Men of the North

It's hard to remember that this was one of the First talkies because the camera work is spectacular! The snow slide was glorious! The love affair is sweet. Jealous girlfriend realistic. Accents aside, this is a fine entertainment flick even by today's standards. I've seen expensive productions that put me to sleep!! Not to forget that Roland is just so handsome! Enjoy

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.

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.

Two sacks of gold are missing from a shipment. There has been a series of robberies. Sergeant Mooney (Robert Elliott) suspects slick trader Louis LeBey (Gilbert Roland) who takes a liking to new arrival Nedra Ruskin (Barbara Leonard). Woolie-Woolie (Nina Quartero) gets jealous.

I'm not saying that Gilbert Roland's accent is any good. The sound quality masks some of his difficulties. It's not that thick and I can understand him. He throws in some French words every other line. It's obviously not his native tongue. At least, he has the charisma. I have more problems with Robert Elliott's loose performance. He needs to portray power and authority. He does not. The even bigger problem is Nina Quartero. I think the character is supposed to be a Native Canadian. I couldn't tell from her talking and forget about the wrong ethnic casting. Maybe she's trying for gypsy. Hal Roach is directing but he's not the producer. It's a bit of a mess.