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The Great Train Robbery"
*** (out of ****)
The train employee is taking inventory when suddenly, in that overly dramatic acting style so common in silent movies, he expresses he hears something. He locks a safe and throws away the key. Before we know it, bandits are breaking into the room to steal what is inside of the safe.
This scene happens early in "The Great Train Robbery" (1903) and by me describing it, there may not seem to be anything special about it. Why am I highlighting this moment? Two things are important here and speak to why film historians have given this film a place in history. One, it suggests a world beyond the frame. Silent movies were silent because the technology wasn't available to record sound. But the stories told were meant to take place in the real world where sound did exist. People and things made noise. I can't tell you how many times I have watched a silent movie, and I don't mean these early 1900 movies, I mean 1920s comedies and dramas, and sound doesn't seem to exist in the world the characters are inhabiting. Characters speak and run around and no one hears them in the next room. It creates an amazing disconnect. You couldn't get away with this after the movies learned to talk. But here in 1903 we get validation that in the real world sound does exist. The character in the movie hears someone approaching the room, fears it might be trouble, and takes action. The second reason this moment in "The Great Train Robbery" is important is because another way we can read the scene is that this is an example of cross-cutting - the editing technique meant to imply two seemingly separate events are occurring simultaneously. The bandits have already boarded the train and while that is happening the employee is reacting in real time. The events are not occurring in a straight linear line.
The film was directed by Edwin S. Porter, an important pioneer in the history of cinema. Unfortunately, his name is all but forgotten and so is his work, with the possible exception of "The Great Train Robbery", which may still be shown to college film students that take a Film History 101 course. I personally first saw this movie in such a class in college.
While D.W. Griffith is often referred to as the father of American cinema and his "The Birth of A Nation" (1915) as the first American masterpiece because of the way it incorporated film techniques we take for granted today, it was Porter that is credited by historians as being the first to use the technique of cross-cutting as seen in his movies "Life of an American Fireman" (1903) and "The Great Train Robbery"- making these movies standout as significant achievements. It is why I wanted to discuss the work of Porter during this year's blog theme, Life is Short, my year long look at short films.
The movie's plot is pretty much given away by its title. The movie is about a train robbery and the eventual attempt to capture the bandits by a local posse. As the movie starts two bandits break into an office at the train station and force the employee to stop the train. The bandits beat the man and tie him up. Then they overpower the train operators, steal the valuables from the train and make their get-a-way.
And then the movie does something that was remarkable for the time period. After the bandits' story is told, we go back to the employee at the train station that was tied up. This again can be read in one of two ways. Is it an initial flashback leading to an example of cross-cutting or just cross-cutting? The employee is untied when his daughter conveniently arrives for no apparent reason. In a mad dash the employee informs a group of people - its not made clear if this is law enforcement - that the train has been robbed. The posse then goes on a hunt for the robbers, escalating to an eventual shoot-out.
Besides the cross-cutting technique, Porter and his movie make another contribution to cinema when the camera makes a pan and even a tilt. The bandits run across a stream as the camera follows them. It also goes back to my original comment where there is more inferred than what is in the frame. The bandits are actually going towards their horses, which were out of frame until the camera pans. Here is an example of a filmmaker using the camera to supply and delay information. The camera feels active as oppose to the way practically all movies were shot prior - static extreme long shots. This is exciting stuff if you have an interest in film history.
"The Great Train Robbery" is a wonderful example of how real life events influence art and how the movies can shape the mythology of those events. Many people believe one of Porter's inspirations for this movie was the noted bank and train robber Butch Cassidy. One of Cassidy's and his Wild Bunch gang's most notorious robberies for the time was the Overland Limited in Wyoming back in 1899.
The movie has been surrounded by its own mythology, for example this was
not the first Western. That honor belonged to the British film "Kidnapping by Indians" (1899) with a two-minute running time. Others claim the movie was so popular that its success caused a surge of Westerns to be made. Sources however don't back that up. When the legend becomes fact, print the legend. That's a famous bit of dialogue from John Ford's Western, "The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance" (1962) and a nice commentary on the origins of mythology.
What we can say about "The Great Train Robbery", which runs for approximately 11 minutes, is its a simple story told with much dramatic impact. For its time period, it is one of the most violent films I have seen. In one scene a bandit beats one of the train operators senseless by hitting him repeatedly on the head with a rock and then throwing him off of the train. In another scene as the bandits force all of the passengers off of the train, a bandit shoots someone in the back that was trying to run away. This is intense storytelling.
This is not to say there aren't flaws with the movie. "The Great Train Robbery" could have used intertitles since some of the plot elements and the characters aren't made clear. Because of the camera placement (everything is in long shot and there are no close-ups) I did sometimes find it difficult to differentiate the characters - namely the bandits from the good guys.
If any modern viewers were to question the ability of Porter as a filmmaker, keep in mind the final image of "The Great Train Robbery", one of the bandits aiming his gun directly at the camera as he shoots at it. It has remained one of cinema's most indelible images in a class with George Melies having the rocket flying into the Man in the Moon's eye in
"A Trip to the Moon" (1902). How remarkable is it that images from movies that may be considered silly today have stood the test of time and influenced future generations? Filmmaker Martin Scorsese famously copied the image for his film
"GoodFellas" (1990) with the Joe Pesci character.
Besides being Porter's most popular film "The Great Train Robbery" is an important movie in cinema's history. A gritty, fast moving story that in some small way set the formula for all heist movies that followed.
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The "Teddy" Bears"*** (out of ****)
Mythology, pop culture and politics fuse together in Porter's "The "Teddy" Bears" (1907).
Have you ever wondered why we call stuffed toy bears "teddy bears"? The story goes, back in 1902 President Theodore Roosevelt went on a hunting trip in Mississippi looking for bears. Roosevelt was a well known big game hunter but during his hunting trip hadn't come across a single bear. Worried about Roosevelt's public image, his assistants tied a bear to a tree so the President could shoot it. Roosevelt didn't find this to be sportsmanlike and refused, sparing the bear his life. The newspaper The Washington Post ran a political cartoon to satirize the event. To capitalize on this news story, stuffed toy bears were made given the name Teddy.
There's a lot to unpack in this story regarding mass media and politics. This however was the influence for Porter's story which combined Roosevelt's hunting trip with the fairy tale Goldilocks and the Three Bears. This is a satirical movie meant to offer its own interpretation on the origin of the term "teddy bear". It is a clever idea on paper. Having watched the movie a few times over the years, I often like to single it out as an example pre-dating D.W. Griffith's "The Birth of A Nation" for its ability to combine elements of pop culture and revisionist history. Many claim "Nation" as the first to have done this. After I mention this movie, they begin to back peddle: well, "Nation" did it on a larger scale and had more influence. I concede those points but it wasn't the first. Why does it matter? Beyond being factually wrong, you take away from the influence of other movies, and it prevents us from examining other directors. The background story of "The "Teddy" Bears" and the movie itself would make for a very interesting classroom discussion, at the very least.
"The "Teddy" Bears" begins with some dull attempts at humor as Baby Bear is shown outside playing in a snowy forest, outside of his house. Mama Bear wants him to come inside but the rambunctious Baby Bear refuses. He even starts throwing snowballs at his mother. Finally the Papa Bear and Mama Bear force Baby Bear to go inside. In a matter of seconds they all come out again only this time they are dressed as they go for a stroll. A young Goldilocks snoops around the house and enters. She tries the Bear's porridge, eating all of Baby Bear's. This makes her sleepy and ends up taking a nap in Baby Bear's bed. The family of Bears return home to find Goldilocks still sleeping. A chase begins to capture her. Goldilocks finds a Hunter (meant to look a lot like President Roosevelt) to help her escape the Bears. The movie ends with a situation somewhat similar to the real life event that inspired it.
What manages to distinguish "The "Teddy" Bears" from other movies of this time period is a wonderful stop-motion animated sequence. The sequence revolves around a group of teddy bears performing acrobatic tricks. This makes "The Teddy" Bears" one of the oldest surviving films to use stop-motion animation (the oldest known surviving movie is "Humorous Phases of Funny Faces" (1906). The first movie to use this technology is considered lost).
"The "Teddy" Bears" doesn't have the kind of playful tone you might expect from a fairytale story. It's also not exactly funny for a satire nor is it political. If you watched this movie and didn't know the background story of the history of teddy bears, this could be a real headscratcher. You'd probably think this was an awful adaptation of
Goldilocks mixed in with elements from
Little Red Ridding Hood and consider it a grim and unnecessarily violent movie.
Watching the movie nearly one hundred and twenty years after its release however we can view it simply as a curiosity piece and perhaps appreciate the stop-motion sequence. Like other movies from this period, it could have benefitted from the use of intertitles. I've also never seen the movie accompanied by a decent and fitting musical score. Some copies I've watched had no music at all.
What I enjoy most about "The "Teddy" Bears" is what it represents, the combination of pop culture and media. It is fascinating to think on how much movies influence our interpretation of things. This wasn't the first movie Porter directed that took aim at President Roosevelt and his interest in hunting. There was "Terrible Teddy the Grizzly King" (1901), believed by some historians to be the first political satire. It's story is so minor and confusing, I can't even properly assess it. But did these movies in any way perpetuate an image of Roosevelt in the public conscious?
Edwin S. Porter was an important figure in cinema's early history. His methods of storytelling came to be considered old-fashion in contemporaneous time with figures like D.W. Griffith overshadowing him. Porter's contributions to cinema however shouldn't be forgotten. I hope at the very least his name is mentioned in college film courses. "The Great Train Robbery" and "The "Teddy" Bears" demonstrate how Porter tried to capitalize on current events in his films as well as his desire to move the medium forward with cross-cutting, camera movement and new technology (stop-motion).
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