A Summer Idyll

A picture that is different, so different that one is disposed to rub one's eyes to see if the scenario writer has actually dared to introduce an innovation and give a picture a new ending. Here is a city man who a country in a huff, falls in love with the little country girl in the same old way, and then—well, the lure of the city is too strong, he goes back to his former sweetheart, leaving the country shepherdess to fill her grandfather's pipe and chase her sheep across the bridge as of yore. Of course she cries a bit. It needs a few tears to express the shattered emotion, but she accepts the inevitable with good grace and cuddles under her grandfather's wing in a very satisfactory and re-assuring way. So much for the story. The pictorial part is notable. The farm scenes were made while the farm operations were in progress. The harvesting scenes are faithful reproductions. The only criticism the writer has to offer is that the horses haul that reaper and binder faster than they do when actually at work. The machine would not stand such rapid motion. It couldn't. The reciprocating motion of the knife would tear the machine to pieces if it went long at that pace. The scene where they are loading the grain is an excellent reproduction. It is a picture worthy preservation. The man on the load knew what he was doing, he loaded the bundles right. Some farm scenes are carelessly composed, and not infrequently are wrong, but these deserve commendation for their accuracy. The tones in the picture are excellent. There it no soot and whitewash, but a soft gradation which is good to see and adds much to the pictorial effect. It is a notable production. And yet, it must go at the close of a day while poor vaudeville acts stay on. - The Moving Picture World, September 17, 1910