Algie, the Miner

"Algie, the Miner" is one of the better and certainly more intriguing Solax productions. Although, according to Alice Guy expert Alison McMahan (author of the book "Alice Guy Blaché: Lost Visionary of the Cinema" and who provides commentary for the film on the Pioneers: First Women Filmmakers set), it wasn't directed by the world's first female director, instead credited to two male filmmakers, it was supervised by her as were all productions at her studio. Contradictory, the booklet included with the Pioneers set lists Guy as director in its credits for the title. Regardless, it represents a continuation and maturation of the subversion of gender norms with hints of homosexuality seen in some of the best of Guy's oeuvre. In this one, a flamboyantly effeminate city slicker named Algie must prove himself "a man," to a father in order to marry his daughter. So, Algie travels to the gun-toting, horseback-riding, hard-drinking and gold-mining West to kiss and shack up with Big Jim, whereupon the two teach each other something in the ways of manhood. In the end, Algie takes Jim back east with him to prove to the father what a man he's become and be rewarded with that lavender marriage.

Surprising stuff for 1912. While never being more explicit than a rebuked kiss and Algie and Jim's two-bed, one-room shack, it would've presumably been obvious even to sophisticated early-20th-century audiences that with his make-up, styled outfits, stereotypical gestures and initiation into masculine activities and appearances that Algie was coded as queer. Moreover, the humor becomes that this sexually-reversed "Taming of the Shrew" instruction doesn't really make him any more of a heterosexual; it just allows him to superficially pass as one. And, even if not, he's now packing more than merely a dainty pistol that he suggestively smooches.

"Brokeback Mountain" (2005) nearly a century prior would be the obvious comparison here. Algie's handling of his tiny gun also reminds me of such subtle and rather Freudian hints of homosexuality during later heavy Hollywood censorship as Peter Lorre's use of a cane in "The Maltese Falcon" (1941). Such subversion had already been part of Guy's prior films, too. Crossdressing or women playing male parts, such as in "Midwife to the Upper Class" (1902), and the reversal of traditional gender norms, as in "The Consequences of Feminism" (1905), particularly stand out. Besides the subject matter, it also helps that "Algie the Miner" is better acted and features quicker cutting than prior and some later Solax films I've seen. Despite the reputed "Be Natural" sign Guy installed at some point in her studio, as depicted in the documentary "Be Natural: The Untold Story of Alice Guy-Blaché" (2018), the actual acting and direction of the company's productions didn't always reflect that motto. "Algie, the Miner" does in more ways than one.

(Note: Some significant, blotchy decomposition from the surviving 35mm print.)

During summertime, German aristocrats are lazier than ever, certainly in comparison with the rest of the year, natürlich. Laziness is unfailingly a part of the almost human aristocratic nature so to spare any extra effort during these hot and terrible times is important.

Having in mind this important seasonal reason, last night was screened at the Schloss theatre a short film, namely "Algie, The Miner", a perfect film for a small soirée due to its brief running time that can be enjoyed in "petit comité" by any German aristocrat. This allows time to be spent on other trifling things while appreciating this archaeological oeuvre that was recently restored by some hard-working longhaired youngsters beyond the Atlantic sea.

This short film was directed by the frenchified woman film pioneer Dame Alice Guy-Blaché in the silent year of 1912, and though it is somewhat primitive, it has interesting aspects as, for example, different settings ( filmed with a static camera, so don't ask the impossible... ) but with a perfect film continuity. It is the story of a mild man who must show he has the right stuff if he wants to gain the favour of his father-in-law and consequently be worthy of the hand of his daughter, showing in this way to the whole silent world his newly gained masculinity. Dame Guy-Blaché accepts the terms of that ancient and conservative era but in an interesting way.

Careful bourgeoisie settings, coarse taverns in the wild West, different landscapes and a combination of comedy, adventure and quaint human conduct and it all wraps up in tens minutes, an interesting one-reeler that is perfect to be enjoyed during the lazy summertime.

And now, if you'll allow me, I must temporarily take my leave because this German Count must lay mines around the Schloss in order to keep out the terrible tourist hordes.

Herr Graf Ferdinand Von Galitzien http://ferdinandvongalitzien.blogspot.com/

It's interesting to watch this "sissy" get challenged by his prospective father-in-law to prove himself in "becoming a man" by going out west for a year before he can marry the man's daughter, and then to try to interpret it. The guy kisses a couple of cowboys when he meets them at the train station, dresses like a fop, and carries a teeny weeny gun that the "real men" have a big laugh over. As he develops a friendship with one of them, it's hard not to see gay overtones in all this and wonder what producer (and possibly director) Alice Guy-Blaché's intention was.

Is he gay or bisexual and out of conformity to the times going to marry a woman? Or is he just a wimpy guy from the east who has to prove himself to his would-be father-in-law and a bunch of masculine cowboys? Regardless, the characterization is ultimately positive - this effeminate misfit of a man saves another's life in more ways than one and "makes good," rather than not being able to cut it. Is it saying we shouldn't judge a book by its cover, and be tolerant to different ways of being a man? Or is it saying that effeminate weaklings can and should be toughened up?

It may be a Rorschach test or another example of the old saying, "we see things not as they are but as we are," especially 108 years later. Anyway, the story is linear and simple which is a little unfortunate, but in the vignette of the male characters (even exaggerated as they are), and in their relationship to one another, it's fascinating.

The idea of the Wild West being a cure for homosexuality - and the film is unusually frank for the time in that respect - is not exactly very advanced but it is entirely typical of the Solax mix of quite cever ideas with rather crude plot development. Perhaps the most interesting aspect is not the way the West reforms the cissy but the reverse - the way the cissy beings an element of "caring" into the life of the Wild West in his motherly concern for Big Jim.

The film was also clearly an influence on one of Buster Keaton's most underestimated films Go West (1925). Not only does this feature the same notion of the "little gun" to indicate inferior manhood but also plays quite interestingly with the element of "caring" (Big Jim replaced by the cow) and uncertain sexuality (Keaton coems within an ace of choosing the cow in preference to the girl in a very neat double-take at the end of the film).

If he hopes to be married, an effeminate young man must prove within a year that he's a man to the man he hopes will be his father-in-law. The sexual politics might be questionable, but Billy Quirk does raise a few laughs as the camp hero who transforms into a tough cowboy hero thanks to the help of a burly miner.