Intolerance
(1916) Starring: All Ages: Lillian
Gish; Judean story: Lillian Langdon,
Olga Grey, Baron Von Ritzau, Count Von Stroheim, Bessie Love, George Walsh,
Howard Gaye, William Brown; Medieval
French story: Margery Wilson, Spottiswoode Aitken, Ruth Handforth, Eugene Pallette, A. D. Sears,
Frank Bennett, Maxfield Stanley, Josephine Crowell, Georgia Pearce; Babylonian story: Constance Talmadge,
Elmer Clifton, Alfred Paget, Seena Owen, Loyola O'Connor, Carl Stockdale, Tully
Marshall, George Siegmann; Modern story: Mae Marsh, Fred Turner,
Robert Harron, Sam de Grasse, Clyde Hopkins. Directed by D.W. Griffith. Written
by D. W. Griffith and Anita Loos. Produced by D. W. Griffith. Black and White
(tinted). Runtime: 197 minutes. U.S.A.
Silent, Drama
If you were David Wark (D.W.) Griffith, the question was
what do you do to follow up your most successful and most controversial film,
Birth of a Nation (1915)? Not only did Birth of a Nation make a lot of money,
some say it was the most successful film until Gone With the Wind (1939) was
released, but it also came under heavy criticism from all corners, who
condemned it for its bigoted betrayal of blacks and for making the
White-Supremacist Klu Klux Klan the heroes of the piece.
Intolerance, which would eventually be that response, is
actually four stories weaved together. The American “Modern” story, set in 1914, depicting the conflict between
capitalist and their workers, began as a separate film, The Mother and the Law, originally intended as a companion for The Escape (1914), a film Griffith
directed for Mutual which
was a study of white slavery and inner-city corruption. He began working on The Mother while still
editing Birth of a Nation.
When the controversy over
Birth reached its peak in May 1915, Griffith decided to expand that film to
more epic proportions, building elaborate sets to represent a ballroom in a mansion
and the Chicago courtroom and
further expanded the story to include a strike scene.
But Griffith wasn’t through
making a film that would be more epic than Birth of a Nation had been. In the summer,
Griffith began to work on the French story patterned after Meyerbeer's Les
Huguenots, which had enjoyed great popularity at the Metropolitan Opera with
Caruso and Toscanini. It was originally conceived as a lustrous counterpoint to the rather drab Modern story. Set in
1572, which tells of the religious intolerance that led to the massacre of the
Protestant Huguenots at the hands of the Catholic royals, known as the St.
Bartholomew's Day Massacre, the sequence focuses on Brown Eyes (Margery Wilson), a Huguenot who is supposed to get married when the persecution begins.
It was at the end of the year that Griffith began work on
the sequence that would serve as the cornerstone to the film. Set in 539 B.C., the Babylon sequence depicts the
conflict between Prince Belshazzar of Babylon (Alfred Paget) and Cyrus the
Great of Persia (George Siegmann). Babylon falls as a result of intolerance
arising from the conflict between devotees of two rival gods, Bel-Marduk and
Ishtar. Playing an important role in the sequence is The Mountain Girl
(Constance Talmadge).
The final main sequence added to the film, The Biblical or “Judean” story, set in 27 A.D., shows the intolerance after the Wedding of Cana and the Woman Taken in
Adultery that led to the crucifixion of Jesus Christ (Howard Gaye).
Overall, the film cuts back
and forth between these parallel stories something like 50 times. Breaks
between the stories are marked by the symbolic image of a mother (Lillian
Gish) rocking the cradle, showing
the passing of generations.
Estimates are that the film cost about $2.5 million,
about $47 million in 2016 dollars; it was one of the most expensive films made
up to that time. Made at the Fine
Arts Studio in Hollywood, the film had one large outdoor set, the Babylon set
on what would become Sunset Blvd., which would remain standing for four years
after the film was made.
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| A later photo shows the back of the sets still standing. |
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| Map showing the location and size of the Babylon set. |
All of the sets used in the
film were built under the guise of Frank "Huck" Wortman. Wortman’s
building techniques helped save Griffith money, while at the same time building
the oversized Babylon set. If you live in or visit Los Angeles and want to get
an idea of the size of the set, according to Wikimapia, "the developers of the Hollywood
Highland shopping center built part of the archway and 2 pillars with elephant
sculptures on the capitals, just as seen in the film to the same full scale."
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| These features at the Hollywood Highland shopping center were supposedly built to the same scale as they had been in the movie. |
Without a written script,
Griffith would gather 4,000 extras at $2 a day to impersonate Assyrian soldiers,
Numidian eunuchs, priests of Bel, handmaidens of Ishtar, slaves of Mesopotamia;
and, soaring up over his Babylon set on a 100-foot camera-crane, he allegedly
gave the order to “Move those
10,000 horses a trifle to the right, and that mob out there, three feet
forward,” but that is most likely a good story.
The final film, full name Intolerance, Love's Struggle
Throughout the Ages or Intolerance, a Sun-play of the Ages, was released on
September 5, 1916, as two acts with a prologue and a short epilogue. All four
stories are addressed in both acts with the first act serving as a set up and
the conclusions played out in act two. Each story is supposed to have it's own tint, but that doesn't seem to hold true throughout the print we watched, so I won't go into it here.
It should probably not
come as a great surprise that the film is now in public domain, which means
there is really no one controlling the film. While there multiple versions of
the film out there, there are four main ones:
1) The Killiam Shows Version. With a running time
of 177 minutes, this is perhaps the most widely seen version of the film today. Taken from third-generation 16 mm
prints and with an organ score by Gaylord Carter, this is considered one of the
most complete versions.
2) The Official Thames Restoration Version: With a
running time of 177 minutes, this version was given a formal restoration by
film historians Kevin Brownlow and David Gill. It features an orchestral score
written by Carl Davis. Even though it has the same running time as the Killiam
version it is not considered as complete and has some different footage. This
version is now part of the Rohauer Collection.
3) The Kino Version. With the longest running time
of 197 minutes, this version was pieced together in 2002 by Kino from existing
35 mm prints of the film. It contains a synthetic soundtrack by Joseph Turrin.
Despite its longer run time, this version is thought to be more incomplete than
either the Killiam or the Rohauer prints.
4) The Restored Digital Cinema Version, which was
shown at the 2007 Venice Film Festival. At 177 minutes, it is an attempt to
recreate the version shown at the Theatre Royal on Drury Lane, London on April
7, 1917.
Because we own it, we’re
reviewing the Kino Version. We may refer to scenes that are not in the other
versions, but this is the best we can do at the moment. Rather than breaking
the film down transition by transition, the review will cover the four main
stories Act by Act.
 |
| Title card. |
The film starts with a short prologue, the title card reads:
Our play is made
up of four separate stories, laid in different periods of history, each with
its own set of characters. Each story shows how hatred and intolerance, through
all the ages, have battled against love and charity. Therefore, you will find
our play turning from one of the four stories to another, as the common theme
unfolds in each.
We’re then introduced to the first of many
times, tinted in blue, a young woman (Lillian Gish) rocking a large wooden
cradle covered with roses. She is flooded from above by a beam of light. Three
indistinguishable women or 'Fates' sit huddled together to the left in the
background.
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| Lillian Gish is the young woman we see rocking the cradle, representing that through the ages man doesn't seem to change. |
The Whitman poem is shown paraphrased:
"Today as yesterday, endlessly rocking, ever
bringing the same human
passions, the same joys and sorrows."
The film gets a little more heavy-handed with
the introduction of a leather-bound book titled: Intolerance. Like the rocking cradle,
the book will be a recurring symbol throughout the film.
The first story tackled is The
Modern Story, which starts with the wealthy Mary T. Jenkins (Vera Lewis)
realizing that she is no longer young and she is becoming the target of the
Uplifters, a temperance type group which wants to make the world a better place
in their own image. Jenkins, whose wealth comes from her family mill, spends
more and more money on the Uplifters, but times are hard and to make up for her
generosity, her brother, credited only as Jenkins (Sam de Grasse), decides to
cut all worker wages by 10 percent.
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| The ballroom at the Jenkins mansion. |
This surprise cut in pay doesn’t sit well with the
workers and they strike. The sequence is loosely based on a similar strike at John D. Rockefeller’s
Colorado Fuel and Iron Company in 1914. In
that strike, things turned violent and 23 striking employees were killed by the
National Guard. As with that strike, there are casualties in the one in the
film.
With his father killed, The Boy (Robert Harron) leaves for
another city. Similarly, The Dear One (Mae Marsh) and her father (Fred Turner)
also leave and end up in the same district. The Dear One’s father can't handle
the transition and dies. The Boy, having left his best girl, who becomes the
Friendless One (Miriam Cooper), drifts into petty crime, eventually going to
work for the Musketeer of the Slums (Walter Long). The Musketeer takes up with
The Friendless One.
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| The Boy (Robert Harron) is with his father when he's killed during the riot at the Mill. |
But now The Boy and The Dear One make a romantic connection
and get married. When she becomes pregnant, The Boy tries to quit the racket,
but the Musketeer won’t let him walk away. He has his minions plant stolen
property on The Boy and he is arrested and sent to prison.
The Uplifters, having ridded the town of dancing, decide to
turn their attention to mothers and lock in on The Dear One. It doesn’t help
that her Kindly Neighbor (Max Davidson) has just brought her a sandwich and a
glass of beer when the Uplifters arrive. Shocked by what they see and with a
warrant in hand, they seize the baby.
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| The Uplifters seize the baby from The Dear One (Mae Marsh). |
The second story introduced is the Judean sequence. According
to reports, the B'nai B'rith successfully lobbied Griffith to edit this
sequence down and it ends up being the one plot line that gets the least screen
time.
This story is introduced with words transposed over stone
tablets with Hebrew script - this characteristic background will be used for
all the Judean Story titles:
Ancient
Jerusalem, the golden city whose people have given us many of our highest
ideals, and from the carpenter shop of Bethlehem, sent us the Man of Men, the
greatest enemy of intolerance.
The action opens near the Jaffa Gates. We’re warned, through
title cards, about the hypocrites among the learned Jewish Party, the Pharisees.
We see two Pharisees (Gunther von Ritzau and Erich von Stroheim) walking
amongst the citizens, many of whom bow as they pass. When these men stop to
pray, they expect all action around them to stop. Even their prayers speak of
their presumed moral superiority over others: "Oh Lord, I thank thee that
I am better than other men. Amen." The Pharisees are juxtaposed against
The Uplifters in the Modern Story.
The Judean story continues with the Marriage at Cana. The
Pharisees disapprove of the festivities going on the house and disapprove of
the Nazarene (Christ) when as the wine runs out at the party, he performs the
first miracle and turns water into wine. As if to emphasize who he is and his
future, a cross is superimposed over his back while he performs the miracle.
Clearly, Griffith wants us to know he is a marked man.
 |
| Jesus (Howard Gaye) comes to the aid of a woman convicted of adultery. |
The Pharisees continue to disapprove of Christ and denounce
him to the public. As if to illustrate why they hate him, Christ takes the
moral high ground. When an adulteress is revealed and the masses want to use
Moses’ law to stone her for her infidelity, it is Christ who steps forward. "He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone
at her." Hearing that and realizing none of us are without sin, they drop
their stones.
When next we see Christ again, he is
surrounded by a crowd of children and women in the streets of Jerusalem.
The French Story is the third one introduced
with the turning of the page in the great big book of Intolerance:
Another period
of the past. A.D. 1572 - Paris, a hotbed of intolerance, in the time of
Catherine de Medici, and her son Charles IX, King of France.
Much of the action takes place in the court of Charles IX
(Frank Bennett), but the real power behind the throne belongs to the king’s
mother, Catherine de Medici (Josephine Crowell).
Catholic, she views the Protestant Huguenots as a threat to the kingdom. The Huguenots are led by Admiral Coligny
(Joseph Henabery).
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| The court of Charles IX (Frank Bennett) during the French part of the film. |
There is a wedding afoot to join the two
parties together. Marguerite of Valois (Constance Talmadge) sister of the King, to Henry of Navarre, a
Huguenot, is to wed Henry of Navarre (W.E. Lawrence).
But more attention in our story is paid to
Brown Eyes (Margery Wilson) and Prosper Latour (Eugene Pallette), both Huguenots, who are also set to wed. But a
foreign mercenary (A.D. Sears) serving
the French king, watches their good-bye and is immediately drawn to Brown Eyes’
beauty.
They are
unaware of the Royal family’s intolerance towards them and are going on about
their daily lives. But the mercenary makes an attempt to grab Brown Eyes, who
manages to fight him off.
But when
news of rioting by Huguenots reaches the Royals, Catherine recounts a time when
Catholics were slaughtered at the hands of the Huguenots and declares that
their survival depends on their extermination.
Babylon
is the final storyline to be introduced in Act One. Again prefaced by the
turning of pages in the book, Intolerance, We are introduced right away to the
high walls that surround Babylon and the massive gate that is designed to
control access to the city. While these are very impressive, these are not the
most famous images of the city in the movie; those don’t come to pass until the
Second Act.
Babylon
is a teeming city, the streets full of people, merchants, farmers, goods and
animals, including elephants. Into this procession comes the Mountain Girl
(Constance Talmadge), dressed in ragged clothes.
We are
also introduced to The Rhapsode (Elmer Clifton), a Warrior singer - poet agent
of the High Priest of Bel.
Into
Babylon is brought the statue of Ishtar, the goddess of Love. Watching from
above, is the priest of Bel-Marduk
(Tully Marshall), supreme God of Babylon, and a rival to Ishtar.
While she’s watching the parade, The Rhapsode
makes a pass at the Mountain Girl, which she rejects, but he persists, even
kissing her.
 |
| The Rhapsode (Elmer Clinton) steals a kiss from the Mountain Girl (Constance Talmadge). |
Meanwhile, high on the great wall surrounding
Babylon, The Prince, Belshazzar
(Alfred Paget), son of Nabonidus (Carl Stockdale), apostle of tolerance and
religious freedom watches the parade go by below. The Princess Beloved
(Seena Owen) waits for her Prince.
The Mountain Girl’s brother (Arthur Meyer) doesn’t seem to know what to do with
her, so he takes her to see a Judge (Lawrence Lawlor), who decides that she should be sent to
the marriage market to get a good
husband.
 |
| The marriage market. |
At the
market, the Mountain Girl’s tomboy look and disobedient ways does not attract
any bidders at first. The auctioneer (Martin Landry)
even throws in a few coins to sweeten the pot. She is still stomping around the platform when the Prince arrives on scene. She apologies to him for her behavior and he
presents her with his seal, giving her the right to marry or not marry if she
wishes.
Down in the tenements, The Rhapsode preaches to
follow the High Priest of Bel, and give up the worship of Ishtar. When
the Mountain Girl comes on the scene, he once again makes an advance to her,
but once again she rebuffs him. Swearing allegiance to Belshazzar, she dedicates
herself to being a soldier for him.
Meanwhile, in the Love Temple consecrated on
the teachings of Ishtar, young virgin prostitutes frolic in the water and lounge
on couches nude and semi-nude. It is here that Belshazzar enters the chamber of
the Princess and they embrace. While in the main room there is music and
dancing, the Prince shows the Princess his kingdom, which extends out past the
walls of the city.
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| In the Love Temple, prostitutes cavort in the baths. |
Later, when Belshazzar goes to the Temple of
the moon god, the Mountain Girl is with him.
When there are murmurs against
Belshazzar in the crowd, the Mountain Girl moves to defend him by attacking
the High Priest of Bel by the throat. Her assault is taken as an affront to the
High Priest and to the Priesthood as a whole. Dragged off by soldiers, the High
Priest orders her to be beaten to death with an iron rod. But once again
Belshazzar intervenes and once again the Mountain Girl is set free.
At the end of Act One, Cyrus moves on Babylon
with his weapons of war: Rock-throwers, catapults, battering rams, mighty
cross-bows, burning oil and siege towers. Belshazzar calls for the
defense of the city. The Mountain Girl’s brother dresses himself in a suit of
mail and goes out to the wall. Not wanting to be left out, she too dons a
similar suit and goes out on the precept to help defend Babylon.
 |
| The walls of Babylon from the outside. |
Cyrus’ forces manage to breach the walls, but
are ultimately repelled, but not before cries that Babylon is falling and the
Princess is told of possible defeat. But the siege continues into the night and
into the next morning, when a fresh assault comes. The Babylonians are able to overturn
the giant siege towers and set some on fire, before Cyrus pulls back.
Belshazzar is hailed as victorious.
By the end of the first Act,
Cyrus’ siege of Babylon has failed; Christ has gotten the attention of the
elders (and not in a good way); The French have decided to slaughter the
Huguenots; and with the Boy in prison, the Uplifters have found The Dear One an
unfit mother and have taken her child from her by warrant and by force.
The intercutting between
stories for the most part works, though there are definitely moments where Act
One drags, especially at the beginning. While the title cards try to explain
things, much of the action is somewhat hard to follow. As an example, I think Cyrus
and Belshazzar look a lot alike and it is sometimes easy to not be sure what is
happening to whom.
The Huguenots and the Judean
sequences seem to get the least attention, with more being spent on Babylon and
the Modern story. Of the four, these seem to be the most compelling. Babylon,
though we have not seen the famous shots of the city, is still visually
breathtaking.
The Modern story is the easiest to interact with, perhaps the
intolerance of the Uplifters is
the easiest to recognize and the most
universally recognizable to modern audiences.
Between Acts, there is a five minute intermission as audiences gird themselves for the 80+ minutes still to come.
Between Acts, there is a five minute intermission as audiences gird themselves for the 80+ minutes still to come.
It is with the Modern story,
after another visit to the rocking cradle.
With the husband still in
prison, the Dear One is confronted by the Musketeer who promises that he can
get her child back. But close by the Friendless One, who is also the Musketeer’s
mistress, hears their conversation with great jealousy.
After his release from
prison, the Boy returns to the apartment and is informed by the Dear One of
their child’s fate. Meanwhile, we see the baby lying unattended in a crib in
the Jenkins Foundation hospital.
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| The Boy learns the fate of their child from The Dear One. |
When he thinks his mistress is asleep, the Musketeer goes to visit the Dear One, who is alone in the apartment. But the Friendless One is only pretending to be asleep and follows after him with a pistol in her hand.
The Boy is informed of the
Musketeer’s visit and rushes home. The mistress is listening at the door, when
the Musketeer pulls the Dear One towards the bed, covering her mouth to keep
her from screaming. As the Boy approaches, the mistress goes outside on the
window ledge to peer inside the apartment. The Boy bursts in and fights with
the Musketeer, but he is too big and strong for the Boy and the Dear One. He is
only stopped when the mistress fires through the window. He manages to stumble outside
where he falls and dies out on the landing.
Panicking, the mistress
throws the gun in through the window and flees. When the Boy wakes up, he finds
the gun and is standing over the dead body when the police arrive. A
miscarriage of justice takes place and the Boy is sentenced to death by hanging,
while the Friendless One looks on from the gallery.
 |
| The Friendless One (Miriam Cooper). |
Later, the Kindly Officer
(Tom Wilson) learns of the sentence when The Dear One returns home. This is
juxtaposed to the tea party in the Jenkins library celebrating the success of
their reform movement.
Wracked with guilt, the
Friendless One goes to the Dear One’s apartment, but loses her nerve when she
hears her talking to the Kindly Officer. The Officer finds a car to take them
to the Governor’s mansion so she can plead her case. The Friendless One
overhears this and hires a taxi to take her there as well.
When they arrive, they are
not allowed entrance into the mansion. That’s when the Officer notices a crying
Friendless One lurking nearby. It is only
after the Governor’s car pulls away that the Friendless One confesses: “I killed him! I did it, I did it!” The three race after the
Governor’s car, but fail to overtake it before he reaches the train station.
Meanwhile, in prison, the Boy is given his
last Sacrament.
Having missed the Governor’s train, the three
commandeer a race car and driver and take off after the train, eventually
catching up and blocking the track until the train comes to a stop.
The Kindly Officer, the Dear One and the
Friendless One approach the governor onboard the train and make a final appeal.
After the Friendless One pleads her guilt to the governor, the Dear One asks
him to pardon her husband. He agrees and signs a pardon and has one of his
aides call the prison to stop the execution.
 |
| The gallows await The Boy. |
Meanwhile, the Boy is lead up the stairs to the
waiting gallows and is prepped for execution.
While the Governor accompanies
the three in a car racing towards the prison, a guard answers the phone. The
aide tells him frantically that the execution must stop and the guard races to
the gallows. But the executioner ignores the guard and order the execution to
continue.
The car comes racing up to the prison as a
black hood is placed over the Boy’s head. The drama is increased by showing the
three guards with their razors prepared to cut three lines when given the
command.
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| Three guards at the ready to cut the lines on the gallows. |
Inside the prison, the party races to the
gallows, waving their arms and yelling for the execution to stop. The Kindly
Officer bounds up the stairs and gives the pardon to the Executioner, who
finally calls a halt to the procedure.
The Boy and the Dear One are finally
reunited.
Back in France, Catherine conspires to have
the King sign the warrant to begin the genocide. At first he refuses, but the
intolerants wear him down with their kill or be killed argument. Not only does
he sign the paper, he orders everyone to be killed. "By God's death, since
you wish it, kill them all! Kill them all! Let not one escape to upbraid
me."
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| Catherine (Josephine Crowell) convinces the king that it is kill or be killed when it comes to the Huguenots. |
Meanwhile,
Brown Eyes and Prosper are to marry the next day, St. Bartholomew’s Day.
Outside, Brown Eyes’ house is tagged with two chalk white crosses, signifying
they are Huguenots. The Mercenary, leading a group of soldiers, passes by, but
notices the crosses.
The next
day, Catherine has a momentary moment of doubt, but the massacre begins. Brown
Eyes’ father hears the soldiers marching down the street, while unsuspecting
Huguenots are slaughtered for their beliefs. Brown Eyes and her sister awaken
to the sounds of Protestants pleading at their door. Their father bars the door
leading to the street.
Prosper
is notified of the order to slaughter by a friend who has a badge of safety
with him. Prosper, now wearing the badge, takes flight across Paris in an
attempt to save his loved ones.
The
Mercenary, though, seizes the opportunity and goes to Brown Eyes’ home,
where soldiers have used a battering ram to gain entrance. Trapping her in her
room, the Mercenary undresses her and takes the now fainted girl to her bed.
After he
supposedly rapes her, the Mercenary holds Brown Eyes as he runs his sword
through her. Prosper arrives too late to save her and is shot in the street,
dying next to her.
The
slaughter continues as Catholics celebrate the vanquishing of the Huguenots.
The Babylon story shines here in Act Two. We
are finally treated to the long shots of the great city, with the elephant
pillars and Belshazzar's open court.
 |
| The famous Babylon set is finally seen in Act Two. |
The camera swoops down into the court where dancers twirl on steps decorated with flowers.
 |
| Dancers celebrate Babylon's victory over Persia. |
Meanwhile, back in the Temple of Love, prostitutes in various
stages of nakedness lounge about and even engage in a lesbian orgy.
Belshazzar
and the Princess engorge themselves at the feast celebrating the great victory
and celebrate their love.
Meanwhile,
the Rhapsode prepares to betray the prince to Cyrus. The Mountain Girl embraces
the Rhapsode after he has prepared a chariot for the High Priest of Bel to lead
a procession out to Cyrus’ camp. Using a password, they demand the gates be
opened. The Mountain Girl is very suspicious and, after commandeering a chariot
of her own, she uses the password to take chase.
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| The Mountain Girl commandeers a chariot and chases after The Rhapsode. |
When the
Priests reach Cyrus’ camp, the Mountain Girl observes them from a distance. The
conspirators prostate themselves before Cyrus, who them orders his men into
action. The Mountain Girl rushes back to Babylon to warn Belshazzar about the
pending attack.
Back in
Babylon, the Prince prepares to marry the princess. Inside the city, while
Cyrus’ army approaches, revelers continue to celebrate.
 |
| Unaware of their pending demise, Belshazzar (Alfred Paget) plans to wed the Princess (Seena Owen). |
The great
gates open for the Mountain Girl’s chariot, but revelers delay her progress to
warn the Prince. Outside, the Persian army has arrived at the wall. As the
Mountain Girl rushes to warn Belshazzar, the priests are allowed through the
gates, followed by Cyrus’ army. Even with the city under siege, the Prince does
not believe her warnings.
Finally
convinced by his own servants, the Prince leaps into action. By then the
Persians have already breached the Temple of Love and the court. With only 12
guards available to protect the palace gates, the Prince returns to the Throne
room.
The
Mountain Girl joins in the defense of the city, but her chest is pierced by an
arrow and she falls. She later dies as near her hero the Prince as she can drag
her body.
Outnumbered,
the Prince and Princess decide to take their own lives rather than be captured.
Cyrus enters the throne room only after their suicide. Outside, the Babylonians
bow down to their victor and we’re told their civilization is destroyed.
The
Judean story, again, gets the shortest shrift. While the story of Christ is the best known of the four, the
shortness of the screen time is more likely due to the B’nai B’rith which
lobbied Griffith to make cuts to the sequence, including excising the Jews
crucifying Christ.
The story resumes, after Pontius Pilate has
ordered Christ’s crucifixion. Christ is still being paraded through the streets
of Jerusalem, carrying the heavy wooden cross while some people pray at the
sight of him and others jeer. Roman soldiers lash his back and he drops the
cross. Another man picks it up and carries it for him.
This storyline concludes with a distant shot
showing Christ on the Cross with a brilliant light streaming down from above.
 |
| At the end of the Judean story, Christ is crucified. |
In the epilogue, Griffith gets really
preachy. We’re shown a crowded yard full off prisoners, held no doubt by
intolerants. And we see men engaged in pitch battle, World War I was raging at
the time, only to be stopped by the heavens opening and angels
descend. All the soldiers on the battlefield look up and drop their rifles.
 |
| Angels descend from the heaven to stop war. |
We’re told that “Instead of prison walls -- Bloom flowery
fields” as the prisoners once trapped inside the walls move through them. The
exterior of the prison is transformed into a country scene.
 |
| Unknown children at the end represent a Utopian society of peace and understanding. |
In the finale, we see an open field with
people dancing and cavorting. Two small children play happily together in what
is now a Utopian state.
The film ends with the mother still rocking
the cradle.
When the film was released, Intolerance was
not the success Birth of a Nation had been. There are perhaps many reasons for
this. America was just then ramping up to join the war in Europe, so its pacifist
preaching might have fallen on deaf ears so to speak. Add to that the rather
convoluted story that was being told. Cutting back and forth between stories
only linked by a theme of intolerance was a unique way of storytelling and
might have lost some of its audience because of that.
It also wasn’t helped by the director’s
reputation as a bigot, something I’m sure kept some people away from the
theaters.
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| Violent, it might have been the nudity or the suggestion of nudity that kept Victorian audiences away. |
The film, with its nudity and brutal violence (there are multiple beheadings) would most likely receive an “R” rating by today’s standards, which may have
also contributed to its failure at the box-office, as parents may have been
reluctant to take their children to see it, if their own Victorian values were not already
offended.
Finally, working against the film’s success
was the full orchestra that accompanied most of the screenings in big cities;
an added expense that the film could not overcome. Needless to say, Griffith
lost a lot of his own money on the film. He would apparently reshoot and reedit
scenes from the film after its release and would even revive two of these
stories into full length films: The Fall of Babylon (1919) and The Mother and
the Law (1919). I’ve not seen these, nor do I know if they were in any way
successful for him.
The film’s reputation over the years as
improved. Considered by many to be a great though flawed achievement,
Intolerance has gone through a bit of a renaissance, even showing out of
competition at the 1982 Cannes Film Festival.
Having watched it, I can say that it does
have its moments, especially in Act Two, where the action quickens and the
cutting between stories builds towards a combined crescendo. Of the stories,
once again the Modern Story is the most compelling as real tension is developed
as the Governor races to the prison. You really find yourself wondering if they
will arrive in time. The payoff is that they do. The Boy and the Dear One seem
to be the only ones to have a happy ending here. They are the only survivors in
a rather gory film with lots of slaughter. (I believe that in the revisited The
Fall of Babylon, the Mountain Girl might actually survive, but in Intolerance,
like most of the main characters, she dies.)
I’ve read where Griffith
longed for stage-like acting from his cast, but Mae Marsh’s is still very much
over the top as she had been in Birth of a Nation. She seems to bounce between
puppy-dog hyperactivity to slow and sullen. Even in the close-ups, which
Griffith used to allow for subtlety, Marsh is anything but.
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| Mae Marsh acts with puppy-dog hyperactivity throughout most of the film. |
Lillian Gish’s talent is
somewhat wasted here, as she never does anything more than rock the cradle.
The other actors are your
standard silent players, moving from over exaggerated actions to more refined
close ups. I honestly can’t say that one distinguished themselves above the
others. With so many actors and so many characters, it would be hard to really
stand out in this type of film.
It is interesting to note
that Constance Talmadge, one of the acting Talmadge sisters, would appear in two roles in
the film. Her appearance in this film marks her first major roles. For the most
part she made the most of the opportunity. Constance would work in films until the
coming of sound chased her from Hollywood. It should be noted that along with
her sister, Norma, Mary Pickford, and Douglas Fairbanks, Talmadge inaugurated
the tradition of placing footprints in cement outside Grauman's Chinese
Theater.
As with Birth of a Nation, there are some very notable cameos. Not only does Erich von Stroheim make an appearance, but so do directors Frank Borzage, Tod Browning, and King Vidor. Additionally, actors Douglas Fairbanks, Donald Crisp, Mildred Harris and Wallace Reid also make appearances.
Intolerance is not a film to
be taken lightly. Not only does it take a real time commitment, but it is not
really a fun nor easy movie to follow. You have to give Griffith credit for
undertaking such a project, but that alone doesn’t save it. The closest thing
to a real reason to see the film is the magnificent Babylon sets. They are truly
breathtakingly awesome, the sort of thing that would be CGI today, if it was
attempted at all.
Intolerance is the best and worst that silent films can offer. The overlong drama is convoluted at best and while the stories are sometimes engaging, they are still uneven. The acting is what silent films are known for, which means not what we have come to expect in cinema today. But at the same time, the film has the power to amaze audiences a hundred years after its release and it will no doubt still amaze 100 years from now.
Be sure to check out other silent film reviews at our Silent Cinema Review Hub.
Intolerance is the best and worst that silent films can offer. The overlong drama is convoluted at best and while the stories are sometimes engaging, they are still uneven. The acting is what silent films are known for, which means not what we have come to expect in cinema today. But at the same time, the film has the power to amaze audiences a hundred years after its release and it will no doubt still amaze 100 years from now.
Be sure to check out other silent film reviews at our Silent Cinema Review Hub.
