twenty years. Nearby Onset, which is where Charlie is supposed to have been born, is still lovely and was, I believe, the location of the Farrell's summer home. In those days there was a train that ran back and forth to Boston as well as a ferry service (which still exists in limited form). I am told that the Farrells lived in Boston the rest of the year. I am also eager to read that new book Lucky Stars (BearManor) by Sarah Baker, found here that reportedly reveals a romance that mellowed into friendship between Farrell and Gaynor and drew on previously unpublished interviews and correspondence. The book received some good reviews and is supposed to have been well-sourced, so it really intrigues me.

But what do I know

A HUGE amount of knowledge. I learn something from you every time I read your contributions here, on TCM and in your reviews on IMDb.

Pvitari, thanks for the link to that article about Charlie Farrell. Below are pics of the Charles Farrell statue at the Palm Springs International Airport. Um, do you think it looks like him?




Your various comments about the Borzage Liliom, which I haven't seen, makes me want to track it down. I am really interested in the surrealistic touches he brought to it. In the Fritz version, I loved Lang's perverse view of heaven as a police station manned by blank-faced angels and it was an interesting shock to my assumptions to see Boyer as a rather unlovable lower class scoundrel.

[drednm]

I have family in Falmouth and Hyannis. I remember driving through Wareham as a kid (I think it was Wareham) that had its "welcome" sign between two lifesize llighthouses on either side of the road. I always loved it. But I think that was on some old highway through Taunton. Who remembers.

The ending of Seventh Heavenis a total killer. I never saw it coming.....

Thanks for the kid words.... and for the pictures. I think I drove through Palm Springs en route to Desert Hot Springs?

[Ann Harding]

Yesterday I went to see a beautiful print restored by the CF of Dwan's The Half-Breed (1916) with Douglas Fairbanks. It's certainly one of the best CF restoration I have seen. Doug plays a half-breed (half-Indian/half-white) who is raised by an old naturalist. When he dies, he is kicked out of his foster's father hut. As an Indian, he is not allowed to have any property. He lives in the Redwood forest inside a trunk. But the local parson's daughter, Nellie (Jewel Carmen) starts flirting with him...
I have already seen several Dwan pictures with Fairbanks and they were uniformely great. Manhattan Madness, Robin Hood or A Modern Musketeer are all brillant. This Half-Breed contains less action than the others but Doug's graceful movements through the forest are a sight to behold. The first glimpse of him we get is actually quite startling!

His heart is divided between two gorgeous ladies Alma Rubens, the brown-hair bad girl who reforms and Jewel Carmen, the blonde flirt who cannot make up her mind with her suitors. The film was shot entirely on locations in the Californian Redwoods. Some shots were breathtaking such as the opening one showing the river in the valley below surrounded by the forest. A great evening!

[drednm]

Alma Rubens is certainly worth re-discovery. I've only seen her in a few films I can think of right off, Humoresque and Show Boat. She was a big star in her day, and with Marion Davies, was the major star at Cosmopolitan Pictures under WR Hearst.

[pvitari]

Wow, Moira, THANKS!! for the great pics of the statue! It kind of looks like Farrell -- a young Farrell, and bit idealized, but hey, it's a statue. He loved tennis (he even talks about playing tennis in My Little Margie) so that pose certainly is appropriate.

The Sports Illustrated article is a bit of a whitewash -- according to Baker's book, Farrell's marriage to Virginia Valli was very unhappy but she refused to give him a divorce (it is true that she was very helpful in running the Racquet Club) and that he had a longrunning affair with Mousie, William Powell's much younger wife -- they were both big tennis players. There's a great picture in the book of Farrell lifting Mousie into the air on the tennis court.

Drednm -- the ending of Seventh Heaven is right out of the original play by Austin Strong, but Borzage transforms it into an elevated spiritual apotheosis that I don't think Strong envisioned, at least not to that extent!

Someday I have to get to Cape Cod. My husband used to spend a few weeks up there every summer when he was a boy (his cousins had a cabin there) and he has very fond memories of the Cape. I would definitely want to visit Onset Bay. I saw some photos of the town online and it looks beautiful.

AnnHarding -- Wow, that's some pic of Douglas Fairbanks in a thong! *wolf whistle* I love him too... and his little boy Doug Jr too. Flicker Alley's box set of Fairbanks Sr. films -- Douglas Fairbanks: A Modern Musketeer -- is a terrific buy. Unfortunately it does not contain The Half-Breed, but I'm going to have to go searching for that one now. Er, what's the "CF"? Once you tell me, I'm sure I will slap my head and say "Of course!"

[drednm]

I spent several summers on the Cape when I was a kid and attended summer classes at Woods Hole. Nice memories but the Cape ain't what it was in the 50s.