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SMAD. An Organ of Student Opinion. 1936. Volume 7. Number 13.

Film Review — "The Trail of the Lonesome Pine"

Film Review

"The Trail of the Lonesome Pine"

Reminiscent of such famous successes of silent days as "Tol'able David," "Driven," and "The Little Shepherd of Kingdom Come," the all-colour film, "The Trail of the Lonesome Pine," brings back memories of the other years of the films. Produced years ago as a silent, the John Fox Junior story comes with even greater vigour to the screen as a talking film, and the addition of technicolour undoubtedly adds to the enjoyment and success of the film. The feud country of the Cumberland Mountains with its illiterate yet lovable mountineer, who would just as soon kill an enemy as plough the fields, who regard any visitor as a "foreigner" and who would cure a bullet wound in the arm by inserting a plug of "baccy" —you see them again in this story, and the simple tale told gains rather than loses by its direct simplicity.

Not very many films of these people have reached the screen. Yet it is strange that of the few that have, most of them have been real successes. Years ago Richard Barthelmess made his greatest success in "Tol'able David," whilst Charles Brabin made for himself a name in the film world with a simple story, "Driven," which he produced "on a shoestring," and made a fortune for the company which bought and distributed the film. Luckily the success of these stories did not lead producers to make and re-make films in similar vein as is so often the case, so that this present film is almost novel to theatregoers.

Good shots: the arrival of a letter, which no one is able to read, and the attempts of the mountaineers to refrain from appearing as if such an event had never happened to them before; the amazement of the mountaineer when he first uses a telephone.

"As any psychologist will tell you, the worst thing you can possibly do to a woman is to deprive her of a grievance." —Beverly Nicholls.