This is a rediscovered film and there is no more pleasant
watch than seeing something that, until 2023, was considered gone for good and
yet, here it is, looking wonderful with restored tints, a ghostly crispness and
accompanied by Stephen Horne on top form accompanying himself. I’d previously
seen it in Pordenone at Il Cinema del Cinema Muto in 2024 and now it is
available for all to see streaming from the splendid National Film Preservation
Fund website: a gift to the film community and one we must not only celebrate
but support (donation details at the bottom).
Watching the film in luxury of this Englishman’s castle, with a single Bolonoodle dog standing in for the Duke of Shetland’s lurchers and more self-service than he’d have been used to from his various servants in his grand Scottish caisteal, I was struck by the excellence of Director Maurice Tourneur’s framing and the dynamics of shots in which his human components are moved with such interest and effect. As Dick goes in search Captain McClintock there’s the profile of an older woman against an arch and as our hero proceeds, figures walk towards him staggering…. At first I thought it was my mate Colin’s Dad getting arrested yet again on Liverpool’s Dock Road after closing time but, similar sailors, different port.
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| Frame that and put it on your wall. |
Every scene is like a painting for Tourneur… albeit with moving
parts and whilst the camera is mobile there are so many tableaux that catch the
eye such as the hunting party sequences and the vivid, recreation of the Stock
Market with sunlight casting beams over a frenzied floor of traders pushed to
the limits, investments going up in smoke as the dealers chomp hard on the
cigars of defeat.
Based on the play of the same name by Cecil Raleigh and
Henry Hamilton which opened on Drury Lane in 1897, with multiple scenes and a
running time of some four hours including a climactic underwater sequence in
which two divers fight to the death. I would love to know more about the stage
technology of the time but clearly putting on a spectacular show was key to
success then as now and it ran for years on Broadway as well as in London. The
reviewer in Punch 2nd October 1897 was impressed, if sardonic
(hi bro’!), remarking on the “capital dialogue (when not melodramatic)…” of the
new drama at the Old Drury Theatre which combined with the “smiling villainy”
of Mr Henry Neville and the musical accompaniment of Mr Glover in the
orchestra, was encouraging packed houses: “nightly, a congested district”…
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| Mabel Ballin roamin' in the gloamin'... |
Also praised was “… the admirable acting of Mrs John
Wood, which is beyond all praise” and, hinting at the technical side of things
suggesting that “Were all the iron-work machinery to collapse (as in fact it
did one night and the theatre had to be closed), the drama could go on as its
mainstay, its chief support is Wood…” The review mentions the White Heather was
seen to ascend heavenwards “quite a wonder of the deep!” and the villain played
by Neville ends up attired in a diver’s attire… his huge diver’s helmet and
mute demise raising a few titters before the hero despatches him with further
blows and a dramatic flourish. It must have been some spectacle but we have a
film to consider and this is right up Maurice’s waterway!
Kate Rorke played the heroine in the Drury production – “self-effacing with not much to say…” and Mr Neville, played Lord Angus Cameron. In Tourneur’s film we have Holmes Herbert as Lord Angus Cameron and Mabel Ballin as Marion Hume and, as luck would have it, having not much to say is pretty much her advantage in this silent film, with the director focusing on her emoting as the extent of her betrayal is revealed.
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| Lord Angus promises financial ruin to Marian's father unless he keeps quiet... |
The story is a mix of financial intrigue, the perils of
marrying below oneself, the need for effective auditing and corporate
governance as well as the dangers of marrying at sea, even if everything is
above board and in accordance with Scottish Law. Against this is a good-hearted
woman backed by an array of loyal friends and family although not all filial
relationships in the film are unconditional, far from it. Ultimately it comes
down to a battle beneath the waves as mentioned in the above play, this is a
cinematic tour-de-force, with some realistic aqua-action and peril!
We start in England where the black sheep of the Shetland Clan, Lord Angus Cameron, has run his business into the ground. Initially you feel some sympathy for the man, especially when he goes to ask for help from his rich uncle, the Duke of Shetland who aware of his nephew’s wayward approach to fiscal irresponsibility advises that he really ought to marry a well to do lass of his own station before he could consider a loan. Luckily he has the exact person in mind and it’s Hermione de Vaux (a stunning but uncredited Gertrude Astor) who he offers to match-make.
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| Lady Hermione and Lord Angus - the ruling British oligarchy self perpetuates, comrades! |
We quickly learn that Angus has already been married and
to a lowly kitchen maid, Marion Hume, with whom he had an affair some years
earlier and married her either before or after their child was born. Is Angus
going to put love before duty and business or… is he just a lily-livered cad
who will stop at nothing to save his own skin no matter who gets cast aside.
Things come to a head on a hunting party when Marion and Angus’ child, a young
boy, accidentally gets hit by some shot and his mother reveals all. Angus
quickly denies it and Marion heads back to her home in London to consult her
estranged father James (Spottiswoode Aitken)
Marion, why didn’t you tell me it was Lord Angus that you
married?
Now this is a very good question and the young lady’s response is far from satisfactory as she agreed to the secrecy to prevent Angus’ relationship with the Duke from being damaged. The result cost her the good will of her father and, meant she had to find other way of bringing up their child – who is charming but surely in need of his father’s company, or perhaps not as things unravel… There’s a court case but – darn it! – the couple were married at sea aboard a ship called the White Heather and only one of the two witnesses is possibly still alive to confirm either way.
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| A glimpse of the John Gilbert we know so well, just 21 here and playing his part |
Marion has real friends though, both of whom love her so
much so that Dick Beach – played by a very youthful and skinny John Gilbert –
volunteers not to rest until he has found the missing witness, a Captain (Gibson
Gowland later of Greed and very unsettling here as always). He sets off
on a lengthy search of every bar in every port determined to clear the name and
rescue the reputation of his secret love.
If I understand you correctly, shortly after the ceremony
aboard the White Heather, the yacht sank and the evidence, namely the marriage
record, went down with the ship…
If ever an intertitle had hard work to do, this was it as
the stage is set for the dynamic second half of the story. There will be drunken
sailors, double crossers and violence and there will be an epic underwater
fight that still has us on the edge of our seats wondering how it was all done
as well as how it will all end!
Stephen’s accompaniment is a rare chance to hear him play
all of his instruments but separately with his score featuring piano, flute, accordion,
electronic keyboards and more mixed into one piece. It is full of emotionally
engaging melodies and manages to enhance the mood, appearing to be right inside
the film as usual. The shared humanity of creatives split by a century of
changes in circumstance and fashion if not the basic instinct to connect in
sympathy. This music is archeological, patiently uncovering the original feeling
of the film for those who are prepared to put down their phones to just watch, listen
and understand.
It's easy to assume that history is what happens to ther
people multiplied by time and technology but the persistent “now” can be viewed
with such clarity through this restoration and listening to this music.
You can connect right here, right now on the San Francisco Film Preserve site!
The link for donations to this most worthy cause is to be found here.
About the Restoration – from the NFPF site:
Long presumed lost, a tinted and toned nitrate print of
The White Heather was discovered at Eye Filmmuseum in Amsterdam in 2023.
Because no original titles are known to survive, new English language titles
have been created. The new text is based on translation of the Dutch titles and
by referencing the script for the 1897 play, The White Heather, upon which the
film is based. The title text was also reviewed in comparison to contemporary
trade press sources, the United States copyright registration, censor records,
and the published musical cue sheet. Title graphics and typography are adapted
from the style of other films produced by Maurice Tourneur Productions in the
same year. The colour tinting and toning reproduces the colouring of the
original nitrate print. This restoration is a collaboration between Eye
Filmmuseum, the San Francisco Film Preserve, and the San Francisco Silent Film
Festival. It is made possible through the generous support of the National Film
Preservation Foundation.
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| The Great Drury Lane Melodramatic Success... even in 1919 this was worth quoting! |
