Prairie saga with just awful performances in almost every role. Incredibly slow moving considering the short running time. The wretchedness of the performances can be partially, but only partially, laid to the cringe worthy dialogue that the actors are forced to spout. It's what they do with it where the rest of the problem lies.
Eleanor Boardman comes off best although some big silent screen gestures occasionally slip in to her work here and there. Still compared to the truly dreadful acting of the two main men, Johnny Mack Brown and Gavin Gordon, she's a Duse. That's Lucille La Verne, the voice of the evil Queen in Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, hamming it up as Brown's mother.
If you're a fan of Anita Louise don't be fooled by the prominence of her billing, she has what amounts to a bit in the very beginning of the film and is gone from the picture after that.
All in all a struggle to get through unless you're a student of the early transition from silence to sound.
Eleanor Boardman comes off best although some big silent screen gestures occasionally slip in to her work here and there. Still compared to the truly dreadful acting of the two main men, Johnny Mack Brown and Gavin Gordon, she's a Duse. That's Lucille La Verne, the voice of the evil Queen in Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, hamming it up as Brown's mother.
If you're a fan of Anita Louise don't be fooled by the prominence of her billing, she has what amounts to a bit in the very beginning of the film and is gone from the picture after that.
All in all a struggle to get through unless you're a student of the early transition from silence to sound.