Men of the North

A young Gilbert Roland plays a Metis fur trapper up in the Klondike where he feels a man cheated him out of gold they mined together. The law doesn't see it that way so Roland takes flight.

More soap opera in this story of the frozen north. Roland is caught between two women, pretty Barbara Leonard visiting from Toronto with her father and fellow Metis Nina Quartero. If he kept his mind on business he might have gotten away. Of course we would have no film then.

Hal Roach directed this for MGM. He should have stuck with Stan and Ollie.

Had Nina Quartero been a very famous actress, folks would have laughed a lot more because of her ridiculous accent. While the film is set in French Canada, she sounds way too Mexican (which is odd, as she was actually born in New York City) to fit in with the rest of the cast...well, except for Gilbert Roland. While Roland was a pretty good actor, the Mexican-born guy also sounded pretty silly as he was cast as a French-speaking guy...with a STRONG Mexican accent! Why the film was cast this way, I have no idea--especially since he sounded MUCH more like the Cisco Kid than a French-Canadian! It certainly would have played better with actors who could have at least approximated the correct accent. Or, in a truly crazy move, perhaps MGM could have actually cast some French-Canadians!! Louis LeBay (Roland) is a dashing guy and Woolie-Woolie (Quartero) is in love with him. However, when a pretty blonde comes there way (Barbara Leonard), Louis is smitten with Nedra--and Woolie-Woolie is furious. So, she turns Louis into a Mountie sergeant (Robert Elliot)--telling him that Louis is responsible for some stolen gold. What's next? See the film.

Despite coming from a prestige studio, at heart "Men of the North" is at best a cheap B-movie. The writing (especially the dialog*) is very poor and the film is an inconsequential time-passer at best. In fact, I think most folks would probably either skip this one entirely or watch it just for a laugh.

*Pay close attention when Woolie-Woolie and Louis are having the 'good egg/bad egg' conversation. It is hilariously bad.

Yes folks this is not an April fool's joke. Some background: in 1930 MGM was profiting by their relationship to Hal Roach Studios by distributing Roach's two reel comedies. Roach Studios could do what MGM could not seem to do - produce funny comedy shorts and supply loan outs of great comedy talents to MGM such as Thelma Todd and, of course, Laurel and Hardy. So in 1930 MGM reciprocated and let Hal Roach stretch his wings and direct an action adventure at their studio. Instead Mr. Roach should have stayed in his own comedy nest.

The film is a bit of a mess, and the whole thing is just so poorly directed. It's obvious MGM just treated this as a throwaway in their budget as a goodwill gesture towards Mr. Roach. None of their A or even B list stars appear in this, and most of the players vanished from sight not long after the transition to sound. The exception - Gilbert Roland as likable Louis Le LeBey, who is suspected of robbing shipments of gold, is hiding gold in his cabin, has a very confused love life, and seems to be on the wrong side of the border - nobody has bothered to coach him to sound French Canadian - as he retains his Spanish accent. Gilbert Roland's performance is the only three dimensional one in the lot as the rest are pure cardboard. I've seen the other players in this film give good performances elsewhere so, once again, this just seems to be a case of bad direction coupled with all of the other problems of early sound film.

Barbara Leonard stars as Nedra, a girl who takes a shine to Louis in spite of the fact her father is one of the robbery victims. Robert Eliot plays a Mountie who seems more like a tough New York policemen dressed up like a Mountie for Halloween. Nina Quartero gives the most bizarre performance of all as she seems to have aspirations to be Louis' girl, yet she both pants over him and spies on him. Then when she's talking to the mounties she tries to hang all over them too.

Watch this one for the "so bad it's good" fun of it all and to see Gilbert Roland develop as a sound actor in spite of the impediments thrown at him here.

I'm not going to write much because I'm keeping an eye on the TV while I work.

I'm pretty sure that the snow is fake as are the set backdrops.

The dogs are real...they bark.

Interesting quote: "Do you know what time you went to the post and bought that cheese and stuff?" Reminds me of a gangster movie a la Canada. Then Gilbert Roland bursts out into a 'south of the border'-like tune.

Men of the North (1930)

* 1/2 (out of 4)

Hal Roach directed this "action/adventure" set in Canada. Louis La Bey (Gilbert Roland) is accused of stealing some gold but in the meantime he has a couple women wanting him. I'm sorry if that plot description is bad or just doesn't due the film justice but I'll gladly admit that the story mad very little to no sense to me. This entire picture is a must see because of how bad the thing is and there's never a single second that makes any sense. I'd love to hear some backstory on this thing because what I do know is that Roach brought his huge library of stars to MGM and somehow he was allowed to direct this film. Was this picture offered up in some sort of deal? Did MGM just wish he'd shut up and they allowed him to make a movie? I'm really not sure but it says quite a bit that the studio didn't turn over any of their "A" stars or even any of their "B" stars. Roland, a major Latin lover symbol in the silent era, is quite frankly, awful here. He's suppose to be playing a French guy yet he has an incredibly think Mexican accent that he never tries to cover up. There are a few supporting players who do the same thing and it just really makes the entire film odd to say the least. I'm really not sure why they didn't try to write something around the accents or at least change something about his character but seeing a French guy with a Mexican accent just makes for some laughs. The cinematography is quite ugly throughout the picture and the story is just so thin and all over the place that I'm not sure what's going on. Roach's direction isn't much better because he obviously can't tell a story and really doesn't have any business doing a film of this genre. MEN OF THE NORTH is one of the strangest films of the decade so fans of the bad will probably want to check it out but all others should stay clear.