Cinevent Past Notes: THE RIVER (1929)

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Richard M Roberts
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Cinevent Past Notes: THE RIVER (1929)

Postby Richard M Roberts » Tue May 21, 2013 3:34 am

Here's the first of some old notes I wrote for Cinevent's past. This one was for Frank Borzage's THE RIVER (1929), which was a real rarity when Cinevent showed it, way before it was available on DVD:


As a rule, Frank Borzage movies just don’t work for me, especially when he’s in his “love conquers all” (including logic) mode. I can appreciate his visual style in silents like SEVENTH HEAVEN and STREET ANGEL, even though he’s just aping Murnau like all the Fox directors were at the time, and I like some of the nice character touches he can bring about between his various star-crossed lovers, but there always comes that moment near the final reel like in SEVENTH HEAVEN when Charlie Farrell suddenly and magically returns from WW1 when all signs were pointing to him being cold as a refrigerated mackerel and six feet under. Total plot dishonesty to build up an emotional swell and usually awkwardly done to boot. Doesn’t help when it’s Charles Farrell and Janet Gaynor (whom I refer to as Squeaky and Squeakier when their in talkies) who pull their innocent young lovers nonsense until my nausea factor spikes.

So yeah, it’s a bit incongruous that I’ve been bugging the Cinevent committee to run THE RIVER for the last few years. It’s Borzage, it’s Squeaky. More problematic is the fact that all surviving prints are missing the first reel and the last reel, so basically you’re coming in after it starts and leaving before it’s finished and you know what, I think this just might make it a better picture. Where THE RIVER ends now probably eliminates the part where I think Borzage usually goes south and pulls some contrived deus ex machina to get his pull on the heart strings rather than making the effort to be honest with his audience.

Yep, I said Squeaky’s in the picture, but fortunately the missing reels were the ones that had the talking sequences so we don’t have to listen to him (and that voice only works for me when it’s saying “Oh Margie!”). However, joy of joys, in place of Squeakier we get----Mary Duncan!

Mary Duncan----zowie! Unless you’ve seen Murnau’s CITY GIRL (1930) or any of her handful of talkie supporting roles in films like FIVE AND TEN (1931) with Marion Davies, STATES ATTORNEY (1932) with John Barrymore, THIRTEEN WOMEN or THE PHANTOM OF CRESTWOOD (both 1932), you may not have even heard of her, but if you’ve seen CITY GIRL or THE RIVER, you ain’t gonna forget her. Not the best of film careers, she started near the end of the silent era when Fox hired her in 1927 after she wowed critics with her performance in the lead in THE SHANGHAI GESTURE. Mary played supporting roles in a few Fox programmers, including what was essentially the Margaret Livingston role in Murnau’s FOUR DEVILS (1928), then she apparently became Winfield Sheehan’s girlfriend and he promoted her to lead roles with THE RIVER. Forget Janet Gaynor’s Harry Langdon impersonations, Mary Duncan not only displays a strong sensuality, but a sensitive, intelligent acting ability. How’s old Squeaky going to deal with this?

Charles Farrell is his durn old wide-eyed innocent self here, playing Allan John Spender, a fresh-faced fellow traveling down “the river” when he comes to this lumber camp that’s perched on the side of a canyon (it’s one of those incredible part backlot, part hanging miniature sets that could only exist in the fantasy of silent film, the shots of it are works of art-art direction in and of themselves). The camp is closing down for the rapidly coming winter, and everyone has pretty much left, everyone except Rosalee (Duncan) whose lover, the former boss of the camp, has just been hauled off for murder. Of course Farrell manages to get knocked cold, fall off his boat, and end up in her care, causing her to miss the last train out. So, stuck in a snowed in for the winter cabin in a deserted lumber camp with Squeaky, Rosalee realizes that survival has got to take precedence over her sworn loyalty to her jailbird lover whom she may not ever see again and starts comin’ on to Farrell, who, because he’s Charlie Farrell, doesn’t get it, literally or figuratively. What is he, twelve or somethin’? Here’s Mary Duncan pretty darn hot, hanging around in the middle of this cabin in some pretty skimpy stuff, and Farrell is clueless. He deserves Janet Gaynor.

And that my friends is pretty much the plot. Will she snag Squeaky, won’t she snag Squeaky? Will he head down “the river”, won’t he head down “the river”. Can he chop enough wood, can’t he chop enough wood? And that’s where Borzage does what he does best. What we have here with what is left of THE RIVER is this two-hander between Farrell and Duncan which Borzage keeps afloat by devising some fascinating bits of business (and some pretty neat shots of Mary Duncan) in his fascination of the eternal magic that can be caused between two sparked people , even when one of them is Charlie Farrell. All for the most part within the confines of the cabin. Borzage and cinematographer Ernest Palmer (who also photographed SEVENTH HEAVEN, STREET ANGEL, FOUR DEVILS and CITY GIRL) create some beautiful and expressive visuals within the cramped confines of the space, keeping the temperature hot inside and chilly cold outside. And Mary Duncan’s performance is amazing, conveying the whole scale of emotion, and giving us a full-bodied (no pun intended) sexy and sympathetic character, even within the confines of a rather clichéd and melodramatic tale (this was based on a Tristam Tupper book after all). I especially love the chopping wood metaphor for sexual frustration/virility, good old-fashioned movie Freud.

Unfortunately Mary Duncan’s movie career didn’t amount to much. Terrific as she is in these two late hybrid-talkies (both THE RIVER and CITY GIRL were goat-glanded with talkie sequences and Movietone scores), neither film did much at the box-office, and when Winfield Sheehan dumped her, so did Fox. She bounced around various studios, picking up supporting roles in the aforementioned movies and a few others, by the time she appeared in MORNING GLORY (1933) with Katherine Hepburn, she had given up any hope of becoming a movie star. So she bid adieu to the pictures, and married Steven “Laddie” Sanford, international polo star (if there really is such a thing) and owner of the Bigelow-Sanford Carpet Company. The very-wealthy Sanfords moved to Palm Beach, Florida, where the former Mary Duncan became the doyen of Palm Beach society, friend to the Kennedys and a major charity fundraiser. She passed away in 1993 at the ripe old age of 98.

So our loss of an interesting movie actress was Palm Beach’s gain, although legend has it that she is responsible for destroying the last known print of Murnau’s FOUR DEVILS. Supposedly after borrowing a print from Fox to show for her friends sometime in the 1950’s, she had the print dumped in the Atlantic because it was “that dangerous nitrate stuff”. Twas ever thus. Perhaps Mary got a hold of the first and last reels of THE RIVER as well, but what remains is a heck of a picture, and possibly it’s the best way to leave it. Plot synopses indicate that logic goes out the window in typical Borzage fashion and the jailbird lover comes back into the picture. We get just a hint of what’s to come just before the screen goes black. This way, we leave then in the cabin, with plenty of firewood and lingerie, the future a mere question mark on the landscape, and the belief that love is a river, big, wet, and full of fish. Don’t think about it too hard.



RICHARD M ROBERTS

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