The Sergeant

A pretty story of love and devotion to duty, the scene of which is laid m the great Yosemite Valley in California. There is an Indian fight, with a thrilling rescue, but the most attractive feature of the film is the reproduction of the magnificent scenery of the great valley. The work is adequately done and one may obtain a reasonably accurate impression of the grandeur of the scenery by seeing this film. The operator selected his view points with care, and the work on the film in the reproduction has been so well done that little criticism is possible. Those who have seen the valley will see much that is familiar. Those who have never seen it have here an opportunity to get an impression of it that is only less than the impression made upon one by the great valley itself. The house deserves commendation for producing such an excellent picture. - The Moving Picture World, October 8, 1910

There is a story to this short subject -- a sergeant (played by Hobart Bosworth) and the colonel's daughter (Iva Shepard) find themselves lost in the wild west and must make their way back to civilization. Given that they are lost in Yosemite National Park, the point of the story is to show off as much of the beautiful scenery as possible, with the specific sites noted in the titles. It's basically a travelogue with a plot to fill in the corners and the print, one of the items recovered from the New Zealand archives a century after its production, is remarkable for its stark, naturalistic beauty.

While the techniques of movie making shifted soon afterwards, this style of "faux documentary" did survive and definitely has its values. It's a bypath, another of the ways that film might have gone, which survives in the genetic material of the modern cinema.

The Sergeant (1910)

*** 1/2 (out of 4)

A girl tells a sergeant that she can kiss her if he's able to catch her. They run off into the woods of Yosemite National Park and get lost. That's pretty much all of the story you need to know about this short, which was considered lost before a print turned up in 2010 and what a discovery that turned out to be. Storywise, there's quite a bit that you could actually laugh at and at times some of it doesn't make sense but the real reason to watch this is for the location shooting. You have to consider that the likes of D.W. Griffith was still in the East shooting pictures so it's pretty rare to have something shot on location like this. It's also rare for a film from this era to run 16-minutes but this one here has a lot in it. The reason to watch this thing is for the amazing footage that was shot on location and what's so cool is that each title card tells you not only what's happening with the plot but it also informs you were the footage was shot. This was such a great and rather neat idea and it's somewhat of a shame that other movies didn't think to do this. The film contains some really wonderful cinematography that perfectly captures all the images and thankfully the print too is in excellent shape. While watching this one really wonders what these locations look like today over a hundred years later.

The plot is strictly run-of-the-mill, and director Francis Boggs is certainly no D. W. Griffith, but the striking locations make it worth a watch.