A Ship Comes In

Rudolph Schildkraut ("Pleznik") and his wife Louise Dresser ("Mama") arrive, nervously, as refugees to the United States. Their youngest child is a bit bleary eyed and they are concerned that they won't be allowed in... Luckily, the child smiles and next thing they have a home, he has a job and a neighbour with whom he can play his music with. On his son's eighteenth birthday, "Pleznik" is to meet "Judge Gresham" (Robert Edeson) to have his citizenship conferred upon him. To make him even more proud, that son "Eric" (Milton Holmes) enlists, though this naturally distresses his poor mother. The judge, meantime, is not without his detractors and a group of disgruntled criminals plan to assassinate him. They plant a bomb in his chambers - in a cake box left by "Pleznik" as a thank you. Next thing the jovial and hard working patriot is arrested, found guilty of attempted murder and incarcerated. "Mama" gets even worse news shortly afterwards from an army courier and despairs. Unexpectedly, the man who planted the bomb is also suffering. His guilt is tormenting him as he struggles to reconcile his conscience with the idea of an innocent man languishing in jail, unaware of his recent familial calamity. Can any good yet come from this tortuous scenario for the "Pleznik" family? Although the production is extremely basic and he lighting really need need some help, the efforts from the enthusiastic Schildkraut especially, but also from the sparingly seen but characterful Dresser and the increasingly maniacal Fritz Field contribute well to a sometimes quite touching story of the simplicity and decency of American dream becoming the American nightmare.

"A Ship Comes In" is a flag-waver about the struggles of immigrants in the early part of the last century. Some immigrants took immediately to their new surroundings, and some did not. This is the story of one Jewish family that loved America as soon as they disembarked at Ellis Island. Rudolph Schildkraut plays Peter, the head of the family who longs to become a naturalized citizen but gets framed by a disgruntled immigrant, Sokol, played by Fritz Feld.

Most of us, having been born here, will never experience Peter's feelings of hope and pride but nowadays we are well aware of his counterpart in the picture, who despises his newly adopted country. "A Ship Comes In" is the second picture I have seen in which Schildkraut, with a deftly nuanced performance, takes over a picture and makes it his own. He is as skilled an actor here as in "His People", made a year earlier. He made only one talking picture, "Christina" (1930)before his death. It is thought to be lost.

"A Ship Comes In" is an intensely human drama shot through with patriotism and embodied in another remarkable acting job by Schildkraut. It was shown at Capitolfest 2011, Rome N.Y.

A SHIP COMES IN (Pathe, 1928), directed by William K. Howard, is a sentimental tale of an immigrant family in their newfound land of America. Reminiscent to John Ford's directorial style, though not on a larger scale, A SHIP COMES IN makes up for its lack of top-named actors (by today's standards) with well-constructed story, compliments by Julien Josephson.

The story unfolds in New York harbor where a ship comes in: "Immigrants - hopeful strangers with eyes uplifted toward a vision of homes and happiness - Immigrants." Of the thousands of immigrants coming off the boat, heading for medical inspection before starting their new life on American soil, the main focus turns towards a Hungarian family from Veshala: Peter Placzmik (Rudolph Schildkraut); his wife, "Mama" (Louise Dresser); and their three children, Eric (Milton Holmes); Marthe (Linda Landi) and Katinka (enacted by Virginia Davis as the child and Evelyn Mills as the adult). After acquiring a place to live, in an apartment building five flights up, Peter befriends neighbor, Dan Casey (Lucien Littlefield), who arranges employment for him working as janitor in the federal building, and Sokol (Fritz Feld), a radical who so dislikes the land of opportunity. While brooming the hallway, Peter witnesses Judge Gresham (Robert Edeson) swearing in immigrants as full-fledged citizens of their "adopted country," an honor he will have in five years. After Peter's swearing in as U.S. citizen by his now friend, Judge Gresham, situations begin to occur for the Plecznik family, especially for "Mama" witnessing her 18-year-old son, Eric, becoming a man by enlisting as an Army soldier during the outbreak of the World War, and the arrest and conviction of her husband, a true patriot for his adopted country, for supposedly placing an explosive bomb inside his own cake box intended for Gresham, causing him serious injury and death to his secretary.

Regardless of the plot carried solely by Rudolph Schildkraut's (1862-1930)fine performance, it's Louise Dresser (1878-1965), in a role categorized as secondary, who was singled out by the academy voters as nominee for Best Actress of the year (1927-28), competing with Janet Gaynor for SUNRISE, SEVENTH HEAVEN and STREET ANGEL (Fox Films, 1927-28 respectively) and Gloria Swanson as SADIE THOMPSON (United Artists, 1928). Dresser, losing her statuette to Gaynor, did provide this melodrama with key scenes worth nothing, mainly that her reaction as her son goes off to war, and suffering moments as her husband gets hauled off to prison after being found "guilty" for a crime for which he is innocent. As for Rudolph Schildkraut (short man with round face), he's most noted as the father of stage and screen actor, Joseph Schildkraut (tall with John Barrymore profile), than for his brief Hollywood film roles of the late 1920s. Also listed in the cast is Louis Natheaux appearing as Gregor.

As with most silent films released during its final years (1928-29) before its conversion to sound, then known as "talkies," A SHIP COMES IN is virtually forgotten, even by film historians. Whether the movie has ever been televised or not is uncertain, but is it certain that it was formerly available on home video around the 1990s by a distribution company called Grapevine Video. Along with the former Blackhawk Video of the 1980s and 90s, Grapevine, in its heyday, was the home to its large selection of famous and obscure silent movies such as this one. While the Grapevine label lists A SHIP COMES IN at 94 minutes, the existing print, equipped with fair organ scoring, runs 70 minutes, long enough for a good story and short enough to hold interest. (***)

A story of immigrants in New York, it follows a family of five from about 1912 through to 1917/18. The father (Rudolph Schildkraut - father of Joseph) is an enthusiastic fellow, keen to assimilate and 'get on'. After making friends with a local amateur fellow musician, he finds a job as janitor, and soon becomes anxious to attain US citizenship. Meanwhile, a disgruntled fellow-European (Fritz Feld, playing an Anarchist / Communist / Socialist - wasn't clear) plans an attack on the judge in charge of citizenships, and takes the opportunity to use Schildkraut as his cat's paw...

Although the film is not always clear at times (when Schildkraut is sent to prison we don't know if he is on Death Row), and some of the events are telescoped a bit, this may be due to missing footage. As with the same year's FOUR SONS, the mother is the centre of the film, even when events threaten to disintegrate the family. Louise Dresser was nominated for an Oscar for this film. Also Feld's character is too obvious a troublemaker, even before he opens his mouth, and the business with the bomb in the cake-box is not altogether convincing.

These problems aside, A SHIP COMES IN holds the attention pretty well and is a worthwhile, if sentimental drama. One hopes a better copy survives, as the cast also includes Robert Edeson and Lucien Littlefield. Schildkraut, too, seems to have been a distinguished stage actor in Vienna, before making films for UFA and going to America. Sadly he died only two years after this film was made, although whether he would have done well in talkies will never be known.