Ten Nights in a Bar-Room

1st watched 2/18/2007 - 6 out of 10(Dir-William O'Connor): Honest portrayal of alcoholism and it's effects in this rarely seen film. The title character, a family man named Joe Morgan, has a daughter who is very sick and visit's the new doctor in town at the local hotel and bar. The only problem is he steps his foot into the bar and orders a drink(his family history is such that one drink will start a cycle that he won't be able to stop). Up to this point, he is seen as a hard-working, family-loving man but things get worse as he frequents the bars day after day. After a few months, he is to the point where he needs the doctor worse than his daughter as she is getting better under his care. He loses his job and all his money in a card game and soon he is spending more time at the bar than at home. There are a couple un-forgettable scenes where his daughter visits him in the bar asking him to come home because she misses him so much that is heart-breaking(although the 2nd scene makes it a little over-done). This movie started as a portrait of a sick girl and became a portrait of a sick man who is only temporarily won over by the love of his daughter. The movie doesn't try to explain away the problem, it just presents it. He still loves his daughter and his family but he is taken away from it by his alcoholism. It also doesn't try to candy-coat things with a Hollywood-type ending, it just ends(actually on a pretty negative note). The only real negative to the movie is it's attempt to throw in minor scenes of comedy and a very slight portrayal of the effect on the family but these things really don't diminish from the overall impact of the movie.

In the 19th and early 20th century, moralistic and sensationalistic tales about the evils of drink were very popular on stage. Not surprisingly, in the early days of film, these sorts of stories were also extremely popular. The stories were generally very, very melodramatic and even a bit silly. They had a good point to make but told the stories in such ridiculous ways that they are laughable by today's standards. "Ten Nights in a Barroom" is clearly inspired by all these previous stories and even features some super- sentimental and old time music and is a bit ridiculous. However, oddly, it also is much more realistic at times--particularly in its portrayal of advanced alcoholism and the DTs. So, we have a definite mixed bag of a film that is super-familiar if you've seen any of these anti-drink silent movies. I've seen quite a few and they are all essentially the same--a decent family man avoids alcohol until one day he is pressed repeatedly by his so-called friends to have 'just one'....and he soon is a raging drunk who is abusive and neglectful of his poor family. If course, being an hour long, it's got more to it as well--including a very odd scene near the end when the drunken guy burns down the bar!! Oddly enjoyable despite its being old fashioned even when it debuted in 1931.