Ramona

Regrettably, this is not a good film by any standards. Aside from fine location photography, it's a complete mess. Of course, it's an epic tale of love and suffering, squeezed into less than 20 minutes, filmed probably in a couple of days. But even under these circumstances it should have been better. As the film proceeds, it becomes more and more ludicrous, with white men perpetually stepping into the frame, declaring "This is my land!". The acting is disastrous. Mary Pickford has only two expressions in her acting book; the tragic death of Alessandro (Henry B. Walthall) sadly comes across as one of the funniest in the silent films. Only veteran Francis J. Grandon gives a decent, less-than-rabid performance in one of his last films, before he turned into directing. All said, the film is presented on BluRay in good quality and has a soaring (contemporary) score, played by violin and piano. Wouldn't hurt one to watch it, but make sure this isn't your first encounter with Miss Pickford. She has done better.

The first movie to be adapted from a novel that paid an author a fee for rights to use the story was Biograph Studio's "Ramona," released in May 1910. Director D.W. Griffith insisted the studio pay Helen Hunt Jackson $100 to translate her best-selling book to film. The sentiment of Griffith paying an author for the rights may have been because of the pending appeal of the case against Karem Studios working itself through the courts to the Supreme Court. That was the 1907 "Ben Hur" litigation suit on the studio using the Ben Hur story without the author's heirs' permission. Griffith made sure his audience noticed the attribution to the author by stating her name and and the book's publisher in the opening credits--a first in cinema.

"Ramona" stars Mary Pickford as a Spanish orphan who falls in love with a Native American. Griffith uses solitary or small groups of people to symbolize the larger historical scope of the white man civilization's treatment of constantly evicting Native Americans from their lands. Here, the Indians are represented by a ranch worker who falls in love with Ramona, who returns his passion. Once the Spanish Californians realize the mixed race affair, they go about burning the Indian village where her lover resides, causing a dislocation of the natives from the area.

"Ramona" was filmed in Ventura County, CA, during Griffith's winter stay in that state's warmer climate. Taking advantage of its stunning typography, Griffith used the high, rugged mountains as a backdrop to capture the movie's eye-popping visuals as the drama unfolds before his camera.

This film is part of a DVD set entitled "Treasures III"--a set of four DVDs all about social issues and reform. The fourth disk (where you'll find this one) is about ethnic issues in particular.

In many ways, this film is reminiscent of the later film, THE SQUAW MAN as both are about people falling for and marrying Native-Americans--though in RAMONA, it involves a Spanish (not Mexican) lady and SQUAW MAN was an Englishman. In D.W. Griffith's own "special" way, he was trying to promote racial harmony and understanding--this, the same man who made BIRTH OF A NATION, a film that almost single-handedly was responsible for the rebirth of the KKK!! Oddly, RAMONA stars, of all people, Mary Pickford! At the time, he was one of Griffith's favorite stars, but she looked little like a Spaniard--even under the dark wig and makeup. Why he didn't get a woman who looked the ethnic part is odd considering this was a relatively expensive film when it was made. In 1936, the film was remade starring Loretta Young(!) in this role!! At least the 1928 version starred Delores Del Rio--a Mexican lady.

Ramona falls for an American-Indian, but is attacked by her family. Likewise, her love interest is also punished and he is eventually sent to a reservation. In an odd twist, Ramona learns that she, too, has American-Indian blood--thus making her love not so forbidden after all (and more palatable to the more racist elements seeing the film).

Now that she has chosen the Indian life, she sees how nasty persecution of her new people is by the Whites. She also needs to learn what it is like to live a simple life of poverty. This is a nice attempt by Griffith to promote better treatment for natives. Also, the film features some wonderful cinematography at this point in the film--with amazing vistas of the American West. Sadly, however, this is ruined by a goofy scene where her husband goes crazy and starts jumping about wildly. This is not one of silent film's best examples of acting. Subtle it ain't. And, to make it worse, after he collapses, Ramona herself collapses over the now dead body of her lover.

For 1910, this is very good stuff. Too bad that Griffith lost all the good will and karma he generated in this film with his later infamous BIRTH OF A NATION. Even INTOLERANCE (which followed BIRTH OF A NATION) couldn't do much to improve his image today. Most people just remember him for his Klan-loving mega-epic about the evils of letting Black people "out of their place". Ugghh!

This film was an adaptation of Helen Hunt Jackson's 'Ramona'. Griffith gravitated towards this project because his previous film, 'The Two Brothers', came to a halt because of three days of rain. He felt like a caged lion being trapped inside his hotel room, and decided to get to work on his next project: this one.

If you had not read the original novel or at least read up on the film "Ramona", I don't think you'd have much of a notion of what is transpiring. Though this is only a seventeen minute movie, the whole of a novel is presented to us. If it wasn't for its landmark status as representative of early silent films it wouldn't pass muster.

This is a tale of the inequitable treatment of Southern California Native Americans. Ramona is smitten by a member of the local tribe, and they eventually are wed despite the objections of her sort-of foster mother. The couple are run out of their home by land-grabbing white settlers. All this ends badly.

Consider that the novel "Ramona" was published in 1884 and that it achieved enormous popularity, so D. W. Griffith's film was destined to be a success. But besides its place in film history for the almost overwhelming interest of the story to the public it was one of the many pieces of work D. W. Griffith was churning out, making history just in the doing.

According to Darling Kindersley's "Chronicle of the Cinema", Griffith went on a "working vacation" – one in which he shot 25 films in four months as he and his ensemble toured California. One of the films made was this, "Ramona."

Paul Spehr drives home the importance of "Ramona" and other Griffith efforts around this time:

…it is camera work and editing that make the most startling advances during this period. Griffith "publicly laid claim to the introduction of 'large or close-up figures, distant views as represented first in 'Ramona', the 'switchback' (cross cutting – gc), sustained suspense, the 'fade out', and restraint in expression', raising motion picture acting to the higher plane which has won for it recognition as a genuine art.'

One quite noticeable aspect of this film is the lack of dialogue frames. Instead there are graphic text frames inserted occasionally to detail what is transpiring. But in no sense is the filmed footage tied to the actual dialogue we see. But as mentioned above without prior knowledge of the subject the movie is so abbreviated that it doesn't come close to conveying the whole story.

It has taken me far longer to write this review than to see the movie.

Three stars.