Hughie Mack Movies

Long though lost, Four Sons reemerged in the 1960s, proving anew that the silent films of director John Ford were every bit as accomplished as his talkies. More "Germanic" in tone and texture than later Ford films, Four Sons is the story of the Bernle family of Bavaria. Mother Bernle (Margaret Mann) dotes upon her four sons Joseph (James Hall), Johann (Charles Morton), Franz (Francis X. Bushman Jr.) and Andres (George Meeker), but is powerless in guiding their destinies. When WW I breaks out, her sons march off to the front: one of the boys fights for the AEF, the others for the Kaiser. The film's most poignant sequence takes place on the battlefield, when one of the sons stumbles upon his mortally wounded brother. Though the dying man's plaintive cries are heard on the Fox Movietone soundtrack, the scene itself is effectively played in pantomime. An updated version of Four Sons, wherein the locale was switched from Bavaria to Czechoslovakia, was filmed in 1940, starring Don Ameche, Alan Curtis, Robert Lowery and George Ernest. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Produced independently by the enterprising Nat Levine, this ten-chapter action serial featured Danish-born character actor Anders Randolph as the inventor of a completely silent airplane motor. Various villains are out to steal the potentially valuable contraption but are foiled at every turn by the serial's star trio: handsome young secret serviceman Lloyd Darrel (Malcolm MacGregor), pretty Helen Corliss (Louise Lorraine), and most importantly, Silver Streak, a clever German shepherd. The latter, of course, was Levine's low-budget answer to Warner Bros.' lucrative Rin Tin Tin. Hughie Mack, an obese comic in the style of "Fatty" Arbuckle was added to provide comedy relief. Levine produced the entire serial on location and on rented stages, managing to bring all ten chapters in on a budget of 70,000 dollars. Instead of releasing this his first serial on the usual states rights basis, Levine sold it outright to Universal for 75,000 dollars, the profits going toward establishing Mascot Pictures, a Poverty Row company that would proudly carry the serial tradition into the talkie era. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

When Donovan Steele (Percy Marmont) discovers his fiancée with another man, he loses faith in both women and God. He disappears into the Canadian backwoods to forget and finds Neree Carson (Alma Rubens), a deeply religious young woman who is falsely accused of murder. Cluny (Jean Hersholt), who is on her trail, threatens to have Neree arrested unless she marries him. Steele comes to blows with Cluny, but although he wins the fight, he is blinded. Neree cares for him, restoring his belief in womanhood. Then she convinces him to accompany her to the shrine of St. Anne de Beaupre. She ascends the sacred stairway on her knees, praying all the time, and Steele is miraculously cured. Neree's uncle confesses to the murder, and she is free to start a new life with Steele, who has regained his faith along with his sight. ~ Janiss Garza, All Movie Guide

Frank Norris' powerful Zola-esque novel McTeague was first filmed in 1915. While filmmaker Erich Von Stroheim would insist that he'd been enthralled by the book since it first came out in 1902, it is more likely that he didn't make the novel's acquaintance until seeing that 1915 film. Whatever the case, Von Stroheim vowed that, if he ever had enough Hollywood clout, he'd produce the "definitive" version of McTeague. After scoring an enormous financial hit with Foolish Wives, he had just that clout, and, in 1923, he began work on what he hoped would his masterpiece.

Stripped to its bare essentials, McTeague tells the story of a brutish, but basically good-natured, miner named McTeague (played by Gibson Gowland), who finds his true calling in life by taking over the practice of a traveling dentist. Setting up shop in San Francisco, McTeague falls in love with Trina (ZaSu Pitts), the daughter of German immigrants. It happens that Trina is the girlfriend of McTeague's best pal Marcus (Jean Hersholt), who is mildly resentful, but ultimately forgiving, when McTeague and Trina are married. Always seeking out an opportunity to better herself, Trina buys a lottery ticket. When the ticket pays off and she wins a fortune, the previously even-tempered Trina undergoes a complete personality change, metamorphosing into a grasping, greedy, miserly shrew, hoarding huge sums of money while her husband must get by on his meager earnings as a dentist. Trina's sudden windfall sparks a change in both McTeague and Marcus, as well; driven to distraction by his wife's avarice, McTeague turns into a violent beast, while Marcus boils with jealousy over losing the now-prosperous Trina to McTeague. Pushed too far, McTeague ultimately murders Trina and escapes to the desert with her money. Appointed a sheriff's deputy, the envious Marcus heads out to bring McTeague in, and the two men catch up with one another in the middle of Death Valley. Their water supply gone, their packhorse dead, McTeague and Marcus begin a fight to the death. McTeague manages to shoot and kill Marcus -- only to discover that Marcus has manacled himself to McTeague. Utterly defeated, he sits benumbed on the scorching rocks, awaiting madness and a horrible death.

Filming at actual locations (the murder scene was shot at a locale where a real murder had occurred, while the sweltering Death Valley sequence was, likewise, made there), Von Stroheim remained doggedly faithful to the Norris original, shooting every page word for word. The end result ran 40 reels, or roughly 10 hours of screen time. Then came the corporate intrigues. Von Stroheim, who had begun the film through the auspices of the old Goldwyn studios, now had to contend with the newly formed Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer regime. Production head Irving Thalberg argued logically that no audience would sit still for ten hours of unrelenting realism. Von Stroheim reluctantly responded by paring his film down to 20 reels, but it was still far too long and depressing for MGM's taste. The director's friend Rex Ingram weeded out two more reels, warning Von Stroheim that "If you cut out another inch, I'll never speak to you again." At this point, MGM, feeling that too much money had already been spent on the project, took McTeague away from Von Stroheim and ordered June Mathis to whittle the picture down to ten reels. It is this version, retitled Greed, that was released to the public in late 1924.

Far from the financial disaster that MGM always claimed it was (the film actually posted a small profit), Greed was still too overpowering for many observers. Critics and audiences were sharply divided, some hailing the film as a work of unbridled genius, others dismissing as "an epic of the sewer." Von Stroheim, angered that his baby had been "butchered," refused to ever see the ten-reel Greed. When viewed today, the film retains its raw dramatic power; the continuity gaps and clumsy transitional titles that once seemed so unforgivable are generally ignored by contemporary audiences. Still, Greed is not a happy, high-kickin' production. Though a rewarding experience, it remains very rough sledding for those accustomed to traditional, conservative entertainment. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

This farce was based on the musical comedy by Otto A. Harbach and Louis A. Hirsch, which was adapted from the play The Aviator by James H. Montgomery. Douglas MacLean -- who was especially good at farce comedy -- plays the lead, Robert Street. Street is an author whose novel about aviation, Going Up, is a best seller. The only catch is that he has a horror of flying and the one time he was in a plane, he swore never to fly again. But when he escapes to a summer resort, he finds that everyone there knows his name thanks to his pal, Hopkinson Brown (Hallam Cooley). He decides to leave, but then he meets and falls in love with Grace Douglas (Marjorie Daw). Not only does she convince him to stay, but she inspires his courage -- and he needs a lot of that because his romantic rival, Jules Gaillard (Francis McDonald), is the best aviator in France. Gaillard has dared him into competing, and in spite of all of Steele's efforts --and those of his friends -- he has no choice but to take flight. In spite of everything, Street is a complete success in the air, and back on the ground he wins Grace's heart. A very boyish looking Mervyn Leroy -- many years away from his fame as a director -- had a bit part as a bellboy. ~ Janiss Garza, All Movie Guide

Despite director Frank Capra's claims that he "discovered" May Robson for his 1933 production Lady for a Day, the venerable Robson had already been in films for two years when she starred in 1916's A Night Out. The actress plays a lonely crotchety old lady whose well-ordered lifestyle is turned topsy-turvy when her grandsons Jonas (Charles Brown) and Waldo (George Cooper) pay her a visit. The two young sprouts persuade "Granmum" to accompany them on a night on the town. At first resistant, the old lady's resolve is weakened by a few sips of champagne, and by the end of the evening she's having a high old time. Having created this role on the Broadway stage, May Robson had no trouble repeating her theatrical triumph on celluloid. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide