The Covered Wagon is a 1923 American silent movie in the Western genre released by Paramount Pictures . The director of the film, James Cruz, was based on the novel by Emerson Hough about a group of pioneers traveling in the old West from Kansas to Oregon . The role of Will Banyon was played by George Warren Kerrigan , Molly Wingate - Lois Wilson . During the journey, wanderers are waiting for the heat of the desert, the cold of snow-capped mountains, hunger and the attack of the Indians [1] .
| Covered Wagon | |
|---|---|
| Genre | , , and |
| Producer | |
| Producer | |
| Author script | |
| Operator | |
| Composer | |
| Film company | and |
| Duration | |
| A country | |
| Tongue | |
| Year | |
| IMDb | |
Released in 1923, the film entered the public domain in the United States on January 1, 2019 [2] .
Content
Cast
- J. Warren Kerrigan - Will Banion (Hero)
- Lois Wilson - Molly Wingate (heroine)
- Alan Hale - Sam Woodhall (villain)
- Ernest Torrens - William Jackson
- Tully Marshall - Jim Bridger
- Ethel Wales - Mrs. Wingate
- Charles Ogle - Jesse Wingate
- Guy Oliver - Keith Carson
- Johnny Fox - Jed Wingate
- James Cruz - Native American (scenes removed)
Tim McCoy, who appeared in the film as a technical consultant, hired several Indians for the film [3] .
Production
For its time, the film was a large-budget picture with an estimated cost of $ 782,000 [4] .
In the book Classics of the Silent Cinema (1983), radio and television presenter Joe Franklin called the film "the first American epic filmed not by Griffith ."
In the Hollywood: A Celebration of American Silent Cinema documentary, Jesse L. Laski, Jr., argued that director James Cruise's goal was "... to raise the level of Western, which was always filmed solely for the sake of money, to the status of an epic" [5] .
The film required the participation of a large number of actors and extras [6] and was shot in various places, including Palm Springs (California) [7] and several places in Nevada and Utah [8] . A dramatic scene of hunting for buffalo and crush was filmed on Antelope Island in the Great Salt Lake . During filming, seven bison from the herd were shot.
Covered vans assembled by Paramount from all over the southwest were not copies, but real wagons in which the pioneers arrived west. They were relics of the families that owned them. The film company offered owners $ 2 a day and livestock feed, if the vans were provided for filming. Most extras involved in the film are families who owned the wagons. They controlled them in front of the camera and used them for housing the rest of the time [9] .
Reviews
The film premiered on March 16, 1923 in New York . The session lasted 98 minutes. The musical accompaniment was recorded using DePhorest Phonofilm technology, but sources do not agree whether the entire film accompanied the recording or occupied a total of about two coils. A version with music was shown only at the premiere at the Rivoli Theater in New York [10] . Paramount, according to sources, with Phonofilm soundtracks also released the film Bella Donna on April 1, 1923, and also only at the premiere screening in Rivoli.
The film became the most popular 1923 film in the USA and Canada [11] . President Warren Harding liked him so much that he organized a special show at the White House in the summer of 1923.
The film was nominated for inclusion in the list of the hundred most action-packed American films for 100 years of the American Institute of Motion Picture Arts [12] .
In 1931, excerpts from Covered Wagon featured in The House That Shadows Built , released by Paramount in honor of his twentieth birthday.
Notes
- ↑ The Covered Wagon .
- ↑ Public Domain Day 2019 . Center for the Study of the Public Domain . Date of treatment November 24, 2018.
- ↑ Franklin, Joe. Classics of the Silent Screen. - Bramhall House.
- ↑ The Covered Wagon (September 8, 1924). Date of treatment October 23, 2016.
- ↑ Brownlow, Kevin. Episode "Out West", Hollywood: A Celebration of American Silent Cinema (Thames Television), 1980.
- ↑ www.cinemaweb.com . Date of treatment October 23, 2016.
- ↑ Niemann, Greg. Palm Springs Legends: creation of a desert oasis . - San Diego, California: Sunbelt Publications , 2006 .-- P. 286. ( here for Table of Contents )
- ↑ The Covered Wagon (September 8, 1924). Date of treatment October 23, 2016.
- ↑ Episode "Out West", Hollywood, 1980.
- ↑ Silent Era: Progressive Silent Film List . Date of treatment October 23, 2016.
- ↑ Variety list of box office champions for 1923
- ↑ AFI's 100 Years ... 100 Movies Nominees (PDF). Date of treatment August 20, 2016.
Links
- " Covered Wagon ” on the Internet Movie Database
- The Covered Wagon on the American Film Institute Catalog American Film Institute Catalog
- Posters and other material at silenthollywood.com
- Image of DeForest Phonofilm Corporation stock certificate and section of film from The Covered Wagon showing soundtrack
- The Covered Wagon at Virtual History
- Image of The Covered Wagon at imp awards