This tiny rustic 70 min film was a smash success for emerging poverty row studio Monogram Pictures in 1934 and rated as one of the most heavily booked films of the year. It is on record as having 14,000 bookings in at time when there was 20,000 cinemas in the USA. It is on par with the other major hits of the day "Dinner at Eight" and the Busby Berkeley films. Listed in the industry Quigley Publications diary for 1935/6 as a blue ribbon winner of 1934 it must have come as a bombshell to anyone including the Monogram management that the film was so profitable, costing only $70k to produce and pulling $1m. in rentals. In the same year Monogram had several other 'major' releases one being KING KELLY OF THE USA which even had a minor but cute animation sequence. Most Monogram films of this period ran about 70 minutes and played the second feature on a double bill. However, GIRL OF THE LIMBERLOST played as an A level feature as it commanded main feature box office sales. No wonder Herbert J Yates at Consolidated labs wanted the Monogram outfit rolled into his newly formed Republic Pictures! he accomplished that by closing their account for lab processing and forcing them to merge along with several other studio s like the serial kings Mascot Pictures. GIRL is from one of America's most widely read novels and already had a huge inbuilt audience ready to devour the film. It is a charming tale of an unappreciated child raised in the hills and facing all sorts of bumpkin emotional dilemmas. It had a solid run internationally too, so easily grossed another wad of cash before vanishing like so many other 30s pix.
3 Reviews
The First Talkie Version is a Good One
boblipton5 March 2018
There is a staccato pace to the editing of this movie that gives this first talkie version of Gene Stratton-Porter's 1909 novel an episodic quality. It begins with Marian Marsh anxious to enter high school and get an education, but her mother, Louise Dresser, hates her, because her father drowned the night of her birth. Only her aunt, Helen Jerome Eddy, and uncle, Ralph Morgan, are anxious to help her, but her sweet nature wins over a bevy of admirers, many of them silent film actors, ready to please fans of old movies: Betty Blythe, as "The Bird Lady" -- a stand-in for Mrs. Stratton-Porter -- who becomes her best friend; Henry B. Walthall, as the kindly local doctor; Baby Peggy, as a schoolmate; and Syd Saylor as a local hard case.
The real issues of abuse, poverty and, indeed, nature conservancy that run through the original novel are muted in director Christy Cabanne's handling of the material under the newly enforced Production Code, but the performances are all telling. Indeed, Ralph Morgan may never have given a better one. The material may strike the modern viewer as old-fashioned and sentimental, but the issues that underlie the movie remain real, and its messages of triumph and redemption, rather than punishment, is one I applaud.
The real issues of abuse, poverty and, indeed, nature conservancy that run through the original novel are muted in director Christy Cabanne's handling of the material under the newly enforced Production Code, but the performances are all telling. Indeed, Ralph Morgan may never have given a better one. The material may strike the modern viewer as old-fashioned and sentimental, but the issues that underlie the movie remain real, and its messages of triumph and redemption, rather than punishment, is one I applaud.
Hicks may have nixed styx pic's, but this one takes no licks!
mark.waltz13 October 2014
Warning: Spoilers
In a year where Jean Parker played with deer in "Sequoia", Jean Muir struggled as a farmwoman in "As the Earth Turns", Anne Shirley played "Anne of Green Gables" and Katharine Hepburn was "The Little Minister", Marian Marsh played the title role of Elnora Comstock in this second version of Gene Stratton-Porter's novel. While the other films above were made by major studios, this one was pumped out by the king of the poverty row studios, Monogram Pictures. It is almost an "A" picture considering the care that was taken in making it, and when seen today, it really grabs the viewer with its earthy heart and keeps them hooked.
Elnora is the daughter of the widowed Katherine (Louise Dresser), a very embittered woman who has hated Elnora since she was born, having been in labor pains with her when Katherine's husband was suddenly killed in a freak accident in the nearby swamp. Katherine still continues to grieve, crying years later over the exact spot where her husband drowned, yet treats Elnora with contempt, while Elnora's aunt and uncle (Helen Jerome Eddy and Ralph Morgan) treat her as if she was their own daughter. The opening scene shows the world weary Katherine in major pain awaiting childbirth, and quickly moves to the day when Elnora is to enter high school, a rare opportunity for a girl in her community.
The drama plays out her first days at school, going from a hick in an old dress having ham-hocks for lunch, to the next day when she shows up in a new dress which Eddy has made for her and a more fitting lunch. As her aunt and uncle's love for her gives her a new height of confidence, Dressler's hatred increases until circumstances force the neglectful mother to look deep into her soul and realize the truth about what the hatred in her soul has done to her and why it wasn't necessary in the first place.
Beautifully filmed with excellent performances rising above the mediocre quality of the available print, this is not only a story of redemption, atonement and survival, but one girl's determination to not let the lowly circumstances of her existence stop her from achieving her dreams. The art direction is fascinating, especially the locker that Marsh makes inside the trunk of a tree, and the film's heart is as big as the outdoor locations where these simple folk reside. Tommy Bupp is excellent as the little boy whom Morgan and Eddy take in (with some reluctance at first by Eddy whose character longs to be a mother but can't seem to take to at first), and silent star Betty Blythe gives a touching performance as the kindly rich woman who mentors Marsh. Best known for her role as Trilby opposite John Barrymore in "Svengali", Marsh is an excellent heroine, not too sweet to be seen as tragic, yet not too proud to keep her emotions underwraps. When Dresser makes her atonement to Marsh, it really is a five-hanky moment.
Elnora is the daughter of the widowed Katherine (Louise Dresser), a very embittered woman who has hated Elnora since she was born, having been in labor pains with her when Katherine's husband was suddenly killed in a freak accident in the nearby swamp. Katherine still continues to grieve, crying years later over the exact spot where her husband drowned, yet treats Elnora with contempt, while Elnora's aunt and uncle (Helen Jerome Eddy and Ralph Morgan) treat her as if she was their own daughter. The opening scene shows the world weary Katherine in major pain awaiting childbirth, and quickly moves to the day when Elnora is to enter high school, a rare opportunity for a girl in her community.
The drama plays out her first days at school, going from a hick in an old dress having ham-hocks for lunch, to the next day when she shows up in a new dress which Eddy has made for her and a more fitting lunch. As her aunt and uncle's love for her gives her a new height of confidence, Dressler's hatred increases until circumstances force the neglectful mother to look deep into her soul and realize the truth about what the hatred in her soul has done to her and why it wasn't necessary in the first place.
Beautifully filmed with excellent performances rising above the mediocre quality of the available print, this is not only a story of redemption, atonement and survival, but one girl's determination to not let the lowly circumstances of her existence stop her from achieving her dreams. The art direction is fascinating, especially the locker that Marsh makes inside the trunk of a tree, and the film's heart is as big as the outdoor locations where these simple folk reside. Tommy Bupp is excellent as the little boy whom Morgan and Eddy take in (with some reluctance at first by Eddy whose character longs to be a mother but can't seem to take to at first), and silent star Betty Blythe gives a touching performance as the kindly rich woman who mentors Marsh. Best known for her role as Trilby opposite John Barrymore in "Svengali", Marsh is an excellent heroine, not too sweet to be seen as tragic, yet not too proud to keep her emotions underwraps. When Dresser makes her atonement to Marsh, it really is a five-hanky moment.
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