Gallows Birds (1930)

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Movie
German title Gallows birds
Original title Hell's Heroes
Country of production United States
original language English
Publishing year 1930
length 68 minutes
Rod
Director William Wyler
script Tom Reed
C. Gardner Sullivan
production Carl Laemmle Jr. ( anonymous )
music Sam Perry (silent and sound film version, anonymous)
Heinz Roemheld (silent film version, anonymous)
camera George Robinson
cut Harry Marker
Del Andrews
occupation
synchronization

Gallows Birds (original title Hell's Heroes , literally "Heroes of Hell", Austrian alternative title Drei Heilige Verdammte ) is a western and the first sound film by director William Wyler . A silent film version was also released.

action

Three criminals - 'Barbwire' Tom Gibbons, 'Wild Bill' Kearny and José - ride to New Jerusalem. Their leader, Bob Sangster, is already there. The dance girl Carmelita loves him, which arouses the sheriff's jealousy. The four villains raid the bank; the cashier and José are killed, Barbwire Gibbons wounded. As they flee, a sandstorm stops their chasing troops and scares away their horses; they hardly have any water left.

Near a dried-up waterhole, they find a woman in a covered wagon who is giving birth to a son. Dying, she asks the three men to be the godparents of the newborn and bring it to his father in New Jerusalem; Little does she know that she is asking this from her husband's murderers. After a long hesitation, the three men accept office and assignment and start their way back. Bob Sangster intends to leave the others before reaching the goal.

To save water and not stop the others, Barbwire Gibbons stays behind and shoots himself. When the baby drank the last canned milk they found in the covered wagon, Wild Bill Kearney leaves a note for the sleeping Bob Sangster and goes into the desert. He announced that this was his Christmas present because three could not reach New Jerusalem with the remaining water.

Reluctantly at first, Bob Sangster continues on his way. Shortly before dying of thirst, he found a small water hole; a sign warns that the water is poisoned by arsenic . Hoping that the water would give him enough strength for the rest of the way before it kills him, he eventually drinks as much of it as he can.

In New Jerusalem, the song Silent Night takes him to the church, where the entire city is gathered on Christmas Eve .

Production notes

The outdoor shots for the first "all-sound outdoor film" by the production company Universal Studios were filmed "in late 1929" in areas of California and Nevada : Mojave Desert , Panamint Valley , Bodie and Red Rock Canyon William Wyler liked, as he often explained later , the sound film from the beginning and did not consider it "like most directors [...] a great mystery".

However, there is also a silent film version with partly different images. The suicide Barbwire Gibbons is made clear in the sound film version by a bang, in the silent film version by muzzle flashes in the background.

While filming, producer Carl Laemmle Jr. and lead actor Charles Bickford fought against the director's conceptions. Laemmle “tacted and raged and drove his technicians to change and weaken a lot”, but according to Norbert Grob's judgment, “[the] visual imagination” could hardly harm Wylers. Charles Bickford said "as a well-known theater actor from New York [...] to understand more of dialogue than any filmmaker in Hollywood" and received permission from the producer to rewrite the script. The director "let him go", however, used Bickford's absence to realize his ideas: "[I] gave [...] someone his [namely Bickford's] boots [...] and shot the scene as I imagined it. I didn't turn the boots, just the marks they left. [...] At first they ran straight, then lurched [...]. "

The soundtrack includes the song Oh! Played on a harmonica . Susanna by Stephen Foster and the Christmas carol sung by a choir Silent Night, Holy Night .

Performance history

The film had its premiere on December 27, 1929 in New York; it was published on January 5, 1930.

In 1931, when the film was released in Germany, the director traveled to Europe and, in addition to his native city of Mulhouse, also visited Berlin , where he saw the film and then gave a press conference. As he later stated, it seemed to him that the entire German press had been present; As a 28-year-old, the experience made a great impression on him.

synchronization

In 1931 a total of 64 foreign sound film imports came to German cinemas; 52 were listed in a German language version. Gallows birds belonged to the small group of six stripes among them that were dubbed in Germany itself . Since the reservations in the early 1930s about the “makeshift” dubbed films were still widespread, there was also a sound version without dialogue.

criticism

Contemporary reviews highlighted the film's unusually good cast and direction.

Many film critics value the film very much. Leonard Maltin, for example, considers it to be the best film adaptation of the novel by Peter B. Kyne; She is namely less sentimental than the others and captivates with her staging and acting; therefore he gives 3.5 out of 4 points.

The “excellent” work of the cameraman George Robinsons is mentioned again and again , who - contrary to the standards of the production company at the time - delivered “shadows on faces, hard light-dark contrasts, gloomy views of the promised land”.

Norbert Grob sees Wyler's artistic “high point of the 1920s” in the film, because instead of continuing the standard serial cinema that began in 1925 with the short western Crook Buster , Wyler “simply [took] the simple subject as a scaffolding over which he used the diverse, intricate building of a tragedy [] ”. In particular, he praises how the crooks are characterized in their peculiarity, what “hearty” details Wyler offers - for example a “sheriff who at first unabashedly tries to look under the skirt of one of the dancing girls” - and the cutting technique in the “fast-paced chase scenes directly after the bank robbery. ”Roughly in summary, the Western is“ one of the early examples of the sound film in which the innovative elements of the visual are the carriers of the message, not the story, not the dialog. ”

literature

  • Peter B. Kyne : The Three Godfathers. Illustrated by Maynard Dixon . George H. Doran ["Publisher in America for Hodder & Stoughton" (London)], New York 1913 (numerous new editions; digitized ).
  • Gene Blottner: Universal Sound Westerns, 1929-1946. The Complete Filmography. McFarland, Jefferson, North Carolina / London 2003, ISBN 0-7864-1511-8 , pp. 134-137.
  • Norbert Grob : Gallows Birds. In: Bernd Kiefer , Norbert Grob with the collaboration of Marcus Stiglegger (Ed.): Filmgenres. Western (=  RUB . No. 18402). Reclam, Stuttgart 2003, ISBN 3-15-018402-9 , pp. 54-58 [with references].
  • Norbert Grob: "Not the composer, but the conductor". William Wyler's films - fabrics, themes, styles. In: Ders .: Three Masters in Hollywood. Erich von Stroheim - William Wyler - Otto Preminger (=  Deep Focus. Volume 21). Bertz + Fischer, Berlin 2015, ISBN 978-3-86505-324-4 , pp. 99–196, here 108–111 [Chapter high point of the 1920s: Hell's heroes. ]

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d Release info for Hell's Heroes. In: Internet Movie Database , accessed June 12, 2020.
  2. ↑ See Gene Blottner: Universal Sound Westerns, 1929-1946. The Complete Filmography. McFarland, Jefferson, North Carolina / -London 2003, ISBN 0-7864-1511-8 , p. 136.
  3. ↑ a b c d Norbert Grob: Gallows birds. In: Bernd Kiefer, Norbert Grob with the collaboration of Marcus Stiglegger (Ed.): Filmgenres. Western . Reclam, Stuttgart 2003, ISBN 3-15-018402-9 , p. 54.
  4. ↑ a b Cf. Norbert Grob: "Not the composer, but the conductor". William Wyler's films - fabrics, themes, styles. In: Ders .: Three Masters in Hollywood. Erich von Stroheim - William Wyler - Otto Preminger. Bertz + Fischer, Berlin 2015, ISBN 978-3-86505-324-4 , p. 111.
  5. ^ A b c Norbert Grob: "Not the composer, but the conductor". William Wyler's films - fabrics, themes, styles. In: Ders .: Three Masters in Hollywood. Erich von Stroheim - William Wyler - Otto Preminger. Bertz + Fischer, Berlin 2015, ISBN 978-3-86505-324-4 , p. 108.
  6. ↑ a b See Gene Blottner: Universal Sound Westerns, 1929-1946. The Complete Filmography. McFarland, Jefferson, North Carolina / London 2003, ISBN 0-7864-1511-8 , p. 135.
  7. ^ William Wyler after Axel Madsen: William Wyler. The Authorized Biography. Crowell, New York 1973, ISBN 0-690-00083-9 , pp. 61 f .; quoted here from a translation by Helga Belach in: Norbert Grob: "Not the composer, but the conductor". William Wyler's films - fabrics, themes, styles. In: Ders .: Three Masters in Hollywood. Erich von Stroheim - William Wyler - Otto Preminger. Bertz + Fischer, Berlin 2015, ISBN 978-3-86505-324-4 , p. 111.
  8. ↑ Cf. Norbert Grob: Galgenvögel. In: Bernd Kiefer, Norbert Grob with the collaboration of Marcus Stiglegger (Ed.): Filmgenres. Western . Reclam, Stuttgart 2003, ISBN 3-15-018402-9 , p. 55.
  9. ↑ For further differences cf. Norbert Grob: "Not the composer, but the conductor". William Wyler's films - fabrics, themes, styles. In: Ders .: Three Masters in Hollywood. Erich von Stroheim - William Wyler - Otto Preminger. Bertz + Fischer, Berlin 2015, ISBN 978-3-86505-324-4 , pp. 108-110.
  10. ^ Norbert Grob: "Not the composer, but the conductor". William Wyler's films - fabrics, themes, styles. In: Ders .: Three Masters in Hollywood. Erich von Stroheim - William Wyler - Otto Preminger. Bertz + Fischer, Berlin 2015, ISBN 978-3-86505-324-4 , p. 110. - For a more detailed description of the relationship to Laemmle, the author refers to: Jan Heřman: A Talent for Trouble. The Life of Hollywood's most acclaimed director, William Wyler. New York 1995, ISBN 0-399-14012-3 , pp. 88 ff.
  11. ^ A b Norbert Grob: "Not the composer, but the conductor". William Wyler's films - fabrics, themes, styles. In: Ders .: Three Masters in Hollywood. Erich von Stroheim - William Wyler - Otto Preminger. Bertz + Fischer, Berlin 2015, ISBN 978-3-86505-324-4 , p. 109.
  12. ^ William Wyler after Axel Madsen: William Wyler. The Authorized Biography. Crowell, New York 1973, ISBN 0-690-00083-9 , p. 70; quoted here from a translation by Helga Belach in: Norbert Grob: "Not the composer, but the conductor". William Wyler's films - fabrics, themes, styles. In: Ders .: Three Masters in Hollywood. Erich von Stroheim - William Wyler - Otto Preminger. Bertz + Fischer, Berlin 2015, ISBN 978-3-86505-324-4 , p. 109. - In the excerpt, William Wyler describes in detail the story that the traces tell.
  13. ↑ a b Herb Fagen: The Encyclopedia of Westerns. Foreword by Tom Selleck. Preface by Dale Robertson. Checkmark, New York 2002, ISBN 0-8160-4456-2 , p. 207.
  14. ↑ In the film the song Silent Night is announced as Holy Night ; see. Gene Blottner: Universal Sound Westerns, 1929-1946. The Complete Filmography. McFarland, Jefferson, North Carolina / London 2003, ISBN 0-7864-1511-8 , p. 136.
  15. ↑ a b Hell’s Heroes . In: AFI Catalog of Feature Films. of the American Film Institute , accessed June 12, 2020.
  16. ^ Cf. William Wyler after Axel Madsen: William Wyler. The Authorized Biography. Crowell, New York 1973, ISBN 0-690-00083-9 , p. 74; Quoted in: Norbert Grob: "Not the composer, but the conductor". William Wyler's films - fabrics, themes, styles. In: Ders .: Three Masters in Hollywood. Erich von Stroheim - William Wyler - Otto Preminger. Bertz + Fischer, Berlin 2015, ISBN 978-3-86505-324-4 , p. 113.
  17. ↑ See Michael Wedel: Film history as a crisis story. Cuts and traces through German film. Transcript, Bielefeld 2011, ISBN 978-3-8376-1546-3 , p. 184 [ digitized extracts ].
  18. ↑ Cf.: Thomas Bräutigam : Stars and their German voices. Lexicon of voice actors. 3rd improved, supplemented edition. Schüren, Marburg 2013 [1. Edition 2001], ISBN 978-3-89472-812-0 , p. 9 f.
  19. ↑ See Michael Wedel: Film history as a crisis story. Cuts and traces through German film. Transcript, Bielefeld 2011, ISBN 978-3-8376-1546-3 , p. 195 [ digitized extracts ].
  20. ↑ See Variety, January 1, 1930; excerpts from: Gene Blottner: Universal Sound Westerns, 1929–1946. The Complete Filmography. McFarland, Jefferson, North Carolina / London 2003, ISBN 0-7864-1511-8 , p. 136.
  21. ↑ See Leonard Maltin: Movie & Video Guide. 2001 edition. Penguin, London [2000], ISBN 978-0-14-029696-9 [other editions], p. 604: “The first sound version of Peter B. Kyne's Three Godfathers is probably the most satisfying, and certainly the least sentimental; beautifully directed, tersely acted, and vividly atmospheric. "
  22. ^ Gene Blottner: Universal Sound Westerns, 1929-1946. The Complete Filmography. McFarland, Jefferson, North Carolina / London 2003, ISBN 0-7864-1511-8 , p. 137.
  23. ↑ a b Norbert Grob: Gallows Birds. In: Bernd Kiefer, Norbert Grob with the collaboration of Marcus Stiglegger (Ed.): Filmgenres. Western . Reclam, Stuttgart 2003, ISBN 3-15-018402-9 , p. 57.
  24. ^ Norbert Grob: "Not the composer, but the conductor". William Wyler's films - fabrics, themes, styles. In: Ders .: Three Masters in Hollywood. Erich von Stroheim - William Wyler - Otto Preminger. Bertz + Fischer, Berlin 2015, ISBN 978-3-86505-324-4 , p. 110.
  25. ↑ Cf. Norbert Grob: Galgenvögel. In: Bernd Kiefer, Norbert Grob with the collaboration of Marcus Stiglegger (Ed.): Filmgenres. Western . Reclam, Stuttgart 2003, ISBN 3-15-018402-9 , pp. 55 f.
  26. ↑ Cf. Norbert Grob: "Not the composer, but the conductor". William Wyler's films - fabrics, themes, styles. In: Ders .: Three Masters in Hollywood. Erich von Stroheim - William Wyler - Otto Preminger. Bertz + Fischer, Berlin 2015, ISBN 978-3-86505-324-4 , p. 108 f.
  27. ↑ a b Norbert Grob: Gallows Birds. In: Bernd Kiefer, Norbert Grob with the collaboration of Marcus Stiglegger (Ed.): Filmgenres. Western . Reclam, Stuttgart 2003, ISBN 3-15-018402-9 , p. 56.
  28. ^ A b Norbert Grob: "Not the composer, but the conductor". William Wyler's films - fabrics, themes, styles. In: Ders .: Three Masters in Hollywood. Erich von Stroheim - William Wyler - Otto Preminger. Bertz + Fischer, Berlin 2015, ISBN 978-3-86505-324-4 , p. 110.
  29. ^ Norbert Grob: "Not the composer, but the conductor". William Wyler's films - fabrics, themes, styles. In: Ders .: Three Masters in Hollywood. Erich von Stroheim - William Wyler - Otto Preminger. Bertz + Fischer, Berlin 2015, ISBN 978-3-86505-324-4 , p. 164 f.