In the first and second decades of the last century, the silent cinema was master of visual arts worldwide, and Hollywood was the main and indisputable focus of film production and creation. Those were the years of David Wark Griffith, Chaplin, among other giants; American Thomas H. Ince is one of the filmmakers who had the privilege of working with the greatest geniuses of cinema in his country, those who never reached their level of fame or popularity, but he has his place earned for those who know the history of cinema beyond its highest and unavoidable exponents. The good filmmaker Ince this time shots what would be one of his most celebrated and remembered exercises, a film in which prints with passionate force his feelings towards the context in which he lived, the effervescent war scenario, years before the First World War. So it tells the director the story of an earl, distinguished individual who participates in a war, commanding a submarine, disobeys orders of the King himself to whom he serves, flouts the order to bomb a defenseless boat of civilians, dies in combat, but Jesus Christ will rise him again, and return to earth through him to correct the situation. Without using bright stars, but with a large budget, sets Ince one of his most respectable works, but as well on of the lesser known, although not a few successes and virtues has the feature.
Having seen some texts talking about civilization and some of its contradictions, we are located in the city of Nurma, where people carry out their activities without worrying. The king of the nation (Herschel Mayall) also appears in talks with military commanders, the country is hotly debated between entering directly to an imminent war, or continue following peace initiatives, as advises the lawyer Luther Rolf (J. Frank Burke). There is an inventor serving the king, Count Ferdinand (Howard Hickman), to whom the monarch himself entrusts to put his inventions at the service of the court, promising great benefits. Finally the king is carried away by some of his advisers, approves the fight, the state enters the war, and many young people start departing to fight for the country, leaving wives, mothers and fathers teared apart. Count Ferdinand also departs, leaving Katheryn Haldemann (Enid Markey), grief-stricken, both love each other, but duty comes first for him. Ferdinand, already in combat, runs a submarine, and when he receives orders to mercilessly destroy a small boat carrying civilians, disobeys the mandate, dies in battle. But Jesus Christ himself revives him, He takes possession of his body, and preaches the good on Earth again, taking interaction even with the King, who will assume a new attitude after a revelation.
The beginning of the picture will already be diagramming the nature of the movie that we are about to witness, when repeated text boxes go gliding figures and religious beliefs that are not put into practice; references to Christ, to love our alikes, love the neighbor as oneself, thoughts that many walk hawking, but not put into practice. The film even states dedicated to those beings who not only speak of the lip, but apply it in daily life; thus the two main guidelines for where the film will flow have already been presented, the peace movement on the one hand, and on the other the deep religiosity that permeates the film completely. It is one of the first films to present Jesus Christ as a character in the picture, in portraying the son of God as an element of the story, almost like another human, and, as expected in such a representation, obtained mixed results this resource, some branding as banal this kind of representation, others positively extolling such daring depict. And, if it was used before certain allegories (civilization and its ruthlessness against the weak and helpless that in later lines will be discussed), for the theme of Christ there are no tricks or symbolic analogies, we are here presented frontally, directly to what is desired; it is Jesus Christ who has returned to Earth, has returned to the world of men, He has returned and touts his message, an already ambitious theme, and a way to present even more ambitious again. As if that was not enough, incidentally reinforces the general feeling of the film, pacifism, opposition to violence and war, in the form of the Redeemer himself speaking directly to the king. Ince's film is also distinguished by promptly introducing duality he wants to expose, not taking sides irrevocably by a feeling, without paying attention to the other end, but the opposite. Counterposes the director both perspectives, both approaches, facing both ways of seeing things, first with a king who receives constant exhortations to start the war, but later it contrasts with the grief of the families who see their young fellows departing to war. Duality, bifacial drama develops rapidly, drama reinforced by strong, expressive, pathetic images, such as invalid mother, lying on the floor on his wheelchair, weeping helplessly to send his son, all she has in the world, to war, to a likely death.
We see shots of the city, its crowd, and by the way of this, shots with crowds, known was his fondness for controlling scenes such as these, that in certain pictures Ince even hired additional extras, apart from the numerous which already had his production. We will ppreciate large shots covering everything, but also other frames where centrally-designed images appear, where the center of these images are vanishing point, such as the King in the opening minutes, chatting and having abolished with the military authorities in the portrayed table. In some of the frames for the first few minutes of the film, already is appreciating the thoroughness and planning in the direction that both have characterized the films of Ince, in the design and composition of his images, and the way we are present to them. The narrative and expressive language of the director is rather sober, as mentioned, good composition, good frames but static, lacking movements or travellings, something not inconsistent with the year of film, 1915; rigorous filmmaker shone in other fields of audiovisual expression, while in the dynamics, ease and camera movement, was rather little given to experiments. Thus, without being aesthetic, visual beauty, one of the main characteristics of the films of American director, we will observe some nice chiaroscuro, beautiful and powerful color contrast in some outdoors sequences with the sky and clouds as a counterpoint to the dark soil. Or when Ferdinand, dead, began his metaphysical journey to know Jesus, again we see the contrast; there is appreciated a good job in the field of photography. Worthy to emphasize, yes, the resources used to surreal dream sequences or to generate
unfoldings, with image overlays to achieve these effects, also some fading effects for certain images. All set a correct final result of those sequences, where the divine epiphany is portrayed, interaction also with the king, warmly a double-plane interaction is depicted, dream-realistic interaction, something appreciable for then-cinema. We even travel to conscience of the character, the king, with the moral dilemma he is having after the epiphany with Jesus Christ, the journey into the psyche of the character, a significant resource and, for the time, relatively new.
In that sense, it is also remarkable that the film portrays a metaphysical atmosphere, extra-human environment, a kind of Dantesque journey, when the soul of Count trips to another world, trips -after that great chiaroscuro quoted before- to a world among tormented souls. Dark space where he will find Christ, shady and dense representation which is
his version of those metaphysicians issues, broadly interesting that the picture is a personal version by Ince of both the surreal environment, and the Calvary of Christ, seen contemporaneously. The war sequence is also well made, frantic and literally explosive sequence portraying correct and vividly, for the time, war hell, the nightmare of war, gunfire, explosions everywhere, bodies flying through the air. The film is, as used to happen with Ince, a film of high-profile, a high budget work, which apparently has in these elaborate and frantic images of war a justification to that budget, because outside that for the time visually colorful display, we don't find greater feats. Among the figures that develops the feature we have the biggest paradox of all, with the war, the most pathetic and cruel
achievement of civilization, claiming lives everywhere, we have the so-called civilization, which has no mercy on wrecking and destroying the weak and defenseless. Manifest allegory have this matter in the good Count Ferdinand flouting orders, he disobeys his king, flouts civilization, rejects abusing the weak and defenseless ship carrying civilians, figure where we see symbolized the absurdity, the paradox of civilization, a way of organizing which finally seeks the destruction, extinction of life. As the central character, the conflict in the mind of the protagonist, Ferdinand, is vital, he is an exemplary vassal for the king, but above all is a servant of the Lord, is torn between God and the unquenchable thirst for blood of men. However, and according to the tone of the film, there is room for redemption, to retrain, like the king, moralizing and religiously Christian is certainly above all the feature. It is a spirited and daring manifesto, in the days when film titans like Griffith and Chaplin -just to mention those who shone in North America- were eclipsing colleagues, the prolific Ince resists, will not be the major focus or receive greatest praises, but is an important part of the history of American cinema (it is said that the film helped Woodrow Wilson to get reelected as Yankee president), in his propagandistic content, even he portrays often the peace corps, a team of courageous nurses who put their grain of sand on the national target. Some catalog the movie as masterpiece, others just as a good picture; the fact is that is a fundamental part of the stage of American silent films, an extraordinary feature.
In the first and second decades of the last century, the silent cinema was master of visual arts worldwide, and Hollywood was the main and indisputable focus of film production and creation. Those were the years of David Wark Griffith, Chaplin, among other giants; American Thomas H. Ince is one of the filmmakers who had the privilege of working with the greatest geniuses of cinema in his country, those who never reached their level of fame or popularity, but he has his place earned for those who know the history of cinema beyond its highest and unavoidable exponents. The good filmmaker Ince this time shots what would be one of his most celebrated and remembered exercises, a film in which prints with passionate force his feelings towards the context in which he lived, the effervescent war scenario, years before the First World War. So it tells the director the story of an earl, distinguished individual who participates in a war, commanding a submarine, disobeys orders of the King himself to whom he serves, flouts the order to bomb a defenseless boat of civilians, dies in combat, but Jesus Christ will rise him again, and return to earth through him to correct the situation. Without using bright stars, but with a large budget, sets Ince one of his most respectable works, but as well on of the lesser known, although not a few successes and virtues has the feature.
We see shots of the city, its crowd, and by the way of this, shots with crowds, known was his fondness for controlling scenes such as these, that in certain pictures Ince even hired additional extras, apart from the numerous which already had his production. We will ppreciate large shots covering everything, but also other frames where centrally-designed images appear, where the center of these images are vanishing point, such as the King in the opening minutes, chatting and having abolished with the military authorities in the portrayed table. In some of the frames for the first few minutes of the film, already is appreciating the thoroughness and planning in the direction that both have characterized the films of Ince, in the design and composition of his images, and the way we are present to them. The narrative and expressive language of the director is rather sober, as mentioned, good composition, good frames but static, lacking movements or travellings, something not inconsistent with the year of film, 1915; rigorous filmmaker shone in other fields of audiovisual expression, while in the dynamics, ease and camera movement, was rather little given to experiments. Thus, without being aesthetic, visual beauty, one of the main characteristics of the films of American director, we will observe some nice chiaroscuro, beautiful and powerful color contrast in some outdoors sequences with the sky and clouds as a counterpoint to the dark soil. Or when Ferdinand, dead, began his metaphysical journey to know Jesus, again we see the contrast; there is appreciated a good job in the field of photography. Worthy to emphasize, yes, the resources used to surreal dream sequences or to generate unfoldings, with image overlays to achieve these effects, also some fading effects for certain images. All set a correct final result of those sequences, where the divine epiphany is portrayed, interaction also with the king, warmly a double-plane interaction is depicted, dream-realistic interaction, something appreciable for then-cinema. We even travel to conscience of the character, the king, with the moral dilemma he is having after the epiphany with Jesus Christ, the journey into the psyche of the character, a significant resource and, for the time, relatively new.
In that sense, it is also remarkable that the film portrays a metaphysical atmosphere, extra-human environment, a kind of Dantesque journey, when the soul of Count trips to another world, trips -after that great chiaroscuro quoted before- to a world among tormented souls. Dark space where he will find Christ, shady and dense representation which is his version of those metaphysicians issues, broadly interesting that the picture is a personal version by Ince of both the surreal environment, and the Calvary of Christ, seen contemporaneously. The war sequence is also well made, frantic and literally explosive sequence portraying correct and vividly, for the time, war hell, the nightmare of war, gunfire, explosions everywhere, bodies flying through the air. The film is, as used to happen with Ince, a film of high-profile, a high budget work, which apparently has in these elaborate and frantic images of war a justification to that budget, because outside that for the time visually colorful display, we don't find greater feats. Among the figures that develops the feature we have the biggest paradox of all, with the war, the most pathetic and cruel achievement of civilization, claiming lives everywhere, we have the so-called civilization, which has no mercy on wrecking and destroying the weak and defenseless. Manifest allegory have this matter in the good Count Ferdinand flouting orders, he disobeys his king, flouts civilization, rejects abusing the weak and defenseless ship carrying civilians, figure where we see symbolized the absurdity, the paradox of civilization, a way of organizing which finally seeks the destruction, extinction of life. As the central character, the conflict in the mind of the protagonist, Ferdinand, is vital, he is an exemplary vassal for the king, but above all is a servant of the Lord, is torn between God and the unquenchable thirst for blood of men. However, and according to the tone of the film, there is room for redemption, to retrain, like the king, moralizing and religiously Christian is certainly above all the feature. It is a spirited and daring manifesto, in the days when film titans like Griffith and Chaplin -just to mention those who shone in North America- were eclipsing colleagues, the prolific Ince resists, will not be the major focus or receive greatest praises, but is an important part of the history of American cinema (it is said that the film helped Woodrow Wilson to get reelected as Yankee president), in his propagandistic content, even he portrays often the peace corps, a team of courageous nurses who put their grain of sand on the national target. Some catalog the movie as masterpiece, others just as a good picture; the fact is that is a fundamental part of the stage of American silent films, an extraordinary feature.
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