NZIFF Classic Film Review: "The Crowd" (1928).

"A powerful drama of modern marriage- a marriage that goes smash, and how it is saved..." This is The Crowd. This 1928 American silent film directed by King Vidor, and written by Vidor and John V.A. Weaver. The film follows young John Sims as he weathers the death of his father and travels to New York City in search of success. Instead, he becomes a low-level worker in an enormous office of a nameless corporation. After he meets a beautiful young woman , things seem to be looking up, but before long the newlyweds are sullen and bickering, and the arrival of their children leaves John feeling trapped in a dead-end existence. Then tragedy strikes, causing him to reassess his life.

After the critical and financial success of The Big Parade (1925), Vidor conceived the idea for the film. Vidor wanted the new film to be innovative in its story, acting, and cinematography. Influenced by 1920s German cinema and F.W. Murnau in particular, the film mixes striking visual styles and moving camera cinematography – as well as hidden cameras in some of the New York City scenes, and subtle use of scale models and dissolves, with intense, intimate scenes of the family's struggle. In order to attain greater authenticity, Vidor avoided casting big-name stars; James Murray had started as a studio extra, and had appeared in featured roles already, but had made his way to California riding boxcars and doing odd jobs such as shoveling coal and washing dishes. For his female lead, Vidor selected Eleanor Boardman, an MGM contract actress and his second wife. Vidor's great financial success at MGM in the 1920s allowed him to sell the unusual scenario to production head Irving Thalberg as an experimental film. However, MGM chief Louis B. Mayer reportedly disliked the film for its bleak subject matter and lack of a happy ending, and the studio held the film from release for almost a year. According to Vidor's autobiography, as a result, several alternate upbeat endings were filmed, and previewed in small towns at the studio's insistence. The film was finally released with two endings, one Vidor's original ending, and another with the family gathered around a Christmas tree after John has gotten a job with an advertising agency. Exhibitors could choose which version to show, but, at least according to Vidor, the happy ending was rarely shown. The Crowd was a modest financial and critical success upon its initial release on 18 February, 1928. It went on to be nominated at the very first Academy Award presentation in 1928, for several awards, including a unique and artistic production, as well as the award for best director for Vidor. However, Mayer urged his fellow Academy board members to not vote for it. They didn't, instead gave the first (and only) Academy Award for Best Film--Unique and Artistic Production to, ironically, Murnau's Sunrise (1927). Since then, the film has gone on to become an influential and acclaimed film, as well as being hailed as one of the greatest and most enduring American silent films. French New Wave auteur Jean-Luc Godard was asked in the 1960s why more films were not made about ordinary people, and his response was "The Crowd had already been made, so why remake it?" – but at the time, it was released just as the Great Depression had hit, and audiences sought escapist entertainment over the stark realism of the film, which filmmakers would not embrace again until after the end of World War II. Still, the film was popular enough to gross twice its cost. The arrival of sound films at the same time combined to radically change filmmaking. Due to the limitations imposed by early sound filming techniques, the film's moving camera innovations would not be equaled for another decade. In 1989, the film was one of the first 25 to be selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being; "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant". It is also included among the American Film Institute's 1998 list of the 400 movies nominated for the Top 100 Greatest American Movies.

The film stars Murray, Boardman and Bert Roach. Terrific performances were given by the cast, who conveyed an entire lifetime of the emotional roller-coaster that is life in ninety-eight minutes. Murray especially gave a haunting performance. Like the character of John Sims, Murray's life ended in a real-life unhappy ending as he succumbed to alcoholism and became a Skid-Row bum. When Vidor saw him on the street, panhandling, he offered Murray a part in his upcoming film Our Daily Bread (1934), but Murray angrily refused, saying "Just because I stop you on the street and try to borrow a buck, you think you can tell me what to do. As far as I am concerned, you know what you can do with your lousy part." In 1936, his body was found in the Hudson River, a possible suicide. Vidor was haunted by Murray's death, and in 1979 attempted to raise funds to film The Actor, a screenplay he had written based on Murray's story, but the film was never made.

Masterfully directed by Vidor, this thought-provoking piece of cinema swings easily between comedy, romance and tragedy without missing a beat, and there are numerous set-pieces of enormous power - even today, the harrowing dramatic scenes would rank among the best ever put on film. The silence does try one's patience but the film is noteworthy in showing us that is often filled with them, both good and bad. The film is a wonderfully poignant social statement, but a bit dated by today's standards, but still powerful. The film is technically impressive, well-intended, even if it's ultimately too melodramatic. A harsh film that reflects the Depression era, Vidor's chronicle is both artistically and ideologically a significant Hollywood feature. It makes for an interesting cinematically humanistic capsule survival film from the Depression-era period. It wasn't strong stuff in 1928, but it has since become and remains strong today.

Simon says The Crowd receives:

Also, see my NZIFF review for Nobody's Daughter Haewon (누구의 딸도 아닌 해원)