"ME AND MY DOG" (c. 1925, produced by Robert Bruce)

This delightful one-reeler is one of scores that Robert Bruce made in
twenties for release through Paramount. Fox and sundry other companies.
While the names of Burton Holmes and James Fitzpatrick have been remembered,
the name of Bruce has somehow fallen by the wayside This is a pity, for there
is more feeling for, and love of, the outdoors in Bruce's films than in those of
any of his contemporaries. "Me and My Dog" is as simple as its title - Bruce and
a canine friend (plus an unobtrusive cameraman) wandering through the Rockies. The
camerawork is a joy to behold, and some of the compositions could not have been bettered
by Tisse

"ALASKAN ADVENTURES"  Pathe. 1925. Two-reels. Premiered at the Roxy. New York. Produced by
                                   John Morton Allen. directed and photographed by Jack Robertson. Asst.
                                  Cameraman - Wylie Wells Kelly; edited and titled by Paul Hugon.

Something of a forerunner to Disney's True-Life adventure series. "Alaskan Adventure" is a
somewhat shapeless but nonetheless fascinating account of an expedition into Alaska by
hunters armed only with bows and arrows. While the reason for the expedition remains somewhat
obscure, the footage that emerges is first-class - taking in pleasing studies of wild-life,
and thrilling footage of the party crossing the frozen but thawing Yukon river, and the
subsequent breaking up of the ice. Incidentally, much of the footage that appears in this film
has been on the stock shot market for many years now, some scenes turning up in such unlikely
places as "The Return of the Ape Man", a cheap Lugosi horror thriller!

"WHITE SHADOWS IN THE SOUTH SEAS"  MGM 1928 - nine reels.. (2 hrs. 10 mins approx)
                                                          Directed by W. S. Van Dyke. Based on the book by
Frederick O'Brien; produced and photographed on location with the native tribes of the
Marquesa Islands in the South Seas; adaptation by Ray Doyle; continuity - Jack Cunningham;
Photography by Clyde de Vinna. George Nogle and Bob Roberts: Titles by John Colton Props -
Harry Albiez; Grips - Pop Arnold; original musical score (not on this print) by Major Edward
Bowes. David Mendoza and William Axt. Theme song "Flower of Love" published by Irving Berlin Inc.
Starring: MONTE BLUE (Dr. Mathew Lloyd); RAQUEL TORRES (Fayaway); Robert Anderson (Sebastien)
Rene Bush (Lucy, a native girl).
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A program note by Charles Shibuk:

Late in 1927, Irving Thalberg, production chief at MGM, decided to make a large-scale
adventure film in the South Seas which would combine documentary backgrounds with a
fictional story. Frederick O'Brien's South Seas tale of adventure was chosen as the most
likely vehicle. Thalberg offered the director's Job to Robert Flaherty whose work with the
Polynesian natives on "Moana" qualified him as an expert on South Seas filmmaking.
Flaherty accepted the assignment on      this studio-backed story film only because of his
inability to find work elsewhere. One mitigating factor was Flaherty's friendship for author
0'Brien, in whose work he had long expressed filmic interest.

            However, leery of sending an individualistic director like Flaherty (whose 1920
"Means" was not a spectacular boxoffice success) alone to the South Seas, Thalberg appointed Woodbridge Strong Van Dyke II, an "expert on outdoor films", associate director. Van Dyke's
previous experience was mainly on serials and westerns in which he had directed such stars
as Ruth Roland, Jack Dempsey and Buck Jones; and he had also been instrumental in launching
Tim McCoy on his spectacular career. At this particular time, both the western film and Van
Dyke were in decline.

Thus, on November 30 1927, the two directors, the actors, Monte Blue, Racquel Torres (her
first American film) and Robert Anderson (from the Danish cinema) and a crew of fourteen
set out for the island of Papeete to start production. After a short period of preliminary
work, Flaherty unfortunately found that working under the studio system with an unsympathetic
crew who would rather loaf than work, was an impossibility, and he found himself forced to
resign. (Stories and rumors that Flaherty was fired are quite untrue and without foundation).
W.S. Van Dyke, doing second unit work at this time, was hastily placed is charge of the
production by the front office. This gave him the chance to make a really big film on his own.

Production on the film was completed in four months, and the budget only slightly exceeded
half-a-mlllion dollars. Van Dyke rightfully received sole directorial credit, and with the
exception of some dozen shots by Flaherty, the film was completely his. It is of course
interesting to speculate on what Flaherty would have done had he been able to complete the
film, Paul Rotha has no doubt that it would have surpassed his work on "Moana".

Back in Hollywood, sound was revolutionizing the picture business. Louis B. Mayer, studio
at MGM, decided to turn Van Dyke's production into the studio's first sound film. Music,
native chants, sound effects (remember the scene where the white hero teaches the Polynesian
girl to whistle?), and a sequence in which Van Dyke verbalized the credits, were dubbd in
at studio. A huge publicity campaign soon followed.

The world premiere of the film was held at Grauman's Chinese Theatre in Hollywood. Flying in
from New York came D.W. Griffith to pay his respects to Van Dyke who had served under him as
an assistant director on "Intolerance" twelve years earlier. At the end of the screening,
Griffith introduced Van Dyke to the audience by stating "WHITE SHADOWS IN THE SOUTH SEAS"
is a work of art, and Woody Van Dyke is the artist who brought it into being".

The film was the turning point in Vas Dyke's career as a director, acclaimed as an artistic
as well as a popular success. Although the film was "less pure than "Moana" (Bardeche and
Brasillach) it had the same virtues as Flaherty's film. Fine acting by natives (as well as
stars) combined with Clyde De Vinna's breathtaking natural photography prompted Paul Rotha
to admit, grudgingly: "White Shadows ...... will remain memorable for its liquid sunlight,
its gently swaying palms, its white-clouded skies, its far-reaching stretches of hot sand and
beach ... it ranks with "The General Line" and "Moana" as being a perfect example of the
beautiful decorative values of panchromatic photography".

Van Dyke's reputation as an explorer-director was made: a series of films in exotic lands
followed quickly - TRADER HORN in Africa, THE PAGAN in Tahiti; and ESKIMO in Alaska. Van
Dyke also turned out such solid boxoffice attractions as TARZAN THE APE MAN, THE THIN MAN
(and several sequels), NAUGHTY MARIETTA, SAN FRANCISCO and MARIE ANTOINETTE for MGM. He died
in harness in February, 1943, just after the completion of JOURNEY FOR MARGARET in which
MGM introduced child star Margaret O'Brien to her adoring public.

                                                                                  Charles Shibuk.

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A few concluding notes to Mr. Shibuk's concise summary. First, our print is the complete
nine-reel version, and every frame is there. This is the first NY showing in many years, and
a rare item indeed. Although made as late as 1927-8, the film still employed very much of
a silent speed in its camerawork. Most films made in that period can safely be run off at
the standard sound 24 frames per second. At that speed, "White Shadows" hops about like
"Intolerance" at the same speed, We will of course be showing it at the admittedly
arbitrary but vastly preferable 16 frames per second.

It is strange that Flaherty should have been so generally disinterested in the production, as
it is far from a "Hollywood" film. If it is romanticised, it is romanticised in the tradition
of "Tabu" rather than "Aloma of the South Seas". The only notable Hollywood touch (other than
some technical trickery in a storm sequence) is the inevitable episode of the hero accidentally
coming across some island damsels disporting themselves nude in a pool. The "thrill" of the
clamphell episode, when a diver is menaced by both octopus and shark, may be a trifle contrived
but no more so than the shark-hunting in "Man of Aran", or the tussle with the alligator in
Flaherty's Louisiana film. Rotha's grudging praise of the film as it emerged, and his implied
suggestion that Flaherty, if left alone, could have made a masterpiece from it, is typical of
the intellectual snobbery directed at the Hollywood film. More to the point would have been
to have pondered the question of how much better "Man of Aran" might have been if Van Dyke
had directed it!

Incidentally, Van Dyke's use of gauze before the cameras not only produces some strikingly
beautiful shots, but in the climax particularly, is probably more genuinely creative than this
device has ever been before or since, One of Van Dyke's assistants on the film, be the way,
was Lesley Selander. Selander had also worked with Van Dyke on his excellent series of silent
Tim McCoy westerns (one of the finest series of "lesser" westerns ever made) and from 1936 on
was himself a top-flights director of westerns, both "A" and "B". Van Dyke made some 80 pictures
all told, of which "White Shadows" is undoubtably one of the most famous. Star Monte Blue
is still spasmodically active, mainly in bit roles.

While in itself condemning the white man's spoiling of the island paradises, "White Shadows" and
its production unit seems to have followed the same pattern!  Flaherty told bitter stories of
the crew lolling around in the sun, listening to radio broadcasts from the Coconut Grove. And
the unusually elaborate camerawork indicates that the islands must have been a mad maze of
pot-holes and discarded camera-tracks when the unit finally sailed home!
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                                        EXTRA   PROGRAM

An additional program has been scheduled for exactly one week after "White Shadows" - on Tuesday
March 27th., same time, same place. There will be NO further notification through the mail,
so please make a note of the screening. Full program notes will be distributed at the meeting
itself.

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Program:         Two off-beat musical films on New York life in the prohibition and
                      depression year, covering the late client and early sound eras -

"B R O A D W A Y"      The silent version of Paul Fejos' fabulous hit of 1929. Famous for its
                               extravagant night-club set, and the enormous camera crane that was
                               devised to photograph it. An enormous production in every sense of the
                               word, and one that is rarely shown. Starring Glenn Tryon, Evelyn Brent,
                               Merna Kennedy, Thomas Jackson, Leslie Fenton and Paul Porcasi.

"HALLELUJAH I'M A BUM"    Lewis Milestone's lovely, under-rated, musical romance of the
                                      depression. A minor masterpiece written by Ben Hecht, with songs
                                      and musical dialogue by Rodgers and Hart. Starring Al Jolson, Madge
                                      Evans, Harry Langdon, Frank Morgan and Chester Conklin. Our print
                                      is the shortened reissue version, but it's still a thoroughly
                                      enchanting movie.

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Forthcoming shows:   April 17: "MERRY GO ROUND" with Norman Kerry and Mary Philbin; the extravagant                                            opus directed by Von Stroheim and Rupert Julian. And: NY premiere
                                           of two new experimental films.
May: The Career of Henry B. Walthall. A compilation of films following the star from 1909
        through to 1936. Many fine extracts, plus the complete GHOSTS and the outstanding
        Griffith-Biograph short "THE HOUSE WITH CLOSED SHUTTERS".

June: Frank Capra's "THAT CERTAIN THING" (1928) and shorts to be announced.

July and August - to be announced.
September - Two early features - Henry B. Walthall in D.W. Griffith's JUDITH OF BETHULIA
                                               Alan Hale in "FAST LYNNE"

October - "ROMOLA" with the Gish Sisters. Ronald Colman, William Powell.

Additional programs to be screened shortly:

William S. Hart in SQUARE DEAL SANDERSON plus RIN TIN TIN in THE NIGHT CRY
The complete PHANTOM OF THE OPERA with Lon Chaney.
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     Prog.Notes & enquiries: Bill Everon. Manhattan Towers, 2166 Broadway, NYC 24