Northward, Ho!

This is a mildly interesting documentary about MGM's decision to find locations for shooting NORTHWEST PASSAGE in Utah and Death Valley, with scenes of cast and crew at work filming scenes for the huge Technicolor camera in the wilds.

At the start, the MGM lot features a glimpse of star SPENCER TRACY with two of his co-stars from other films, MYRNA LOY and CLARK GABLE.

Then the narration begins with glimpses from a couple of other MGM films where great obstacles had to be mounted in order to film stories people thought would be impossible to put on screen--THE GOOD EARTH, A TALE OF TWO CITIES, etc.

The Utah location is then visited with tents set up to house the various departments. Although things may look a bit disorganized, we're told that the unit is run with efficiency and nothing has been overlooked to make sure filming can proceed whenever the weather dictates.

What's most impressive is seeing how the technicians and camera crew had to get down and dirty with the cast that was trudging through river waters, all the while handling heavy lights and equipment.

Summing up: A good introduction to watching NORTHWEST PASSAGE, but it would have been even more an even more effective short if photographed in Technicolor, as the feature film was.

Here's one of the many short films that MGM made over the years to puff their productions. There's a set-up of some of their major, big-budget releases over the previous decade, and how people said they couldn't do them..... and they couldn't.

No, actually they did, and they offer clips from movies like TRADER HORN and SAN FRANCISCO before they tell you what movie they're pushing with this short: NORTHWEST PASSAGE, starring Spencer racy ad Robert Young, by showing the work they did to get the shooting sites in Idaho and Oregon ready for the production.

This short was a promotional film made in conjunction with the release of the MGM epic NORTHWEST PASSAGE. Often in the 1930s and 40s, MGM made such films to hype an upcoming release and it was less a film trailer and more a behind the scenes look at how the film was made. In this case, the film centered on the difficulty and logistics involved in doing a location shoot. The massive efforts needed to move all the equipment and build all the sets was rather interesting to fill buffs and historians, though I doubt if the casual viewer will find this film all that interesting. Oddly, for this type of film, there were very, very few shots of the actors involved (other than two of Spencer Tracy) and you'd have no idea that Robert Young or any other actors were involved.

My advice is see NORTHWEST PASSAGE--it's a great film. Then, if you'd like, see NORTHWARD, HO--then, perhaps, you'll find it a little more interesting and can appreciate the efforts that went into the feature-length film.