US © 1908 American Mutoscope & Biograph Company.
Dir: D. W. Griffith. Story: based on the short story by Jack London, “Just Meat” (1907; aka “Pals”, 1908). Photog: Arthur Marvin. Cast: Harry Solter, George Gebhardt.
Filmed: 21.7.1908 (NY Studio). Rel: 21.8.1908. Copy: DCP (4K), 9'45" (from paper print, 548 ft, 15 fps); Titles: ENG.
Source: Library of Congress National Audio-Visual Conservation Center, Packard Campus, Culpeper, VA.
Film Preservation Society (FPS) / Tracey Goessel / digital scan 2017. Given the absence of original intertitles, new ones have been written by the Film Preservation Society. 2024 edition.
43rd Le Giornate del Cinema Muto (GCM), Pordenone: Early Cinema - The Biograph Project.
Grand piano: Günter Buchwald.
Viewed at Teatro Verdi with e-subtitles in Italian, 8 Oct 2024.
There is no credit information in the film itself, just the title card with the year of copyright and the name and the address of the American Mutoscope & Biograph Company, like in The Adventures of Dollie.
Tracey Goessel (GCM/FPS The Biograph Project 2024): "This early Biograph is one that film historians love to reference. Per Kemp Niver: “The legend goes that D. W. Griffith ordered the camera moved during a scene to better show the facial expressions of the actor, but here is no indication of any kind of camera movement within a scene… What Griffith actually did was to eliminate the foreground and begin the scene with the camera closer than usual to his seated actors, thereby making their expressions somewhat clearer to the audience.”"
"But writers do love to extrapolate on this example. If nothing else, this serves as a demonstration of the human tendency to take a good story and run with it. But even if Griffith didn’t cut off the actor’s feet in this film, he was to progress to do so. And For Love of Gold stands as fine documentation of a tottering baby step in the move from filming staged plays to creating cinema."
AA: Before the film Günter Buchwald treated us to a subtle performance of the second movement of Beethoven's Klaviersonate Nr. 14 op. 27 nr. 2 Quasi una fantasia ("Mondschein").
For Love of Gold is one of the earliest Jack London film adaptations - the second registered in the IMDb, only preceded by the first adaptation of The Sea Wolf (1907). The story had been published in the Cosmopolitan Magazine in 1907 - the same one that exists today, now providing sex tips for girls, still published by Hearst Communications.
For Love of Gold is a good story, echoing something timeless and absolute, like Aesop's Fables and the Parables of Jesus. A thriller, a story of crime and punishment without a detective.
A story of poison: first the rich master is drugged with chloroform. When the diamond necklace cannot be divided, the robbers poison each other.
For Love of Gold is famous for Linda Arvidson's remarks about Griffith moving his camera closer to the bandits to show their facial expressions more clearly. Every writer comments on this. I did not register any big change. For me the change took place one week earlier in The Greaser's Gauntlet.
Mostly I was impressed by the intensity of the composition, the energy of the mise-en-scène in long take and long shot.
And the "vanitas vanitatum et omnia vanitas" theme. This is not a big caper movie but a nutshell movie which shares the philosophy of the masterpieces of Huston, Fleischer, Dassin, Kubrick, Melville and Michael Mann.
...
I saw For Love of Gold in GCM's Griffith Project (DWG 37), mattino 14 October 1997 at Ridotto del Verdi on 16 mm /15 fps/ 9 min without intertitles and Neil Brand at the piano.
Moving Picture World synopsis from the Biograph Bulletin, No. 163, August 21 1908: "A STORY OF THE UNDERWORLD TOLD IN BIOGRAPH PICTURES.
O cursed lust of gold! When for thy sake
The fool throws up his interest in both worlds
First starved in this, then damn'd in that to come.
- Blair.
"True indeed are the above lines; for what will not man do for gold. No deity is more devoutly worshiped than Mammon. Men will barter eternity's crown, yield honor - all for love of gold. It is often said there is honor among thieves, but not so, as we shall see in this story."
"Two denizens of the underworld are seen in their squalid furnished room planning a robbery. Their intended victim is known to hold at all times in his safe at home a large sum of money and a wealth of jewels."
"Gathering together the tools of their nefarious calling, they start off, arriving at the house shortly after the master had retired for the night. Entrance is easily and noiselessly effected."
"A chloroform-soaked handkerchief soon puts the master beyond the power of interfering and the safe is broken open. The sight that greets them almost makes them gasp. There in this strong box is not only an enormous sum of money, but many valuable jewels as well, prominent among which is a handsome diamond necklace."
"All this is put into a cloth, and a hurried egress made. Back to their room they go to divide the spoils of their night's haul. The diamond necklace being an indivisible article, a contention is at once raised between the partners in crime. There is no way in which they seem able one to satisfy the other, so they drop the argument for the time being to eat lunch."
"One, to make sure that he shall be the possessor of the loot, drops poison in the coffee of his chum, Which he drinks, and is soon in the throes of convulsions, falling to the floor lifeless, while the other stands by sardonically gloating over his seeming victory; but his elation is short-lived, for he is now seized with the same agony and pitches forward alongside his partner."
"The two had played the same game, each unknown to the other. "Honor among thieves?"-Bah!"—Moving Picture World synopsis from the Biograph Bulletin, No. 163, August 21 1908
No comments:
Post a Comment