Le bateau ivre

TWELVE MILES OUT is hard to judge in its current condition. The print I saw was definitely incomplete, particularly in regards to setting up characters. The intertitles were translated awkwardly from French, leading to unintentionally amusing typos during dramatic scenes.

Judging from the hour-long copy that exists, TWELVE MILES OUT appears to have been a standard romantic potboiler of the time. It is competently shot and matinee king John Gilbert is a roguish, charming bootlegger with eyes for society girl Joan Crawford. This was an early role for Crawford and one can tell she is still learning the ropes from the limited reactions she has to what's going on: either tight-faced disapproval of all the criminal shenanigans or teary-eyed fear. Ernest Torrance is the villain of the piece, a rival bootlegger who seems more interested in having Crawford to himself than anything else.

So on the whole, there are no big surprises here. As always with silent movies, we are lucky to have films such as this preserved, no matter their quality. TWELVE MILES OUT could use explanatory intertitles showing what was cut just for story clarity, but on the whole, it is an entertaining bit of MGM fluff.

Yes only the French 62-minute version survives (originally 85 minutes) and the film starts without the opening scene but this is still an exciting sea yarn about battling bootleggers and features two great stars: John Gilbert and Joan Crawford.

Gilbert is a bootlegger who kidnaps Crawford and her fiancé in an attempt to escape the Coast Guard. But he starts to fall for Crawford after his boat is boarded by even WORSE bootleggers led by lecherous Ernest Torrence. The men begin a battle over Crawford until the surprising ending.

The film was a hit in 1927 but is often credited with being the first film on which Gilbert wrangled with LB Mayer. Gilbert helped write the screenplay but was unhappy when key scenes were cut; he also disliked the ending. This was an important starring assignment for Crawford since Gilbert was #1 at the box office at this time.

The scene featuring Eileen Percy, Dorothy Sebastian, and Gwen Lee is lost.

Still worth a look.

I recently purchased this video from an independent distributor and found out there are only a few copies left of this silent film on VHS. The VHS version is 62 minutes long, transferred from a French print; the original 1927 version was 85 minutes. John Gilbert plays a bootlegger who kidnaps Joan Crawford and her fiance on his boat and eventually the two fall in love with each other, but things happen that cause a rift in their relationship. It is interesting to see a very young Crawford in a small role and her presence is what makes the film interesting, but in general it is a strange and muddled story, likely due to the fact that important pieces are missing. Again, only valuable for film history reasons, due to the fact that the original film no longer exists. 2 1/2 out of 4 for this one.