Cinematic LiquidationTitle seen via the online portion of the 44th Pordenone Silent Film Festival: www.giornatedelcinemamuto.it/en/(EDIT: And now is available online here: filmpreserve.org/restoration/the-white-heather/ )Ah, so that’s the “liquidation” of which the stock brokers speak: underwater cinematography of a fight to the death over a marriage certificate. And, fortunately, it’s not only marriage certificates in waterproof casing that people are trying to recover, The White Heather itself being a recent rediscovery and restoration circulating the film festivals. In its time, it’s as if the film were made solely to capitalize on the cinema-of-attractions popularity of John Ernest Williamson’s submarine camerawork made famous in the 1916 adaptation of 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, and, admittedly, it’s a fascinating scene and the highlight of the picture. Not that Maurice Tourneur wasn’t one of Hollywood’s best directors at the time, either, but his Victory or the same year, for instance, I remember being superior (plus A Girl's Folly, The Poor Little Rich Girl (both 1917), The Blue Bird, and Prunella (both 1918) is the lost film I especially wanted found).Regardless, the second highlight here is the archway-camera-masked sequence of John Gilbert, in a supporting role as Dick Beach, searching every gin joint and seedy corner for Gibson Gowland’s (of Greed (1924) fame) Captain Hudson, another proof of the plot’s contested marriage, as he oversaw the ceremony. The eyebrows on those two alone are a more compelling watch than the rest of the cast. Of course, what all of the narrative’s contested marriage business is over is inherited wealth. That’s more powerful than all the gambling going on over at the stock exchange.Anyways, more interesting than the melodrama potboiler is that Jack struck me here as looking similar to Robert Pattinson. I guess it’s been a while since I’ve seen the would-be silent film star sans mustache and looking so lanky and long-haired. Not that it’s a chore to get through the 70-minutes runtime, either, but the plot could’ve been streamlined a bit more without the redundancy of the Dick and Alec roles. Also, speaking of submerged film, the tinting/toning is lovely.
It's always a celebration when a lost silent film is found, but in my house it's extra special when that lost silent film stars a young John Gilbert (still credited as Jack!). I wasn't able to attend the world premiere of the Eye Film, SF Film Preserve, and SF Silent Film Festival restoration at MoMA's To Save and Project in January, so god bless Pordenone SIlent for including it in their online offerings this year.It's so interesting to watch his pre-fame days where he is clearly still having a blast playing characters untethered by his matinee idol star persona. Here he plays a groundskeeper in love with the housekeeper who has been discarded by her secret husband, Lord Angus, who then does everything he can to find the captain of the ship where the secret marriage took place. He's weird and he's sometimes over the top but you can see he's having a blast. And the camera? It already loves his intense, striking eyes that seem to look directly into your soul. Gilbert is fifth billed but he runs away (sometimes literally) with the film, and it's easy to see how he became such a big star a few years later. This film is pure melodrama, but between Gilbert's heightened performance, Mabel Ballin's tender performance as the slighted woman, that insane diving sequence, and Maurice Tourneur's poetic framing and engaging sense of visual storytelling (he often has a whole world outside the story of the film happening in the margins of the frame) this has been the highlight of this year's festival for me so far. I still wish I could have seen John Gilbert's magnificent face on the big screen though. GCM 44 - #10
I dunno, surely, he could've extorted money from her father if her father had enough money to sue him for denying marrying his daughter? hUH at that plot. Like what? ..??!Anyway, shout out to Cineanalyst for letting me know The White Heather made its way onto SFFP's website. #blessedWhy? Because I'm here for John (billed as Jack here) Gilbert without a moustache as he was in his earlier films. 2025 has gifted me three of his talkies and now one of his silents. Now I'll wait for the infamous His Glorious Night which premiered on TCM earlier this week. One day, one day. look at all that emoting, can anyone do dejected so well, yeah I went back to screengrab a lot (p.s. freebie Gibson Gowland's shadow giving him horns, that's called proper lighting and cinematography, mwah)My favourite part in Tourneur's silent was when Jack was like IMMA FIND HIM, *POOFS FROM FRAME* Magic. The restoration is stunning as is the color tinting. You can read about the restoration process here. Interesting that it was found without any intertitles. What a task to splice a film with guesstimated dialogue. They did a marvelous job.
