Nugget Reviews - 23

Johannisnacht ( 1956 )  14k 

An opera singer divorces her husband shortly after an extended performing tour in America. Years later, she returns to Germany to see her daughter whom her husband hid away in a chalet in the valley. Willy Birgel, Hertha Feiler, Erik Schumann, Sonja Sutter, Wolfgang Grunner. MGM Pictures. Directed by Harald Reinl.

A sweet romance from Delos-Film studios. Austrian-born Hertha Feiler, who often starred in comedies with her husband Heinz Ruhmann, is given a decent dramatic part here and the location filming of this "Heimatfilm" is beautiful. There is also a nice sub-romance going on between Erik Schumann and Sonja Sutter. 

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A Royal Scandal ( 1945 ) Elect.

A young idealistic lieutenant warns Catherine the Great of treachery within her court. She finds his loyalty and good looks very appealing and makes him her boy-toy, much to the chagrin of his true love, Queen Catherine's lady-in-waiting, Anna. Tallulah Bankhead, Charles Coburn, Anne Baxter, William Eythe, Vincent Price, Mischa Auer. 20th Century Fox Pictures. Directed by Otto Preminger and Ernst Lubitsch.

Ernst Lubitsch was a master at creating frothy comedies. He reached his prime in the early 1930s with such classics as Monte Carlo, The Smiling Lieutenant, One Hour with You and Ninotchka, but even he couldn't save this film from Preminger's heavy-handed direction. While there were a few amusing sequences in A Royal Scandal, overall the comedy seemed force. Tallulah Bankhead gave a grand performance as Catherine the Great, with some excellent support from character actors Charles Coburn and Sig Ruman, in spite of the circumstances.

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King Richard and the Crusaders ( 1954 ) 14k.

While encamped in the Holy Land, two noblemen plot to murder Richard the Lionheart and make his death appear to be from a Saracen attack, but his loyal knight Sir Kenneth discovers the plan. Rex Harrison, Laurence Harvey, George Sanders, Virginia Mayo, Robert Douglas. Warner Brothers. Directed by David Butler. 

Rex Harrison and Laurence Harvey give engrossing performances in this otherwise run-of-the-mill Crusades adventure, based upon Sir Walter Scott's novel "The Talisman". George Sanders makes an unconvincing King Richard, and Virginia Mayo's presence serves merely as eye-candy, but the Technicolor is beautiful and it's fun watching Rex Harrison tackle an Arab role.

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Scaramouche ( 1923 ) Elect.

A quiet French lawyer becomes a revolutionary after a nobleman kills his friend in a duel. Ramon Navarro, Alice Terry, Lewis Stone, Julia Swayne Gordon. Metro Pictures. Directed by Rex Ingram.

Production standards were high in this Rex Ingram silent classic, but the film fails to capture the excitement of Rafael Sabatini's novel and lingers on a bit too long. The zest that Stewart Granger brought to the part of Andre Moreau in the 1952 remake was non-existent in Novarro's portrayal. Douglas Fairbanks and Mary Pickford would have been ideal casting choices instead. However, the French Revolution sequences at the climax were truly hair-raising.

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The Toy Wife ( 1938 ) 14k

A flirtatious and frivolous Southern belle marries her sister's serious-minded fiancee. He later comes to regret not having found himself a more sensible wife. Luise Rainer, Melvyn Douglas, Barbara O'Neil, Robert Young, Alma Kruger. MGM Pictures. Directed by Richard Thorpe.

Luise Rainer was fresh from her Oscar-winning performance in The Good Earth when she starred in The Toy Wife, MGM's consolation project after losing the book rights to Margaret Mitchell's "Gone with the Wind". This southern belle story put the spotlight on Rainer, allowing her - as "Frou-Frou" - to swoosh her hoop skirts around New Orleans and playfully toy with the heart-strings of not one, but two, gentlemen. It makes for engrossing soap. Barbara O'Neil earned the role of Ellen ( Scarlett's mother ) in Gone with the Wind, thanks to her performance in this film as Frou-Frou's sister. 

George O'Brien - A Heroic Man

"Gorgeous George" and "The Torso" were just a few of the many nicknames of hunky actor George O'Brien throughout the 1920s and 1930s. And very fitting titles these were. Not only was George a charismatic actor, but he boasted one of the finest physiques in Hollywood. Clothing looked unnatural on him since his muscles always seemed like they were about to bust his shirts apart. Here was a truly rugged man. O'Brien's leading ladies never feared danger when he was by their side. 

George had all the attributes of a natural born cowboy. Hence, saddles and spurs suited him well. Between 1929-1940, O'Brien starred in over 35 westerns, most of them for RKO studios. This association with westerns began as far back as 1922, when he first came to Hollywood from San Francisco. His father was Frisco's chief of police. George not only inherited his father's physical prowess, but strove to emulate his values in being honorable and serving others. In high school, he played football, baseball, track and field, and swimming, and when World War I broke out, he joined the Navy, serving first on a submarine chaser and then as a stretcher bearer where he earned five decorations for bravery under fire. 

George also learned how to box in the Navy. In fact, he was so good in the ring that he won the light-heavyweight Pacific fleet boxing title. When he returned to college, he found visits to the RKO studios more absorbing then his studies and decided to enter pictures. Stunt work in westerns led to a few supporting roles in silents, which caught the eye of John Ford who was looking for a leading man to play in his western epic The Iron Horse. O'Brien was ideal. This part not only earned plaudits for O'Brien and a ten-year RKO contract, but John Ford became a life-long friend. 

Noah's Ark 

Several silent films followed, including Fig Leaves and Three Bad Men, both of which starred O'Brien's sweetheart Olive Borden. And then, in 1927, he starred in F. W. Murnau's silent film classic Sunrise : A Song of Two Humans ( 1927 ). His performance of "The Man" who gets lured away from his wife and child by a city woman, is still O'Brien's most recognized work, and a fan favorite. Janet Gaynor may have been the film's Academy Award nominee, but it was George who gave the standout performance as the sensitive husband. He personally loved the part and was proud of his work in Sunrise. In 1979, at the end of a screening of Sunrise in New York City, he received a standing ovation for his performance and was moved to tears. 

George found westerns the most exciting films to work on, and since he loved to ride ( and audiences loved to see him sport a cowboy hat ) he was frequently cast in the genre. O'Brien quickly became a favorite B-western star for RKO appearing in such films as Lone Star Ranger, Riders of the Purple Sage, The Golden West, Frontier Marshal, and The Renegade Ranger ( 1938 ) which co-starred Tim Holt, who would become his successor as RKO's top western star. 

George's films tended to follow a formula, usually beginning with his character having a chance encounter with the leading lady who would express her dislike for such a rogue as he ( much like the Errol Flynn films of the late 1930s ). Then they would find themselves in danger and his winning smile would make her realize how she misjudged him; finally ending with them being involved in a dangerous situation and him demonstrating his fisticuffs technique on the villains in order to save them both. 

O'Brien as a miner in Hard Rock Harrigan ( 1935 )

George always liked to flash a grin in the face of danger. He usually found every situation amusing...never worrying about the outcome. Take, for example, Windjammer ( 1937 ). In this film O'Brien has the simple task of delivering a subpoena to a commodore aboard his yacht. In doing so, he finds himself on the vessel bound for Hawaii, working in the galley as a cook. He never grumbles about the task, but thoroughly enjoys it. Later, when gunrunners kidnap them, they are taken to China, and then the Commodore and his daughter find George to be a kindly ally, relying upon him to take them out of danger. 

Expecting this formula is what makes his films so entertaining, and since most of them were merely 60 minutes long, they were fast fun packed with plenty of action. 

Two happy Irishmen : O'Brien and Tracy

In 1933, George married Marguerite Churchill ( The Big Trail ) whom he met when making Riders of the Purple Sage that same year. They had three children, Brian, who died in infancy; Darcy, who became a popular true-crime novelist; and Orin O'Brien, who is considered to be one of the foremost double bassists in the history of the New York Philharmonic orchestra. 

Their marriage was a happy one....until World War II, when George re-joined the Navy and served in the Pacific for the length of the war. Like many veterans, he came back a changed man, and Marguerite filed for divorce shortly thereafter. George never re-married but stayed on friendly terms with Marguerite. 

George continued to appear in westerns upon his return to Hollywood, notably John Ford's Fort Apache and She Wore a Yellow Ribbon, but roles were few for an aging cowboy, and so George went back into active service, not only to help America settle the mess taking place in Korea, but in Vietnam as well. George was a highly decorated naval officer and was recommended for the rank of admiral four times. 

When his term of service had ended, he retired to a ranch in Broken Arrow, Oklahoma, living the life of a true American cowboy up until his death in 1985 at the age of 86. 

Beau Geste ( 1926 )

In 1926 Percival Christopher Wren's best-selling novel "Beau Geste" was brought to the screen in a thrilling silent adaptation by John Russell and Herbert Brenon. It was a film that inspired director William Wellman and launched numerous remakes ( including Wellman's own 1939 version of Beau Geste ).  

Ronald Colman, Neil Hamilton and Ralph Forbes star in the lead roles of three English brothers who join the Foreign Legion after one of them is accused of stealing a family jewel known as "The Blue Water". They find that becoming real soldiers is a far cry from the game of soldiers they played in their youth, especially with a bestial sergeant ( Noah Berry ) and a greasy rat ( William Powell ) in their company. 

Beau Geste could be called a war film, but it would be better to classify it as a mystery, for director Herbert Brenon established a riddle of events within the first fifteen minutes that draws audiences into discovering what the remaining story has to tell. Unlike most mysteries, it unravels its narrative working backwards to a solution.

Beau Geste begins with a troop of Foreign Legion soldiers marching towards a fort announcing their coming and receiving no response from the trumpeteer within. When the leader of the troop, Major de Beaujolais, investigates closer he finds that all of the soldiers standing guard around the fort are corpses, leaning with their guns pointed outwards in readiness for an attack. He asks for a volunteer to climb the walls and open the gates from within, but this man too disappears and so the Major scales the walls himself and finds the dead body of the commander clasping a letter in his hand...a letter addressed to Scotland Yard, confessing a crime that he had committed. The major returns to his soldiers outside of the gate but within a few minutes turns to find that the fort is going up in flames. A bonfire of corpses standing alone in the desert. What could it all mean? 

Paramount united with its rival, Famous Players, to bring Beau Geste to the screen, releasing it in the autumn of 1926. Critics at the time thought the film would have only a mediocre run, underestimating audiences ability to endure an "epic length" film ( 120 minutes ). Little did they realize that within twenty years this would become a standard running time. Beau Geste quickly became Paramount's biggest hit of the year and one of the greatest box-office successes of the entire decade. 

Some of the era's most popular stars worked together to make the film such a roaring success....Ronald Colman, who was being groomed as a rival to Rudolph Valentino, the legendary actor Neil Hamilton, William Powell, Ralph Forbes, Victor McLagen, Alice Joyce ( as the boys mother ), and Mary Brian as their love interest. 

Norman Trevor receives the choicest role as Major de Beaujolais, the man who first discovers the mysterious Citadel of the Dead with its legions of dead soldiers standing guard. As Sergeant LeJaune, Noah Berry demonstrates a glorious slice of ham in a performance which would have earned him an Academy Award had the awards been established at that time. 

Beau Geste is silent cinema at its best, combining elements of adventure, mystery and romance in one tight production and we highly recommend it as an introductory film for those who have not yet had a taste of silent cinema. 

This post is our contribution to The Silent Cinema Blogathon being hosted by In the Good Old Days of Classic Hollywood and running from Oct. 27 - Oct. 29, 2015. Be sure to check out all the great articles on your silent film favorites.