Uncle Dave Lewis
2003-07-12 16:37:32 UTC
On "The Unoffical Raoul Walsh Site" it reads:
(Raoul Walsh) got a break in 1914 when he was signed to appear as a young
Pancho Villa in 'The Life of General Villa'. It was not so much the role
that was his break, but managing to be assigned as the assistant director
responsible for the Mexican documentary sequences for the film. He even was
able to persuade Pancho Villa to re-stage the battle of Durango for the
film.
Leonard Maltin at
http://www.movietreasures.com/main/Directors/Directors_2/body_directors_2.ht
ml
(Walsh's) first film work was with D. W. Griffith as an actor and assistant
director. He codirected and starred in The Life of General Villa (1914),
which in later years led the filmmaker to spin yarns about his association
with the Mexican bandit/hero; in fact Walsh never left Los Angeles while the
film was in production.
The AFI online silent film catalogue says:
D. W. Griffith's actual participation in this film is spurious. The newsreel
footage of The Battle of Torreon may have been released previously as a
short. According to contemporary reviews, General Villa himself participated
in the production, although the extent is unclear. A news item in MPW stated
that the Mexican War Film Corp. (which was tied financially to Mutual) had
purchased the American rights to this film. The film was probably re-edited
and re-issued by Mutual on 15 Apr 1915 as The Outlaw's Revenge. Modern
sources credit Raoul Walsh with the camera work for The Battle of Torreon .
Obviously this is some widely ranging information, and unfortunately none of
it jibes. I suspect that AFI is right in that it was "The Battle of
Torreon", not "The Battle of Durango" featured in the film. But I haven't
yet found a reference to a "Battle of Torreon" in connection with Villa. The
"Batlle of Durango", if what I've read is to be trusted, took place in
December 1913. And note that AFI has no cast list and does not mention
Walsh's participation in the film as an actor, nor that he played the part
of Villa. But it does date the film's release squarely in May 1914, wheras
other references are all over the map, dating "The Life of General Villa"
(which in its original form, ran 7 reels) anywhere from 1912 to 1915. imdb
has two entries for it, one under "Life of Villa" and the other under "The
Life of General Villa".
I'm not sure I remember when the production schedule of "The Birth of a
Nation" got underway, and the beginning of it may tend to overlap the latter
days of "Villa". It's not Griffith's "spurious" participation that concerns
me; I realize that as "supervisor" he was probably no more involved in
"Villa" than merely being the head of the Mutual unit that made it, although
that's a bit more involvement than some of the writers are willing to allow
him. Nonetheless, it's Walsh's possible conflict that is of interest to me -
he didn't "just" play John Wilkes Booth in TBOAN, he was involved in
second-unit work and probably blacked-up as a "negro" when Griffith needed
it. Certainly someone here would be able to tell me when Griffith broke
ground on TBOAN?
My preliminary analysis is that I suspect the director, and the only
director, of "The Life of General Villa" was W. Christy Cabanne. Yet the
combined credit of both Walsh and Cabanne persists in practically every
reference to this title. Had Walsh merely acted the role of Pancho Villa and
was not required to go into the post-production process on the film, then he
would be free to work on TBOAN, the production schedule of which took many
months in 1914. This would not preclude him from having done second-unit
work for "Villa" much as he did for TBOAN, but we all know that alone would
not earn him a credit as "co-director."
Finally, from the AFI Preservation page:
Magdalena Arias of El Paso, Texas, donated her father Edmundo Padilla's
collection of Pancho Villa titles and related Mexican subjects, including
two unique early subjects, For The Soul Rafael (1920) and Liberty, A
Daughter of the U.S.A., plus a number of unidentified titles. La Venganza de
Pancho Villa, on deposit with the Library of Congress and owned by the
University of El Paso, will be restored and preserved with AFI Challenge
Grant funds.
Perhaps this is hopeful more than rational, but I wanted ask if that among
this material of elsewhere whether any part of "The Life of General Villa",
"The Outlaw's Revenge" or the "short" AFI refers to as "The Battle of
Torreon" has turned up? Otherwise I find these films listed as "lost".
Thank you,
Uncle Dave Lewis
(Raoul Walsh) got a break in 1914 when he was signed to appear as a young
Pancho Villa in 'The Life of General Villa'. It was not so much the role
that was his break, but managing to be assigned as the assistant director
responsible for the Mexican documentary sequences for the film. He even was
able to persuade Pancho Villa to re-stage the battle of Durango for the
film.
Leonard Maltin at
http://www.movietreasures.com/main/Directors/Directors_2/body_directors_2.ht
ml
(Walsh's) first film work was with D. W. Griffith as an actor and assistant
director. He codirected and starred in The Life of General Villa (1914),
which in later years led the filmmaker to spin yarns about his association
with the Mexican bandit/hero; in fact Walsh never left Los Angeles while the
film was in production.
The AFI online silent film catalogue says:
D. W. Griffith's actual participation in this film is spurious. The newsreel
footage of The Battle of Torreon may have been released previously as a
short. According to contemporary reviews, General Villa himself participated
in the production, although the extent is unclear. A news item in MPW stated
that the Mexican War Film Corp. (which was tied financially to Mutual) had
purchased the American rights to this film. The film was probably re-edited
and re-issued by Mutual on 15 Apr 1915 as The Outlaw's Revenge. Modern
sources credit Raoul Walsh with the camera work for The Battle of Torreon .
Obviously this is some widely ranging information, and unfortunately none of
it jibes. I suspect that AFI is right in that it was "The Battle of
Torreon", not "The Battle of Durango" featured in the film. But I haven't
yet found a reference to a "Battle of Torreon" in connection with Villa. The
"Batlle of Durango", if what I've read is to be trusted, took place in
December 1913. And note that AFI has no cast list and does not mention
Walsh's participation in the film as an actor, nor that he played the part
of Villa. But it does date the film's release squarely in May 1914, wheras
other references are all over the map, dating "The Life of General Villa"
(which in its original form, ran 7 reels) anywhere from 1912 to 1915. imdb
has two entries for it, one under "Life of Villa" and the other under "The
Life of General Villa".
I'm not sure I remember when the production schedule of "The Birth of a
Nation" got underway, and the beginning of it may tend to overlap the latter
days of "Villa". It's not Griffith's "spurious" participation that concerns
me; I realize that as "supervisor" he was probably no more involved in
"Villa" than merely being the head of the Mutual unit that made it, although
that's a bit more involvement than some of the writers are willing to allow
him. Nonetheless, it's Walsh's possible conflict that is of interest to me -
he didn't "just" play John Wilkes Booth in TBOAN, he was involved in
second-unit work and probably blacked-up as a "negro" when Griffith needed
it. Certainly someone here would be able to tell me when Griffith broke
ground on TBOAN?
My preliminary analysis is that I suspect the director, and the only
director, of "The Life of General Villa" was W. Christy Cabanne. Yet the
combined credit of both Walsh and Cabanne persists in practically every
reference to this title. Had Walsh merely acted the role of Pancho Villa and
was not required to go into the post-production process on the film, then he
would be free to work on TBOAN, the production schedule of which took many
months in 1914. This would not preclude him from having done second-unit
work for "Villa" much as he did for TBOAN, but we all know that alone would
not earn him a credit as "co-director."
Finally, from the AFI Preservation page:
Magdalena Arias of El Paso, Texas, donated her father Edmundo Padilla's
collection of Pancho Villa titles and related Mexican subjects, including
two unique early subjects, For The Soul Rafael (1920) and Liberty, A
Daughter of the U.S.A., plus a number of unidentified titles. La Venganza de
Pancho Villa, on deposit with the Library of Congress and owned by the
University of El Paso, will be restored and preserved with AFI Challenge
Grant funds.
Perhaps this is hopeful more than rational, but I wanted ask if that among
this material of elsewhere whether any part of "The Life of General Villa",
"The Outlaw's Revenge" or the "short" AFI refers to as "The Battle of
Torreon" has turned up? Otherwise I find these films listed as "lost".
Thank you,
Uncle Dave Lewis