Ghosts

I certainly wanted to like this movie, in no small part because of its cast. However, despite the great esteem Ibsen was held in -- and still is -- the censor's hand lays heavily on this version of his play. With all mention of syphilis removed, it becomes a story of hereditary madness and incest: just the thing to suit a movie industry still subject to fits of outright melodrama, but lacking the moral component of the play. Henry B. Walthall and the title writers work hard to suggest the disease to anyone familiar with it, but that results in a bit of overacting, as the slow course of the disease first suggests a pain in the neck. Perhaps if Hollywood had tried to do this in the Pre-Code era it might have worked. They didn't.

I came to this movie knowing Ibsen's play, and that informs my impression of it, like understanding a veiled reference to an absent individual from the speaker's tone of voice and a raised eyebrow. Undoubtedly the audience for this movie understood it by the same cues. However, given the fact that it tells its story through the chapter-heading style of movie-making tells us that this was intended for an audience who knew the play and would now have a chance to see it performed in pantomime. As an independent work of cinema, it doesn't quite work, in large part because of its mandated coyness.

Ghosts (1915)

** 1/2 (out of 4)

This early feature film was advertised under the tagline: One of the first authentic horror movies! but this plays more as melodrama today and contains very little of what we'd think of horror. Henry B. Walthall plays a rich writer who comes down with syphilis due to his partying ways. This disease eventually kills his wife and slowly begins to take away the writers mind, which leads him to madness. This film was produced by D.W. Griffith but one only wishes that the director actually directed the film but he was off promoting The Birth of a Nation so it's doubtful he spent much time as producer on this either. The main thing worth watching is the performance by Walthall who really was one of the first great actors. He's slow decent into madness comes off very well. The supporting players aren't as impressive but Al W. Filson is also good as the doctor who tries to warn the writer of his ways. Erich von Stroheim did the costumes and also does a cameo but I couldn't spot him.

This movie is a truncated version of Ibsen's play, to be sure, but it still retains a compelling power, mainly due to the actors. Henry B. Walthall is most remembered as the Little Colonel from THE BIRTH OF A NATION, but he was in general a fine actor who played a great variety of roles. He was one of the most dynamic talents of the 1910s and never more so than here, where he plays both father and son. His characterization is tragic and engaging, even if he goes a little hammy during his death scene.

Actually, the other fine performance here comes from Mary Alden as the long-suffering wife and mother. Her transformation from innocent young heiress to bitter widow is subtly done and moving.

This is a very approximate adaptation of Ibsen's play in which inherited syphilis is a metaphor for corruption. The basic theme is preserved although not surprisingly it is not explicit. We are just told of an 'inherited taint'. The skillful dramatic structure of the original is sacrificed for melodramatic contrivance and most of Ibsen's political point is lost. The film comes into its own at the end with Henry Walthall's magnificent attack of 'artaxia motor'. Admirers of the play will be pleased that we do get 'the sun' but will also note that Ibsen's disturbing and emotionally challenging conclusion in which Oswald's suicide is actively assisted by his mother was obviously deemed too strong. Here he just drinks the poison by himself. Worth seeing for Walthall's powerful acting at the end and for checking out just exactly how far a 1915 film could go when tackling a controversial subject.