Beyond the Rocks

I had a full range of impressions and emotions while watching this recently rediscovered silent film. I saw it on a big screen in Orlando (before DVD release) and my husband and I sat in the very front row so we would be right on top of it and wouldn't miss a thing.

Story aspects: Beyond the Rocks is a romantic melodrama, based on a story by Elinor Glyn. It had some typical silent film clichés and overacting, but to a veteran silent film fan this will not be distracting. Gloria Swanson plays Theodora, who loves her father and family enough to sacrifice for them by marrying an older man she does not love just because he is rich. Afterward she falls in love with Hector (Rudolph Valentino), a rich romantic young gentleman who rescues her from the clutches of death not just once, but twice. A series of circumstances leads the husband to understand his wife is in love with another man, and he goes off on a dangerous exhibition to Algeria with the aim of sacrificing himself so that the young couple can be together.

Swanson and Valentino obviously enjoyed working together, they had a nice chemistry together on screen, though it didn't strike me as a terribly passionate one. In fact there was not one single kiss scene in the entire film, a major disappointment to me (unless there was one in missing footage). The closest they come to it is one scene where she rubs her cheek against his head. There was instead much talk of duty and doing the right thing by staying away from each other as much as possible, so that the husband would not be hurt.

Style aspects: Gloria's clothes in the film were gorgeous. Valentino on the other hand looked like he was shortchanged in the wardrobe department in several scenes, where he wears a tweed suit that ill becomes him. It looks too tight and only one top button is buttoned on his suit coat, which looked odd to me. For one brief scene he looks incredibly dashing all dressed in white. This was also the first time I noticed that Valentino had a rather large horizontal scar on his right cheek! You can see details like this much better on a big screen. I have never noticed it in any Valentino film I've seen on DVD. In the beginning scenes Valentino looks so young he looks like a teenager. Delectable. Gloria on the other hand had so much makeup on that she looked much older than her years, older even than she looked in Queen Kelly! That kept putting me off. It got a little better when she started wearing sophisticated, glamorous clothes, when she did age as part of the plot.

The art direction was pretty good for a 1922 movie. The scenes on the water and in the desert were quite realistic. The interior of homes looked authentic to the time period. Obviously a great deal of thought was dedicated to the overall look of the film, to make it artistic as much as possible.

Technical aspects: The film started at 7 pm and ended at 8:15 pm, so it was roughly one hour and 10 minutes long (with a 5 minute intro). My first impression of the film was that I was disappointed the beginning titles and credits were obviously lost. The font they used for the title and star credits was a modern, simple one and not impressive. If I were restoring it I would have designed opening credits with a strong vintage look to them, perhaps using a decorative flower design border. They could have gotten ideas from similar 1922 films. To just announce their magical names, Gloria Swanson and Rudolph Valentino, with a boring, ugly modern font was not appropriate and didn't do justice to the importance of this film find.

Most scenes had artifacts galore and missing frames. A pageant sequence was partly missing, leaving the audience with unanswered questions as to what went on during those important scenes. There were some deteriorated scenes and decomposition but most of the film was in watchable condition, and we should be thankful we have it at all.

Musical aspects: The score was a strange mixed bag of new age music with some jazzy refrains thrown in at inappropriate times. One flashback scene received some vintage sounding music but it wasn't impressively authentic. There was one nice bit of music in a hotel scene where a musician was playing some kind of elaborate string instrument and people were dancing. That was my favorite part of the score, but alas, all too brief. Overall I feel the composer was trying to sound like James Horner's music, the fellow who did James Cameron's Titanic soundtrack, but this new age, Celtic sound is just not what I prefer when I watch my silent films. Enough with the pan flutes already! I prefer period music for silents.

The absolute worst thing about this score was the constant sound effects. It was ridiculous. No audience would have heard that many sound effects when going to watch a silent film in 1922. They wouldn't have heard that many sound effects if they had seen a silent-part sound film in 1929!

My rating: I'd give this film a 7 out of 10 for the storyline itself, a typical melodrama that wasn't original, an 8 out of 10 for set design and locations, a 4 out of 10 for the "restoration" work done, a 6 out of 10 for the music score (I might have raised that to a 7 without all the sound effects!), and an 8 out of 10 for the acting.

Addendum: I have since read the 1906 novel by Elinor Glyn, it's much better than the film. I would strongly suggest people interested in this film seek out the novel.

Just saw the film at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences in Los Angeles, very faithful and loving restoration. Still some bits missing. The speaker who was in charge of the restoration said there seemed to be approx four minutes still missing. In attendance were members of Swan's and Valentino's family. They spoke of their gratitude that the film was found and restored. Swanson's granddaughter quoted a passage from her grandmother's autobiography about her thoughts on the picture and that passage finished with a plea that somebody somewhere find a print of the film as she did enjoy it so and was so sad it had been lost. It really did feel in that theatre as if both stars were there watching it again. It's a rather good film, not a "great" film but well worth seeing for any fan of either star or of silent films in general. The DVD release will be "soon" and be on the Milestone label, a company that releases DVDs of a large number of silent films including nearly all of Keaton's.

This was a good day for film to have found this treasure

It's great to have this film back after 84 years! It's only a pity it couldn't have been rediscovered while Gloria Swanson was still alive (in her autobiography she named it as one of the three films of hers the "loss" of which she regretted most, along with "Madame Sans-Gêne" and the last reel of "Sadie Thompson"). Elinor Glyn's story is horribly contrived — I can't think of another movie until the Beatles' "Help!" that moved its characters so extensively around the world to so little effect — and the love scenes are a bit disappointing (Swanson recalled that the Fatty Arbuckle and William Desmond Taylor scandals both broke just before this film started shooting, with the result that the script was given a last-minute rewrite to tone down the adulterous passions of her and Valentino's characters) — but what makes this movie truly great is the marvelously understated acting. This is the film to show someone who thinks all silent-film actors swooned, waved their arms like windmills and reacted to traumas like the Statue of Liberty collapsing in an earthquake: the people in "Beyond the Rocks" use simple, economical gestures and facial expressions to get their emotions across. I credit director Sam Wood — who made the transition to sound quite successfully and had a long career in the talkies — with getting these marvelously realistic performances from his cast. Henny Vrienten's musical score for the restored print is somber and effective, though I could have done without the sound effects and crowd noises and it seems odd to watch a silent film with music whose primary instruments are a flute and a Miles Davis-style trumpet.

I have to start by saying that I am probably the worst possible person to write a comment on "Beyond the Rocks", as it is the only silent movie I've seen to date. However, since not many people have yet had a chance to see this movie, I thought it my duty as a movie enthusiast to review.

In "Beyond the Rocks" a poor young woman, Theodora Fitzgerald (Gloria Swanson), briefly meets the handsome Lord Hector Bracondale (Rudolph Valentino). They like each other, but soon part ways. Some time later Theodora marries a rich man, even though she has no feelings for him whatsoever, in order to make her father and sisters happy. On her honeymoon she runs into Hector again, and they continue to meet each other socially. Soon they realise that they love each other, but Theodora is now married, which makes it impossible for them to be together.

I found the beginning of "Beyond the Rocks" a bit slow and uneventful. Things do happen, but somehow I couldn't really get 'into' the story. The reason for this is, most likely, that the love between the two main characters at that point hasn't fully developed yet, nor have their problems, and there is little to get emotionally involved with the characters about. But this 'slow' part doesn't last long, and the rest of the movie is as interesting as such a love story can possibly be.

"Beyond the Rocks" is famous for co-starring two silent movie greats, Gloria Swanson and Rudolph Valentino. I was a bit disappointed with Valentino at first. During much of the first half of the movie, he has little to do but smile and look good, neither of which requires much acting talent. Fortunately he has more emotions to convey later, and then finally gets the chance to show what he's capable of. But Swanson remains the star of this movie. Whenever she is on the screen, whatever she is doing, she's the one you're looking at. Even when Valentino acts at his best, he is very much in his own world inside the movie, while Swanson transcends the bounds, radiating off the screen and drawing you into the story.

Not long ago, only one minute of this movie was known to have survived. Then, a few years ago, a copy of the whole film was found in The Netherlands, where it was restored by the Nederlands Filmmuseum. The quality is, as far as I can judge, usually very good. There are only two moments in the film where there is a lot of damage, and it briefly becomes extremely difficult to see what's happening on the screen. The first of these moments is very short, and the shot rather uninteresting, so that it is no great loss to not be able to see it. The other is longer and happens in the middle of a considerably more important and interesting scene. It is a shame that this part of the movie didn't survive in a better condition, but one can't expect miracles, and an advancement from one minute of film to all 80 minutes whereof perhaps one minute damaged is doubtless a great one.

Dutch movie composer Henny Vrienten has made a soundtrack for "Beyond the Rocks". Unique of this soundtrack is that it not only contains music, but also sounds from the surroundings of the characters: cars driving up, footsteps on the stairs, knocks on the door, etc. The general opinion on this seems to be that it makes it easier for people to follow what's happening. I personally can see the other view - that silent movies weren't meant to have sound effects - as well, but the sound as it is didn't bother me. There is one thing, however, that I think should have been left out, and that is the sound of people talking in the background, which is sometimes used. If the actors don't talk audibly, I really don't think it's appropriate to have talking (and sometimes laughing) heard in the background, even if it only occurs in 'party' scenes, where it would be a normal sound to expect. The music is often good and fitting enough (though sometimes rather early-21st-century), except in one scene where the music played in a fancy hotel/restaurant is of the kind you would expect to hear in a saloon in a bad western. This soundtrack is not my favorite part of the film as I saw it, but it certainly isn't so bad that it ruins one's viewing experience, and naturally the movie can't be blamed for it.

All in all, this is a great movie. I hope that it will soon get distributed around the world to give everyone the opportunity to see it.

I've loved silent films for years so I'm not your average film viewer, I watch as many as I can find because they're to too rare and usually uniquely entertaining. Beyond the Rocks is not your typical silent in that is the only pairing of stars two of the brightest stars in what was a lost but not forgotten film. It was only forgotten because it was lost for 80years but after the discovery in the Netherlands we finally have a chance to see it for ourselves. I first want to applaud them and all their hard work as I would any archivist in their efforts to make history available to all of us.

I had read some of the many reviews on the IMDb, and after seeing it, the reviews are quite funny. One reviewer writes how Valentino walks away with the film but was not impressed by Swanson. Another finds Swanson radiant and Valentino stiff and inexpressive. And other's thought the film's costumes were the best part! I enjoyed it mostly because the actors had charm including the dumpy old rich husband that got in and then later out of the way. The story was typical meller-drama with our sympathies being first with drowning Swanson, then the dangling mountain climber Swanson, then the trapped in a poor family Swanson turned social climber stuck married to a chubby old man she didn't love Swanson.

Valentino and Swanson never really turn on the heat on high but after kismet (aka author/scriptwriter) has brought them together repeatedly they do simmer a little.

On the whole I enjoyed seeing the film on the big screen. The "digital restoration" turned out to be that the picture image pretty sharp and is rock steady instead of jumpy and jittery. It was a detailed image with sharp focus obviously made from a 35mm nitrate print. What continually struck me as being odd is that the film was filled with artifacts like spots, dirt, specks, blotches, scratches, tears, etc. I've seen several digitally restored titles where these minor image imperfections were removed. And I'm familiar with nitrate decomposition and what that looks like and there were a couple of sections where I understand it was a necessity to see/show that's all that has survived in the source material. But, it does not look like any effort was made to clean up or correct any of the wear throughout the print. Especially, the little lines on the left side of the image caused by those tiny, stress tears at sprocket holes that dance thru out the film. I realize a lot of people probably worked hard and much money was spent on making it look as good as it does, but if the lack of money or time was a problem then why spend too much on the excessive soundtrack? I've seen hundreds of silent films and they should be presented with music that matches/compliments the action. The presentation I saw used a new soundtrack especially made for this restoration and it was not a simply piano or music track using music in a style that would have been used at the films original release. Instead we heard boat and car motors running, the gravel getting crushed under the wheels of a moving car, doors opening & closing, every footstep, papers rustling, dogs painting, background crowd murmurings, envelopes being opened, every sound under the sun except the voices of the lead actors! UGH! These background effects did not compliment the action but constantly bring attention to them selves as unnecessary and intrusive! A proper silent era film presentation has the film accompanied by music of the era that is played live and the musician interprets the mood as it is presented on screen and blends it with the mood of that particular audience. This live mixing of projected larger than life image, live music and interactions of the audience create a recipe for cinema magic! And even though I have ranted on about how I disliked the sound effects that were added to this silent motion picture I did enjoy seeing the film and would not want to prevent anyone from seeing it any way they can. But I hope when it is released another/better soundtrack is offered/optioned on the DVD in case a customer has an experience like mine. My votes, film 7 out of 10, 1950s styled jazz music 4 out of 10 and distracting modern/faked sound effects -1 out of ten.