Sometime during the shooting of the landmark The Birth of a Nation, filmmaker D.W. Griffith probably wondered how he could top himself. In 1916, he showed how, with the awesome Intolerance. The film began humbly enough as a medium-budget feature entitled The Mother and the Law, wherein the lives of a poor but happily married couple are disrupted by the misguided interference of a "social reform" group. A series of unfortunate circumstances culminates in the husband's being sentenced to the
gallows, a fate averted by a nick-of-time rescue engineered by his wife. In the wake of the protests attending the racist content of The Birth of a Nation, Griffith wanted to demonstrate the dangers of intolerance. The Mother and the Law filled the bill to some extent, but it just wasn't "big" enough to suit his purposes. Thus, using The Mother and the Law as merely the base of the film, Griffith added three more plotlines and expanded his cinematic thesis to epic proportions. The four separate stories of Intolerance are symbolically linked by Lillian Gish as the Woman Who Rocks the Cradle ("uniter of the here and hereafter"). The "Modern Story" is essentially The Mother and the Law; the "French Story" details the persecution of the Huguenots by Catherine de Medici (Josephine Crowell); the "Biblical Story" relates the last days of Jesus Christ (Howard Gaye); and the "Babylonian Story" concerns the defeat of King Belshazzar (Alfred Paget) by the hordes of Cyrus the Persian (George Siegmann). Rather than being related chronologically, the four stories are told in parallel fashion, slowly at first, and then with increasing rapidity. The action in the film's final two reels leaps back and forth in time between Babylon, Calvary, 15th century France, and contemporary California. Described by one historian as "the only film fugue," Intolerance baffled many filmgoers of 1916 -- and, indeed, it is still an exhausting, overwhelming experience, even for audiences accustomed to the split-second cutting and multilayered montage sequences popularized by Sergei Eisenstein, Orson Welles, Jean-Luc Godard, Joel Schumacher, and MTV. On a pure entertainment level, the Babylonian sequences are the most effective, played out against one of the largest, most elaborate exterior sets ever built for a single film. The most memorable character in this sequence is "The Mountain Girl," played by star on the rise Constance Talmadge; when the Babylonian scenes were re-released as a separate feature in 1919, Talmadge's tragic death scene was altered to accommodate a happily-ever-after denouement. Other superb performances are delivered by Mae Marsh and Robert Harron in the Modern Story, and by Eugene Pallette and Margery Wilson in the French Story. Remarkably sophisticated in some scenes, appallingly naïve in others, Intolerance is a mixed bag dramatically, but one cannot deny that it is also a work of cinematic genius. The film did poorly upon its first release, not so much because its continuity was difficult to follow as because it preached a gospel of tolerance and pacifism to a nation preparing to enter World War I. Currently available prints of Intolerance run anywhere from 178 to 208 minutes; while it may be rough sledding at times, it remains essential viewing for any serious student of film technique. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
Intolerance reflects much credit to the wizard director, for it required no small amount of genuine art to consistently blend actors, horses, monkeys, geese, doves, acrobats and ballets into a composite presentation of a film classic.
Intolerance's sets, costumes, compositions, and mass deployment of bodies in motion are often impressive, especially in the battle of Babylon sequence.
The greatest spectacle of the silent era, and an audacious storytelling experiment decades ahead of its time… stunning but flawed, alternately dazzling and trying.
Did D W Griffith make Intolerance to exonerate himself of being a racist? No, that is a stupid notion. This was a huge production, made under a year after Birth of a Nation and the wheels were set in motion before the criticism started. Did it help exonerate him? Yes, maybe but yet still to this day I read stupid
reviews on flixster and imbd of people jabbering on about how he is a racist. It's boring, stupid and wrong. Again, these comments generally come from those who tend to believe everything they read and over the years this myth has almost become fact in many peoples minds.
Intolerance is big - especially for it's day. It's not just the budget and set that was big though, the story is one of the most important ever told through the medium of cinema. To shrug this film off is to shrug off what makes you who you are, our history, what makes us what we are - granted, it's not always a pretty sight but one that we should not turn away from. One of the most important films ever made and still breathtakingly impressive nearly 100 years later.
Project 2 (Epic films)
Directed by D. W. Griffith and staring Lillian Gish, Mae Marsh and Robert Harron.
Unlike D. W. Griffith Racists town for his blockbuster the Birth of a Nation and the charging that it had overt racist content, characterizing racism as people's intolerance of other people's views. So he takes us
throw 4 Eras were peoples intolerance to each other has lead to the failure of them and the people in general that are affected.
Intolerance was a colossal undertaking filled with monumental sets, lavish period costumes, and more than 3,000 extras. The film consisted of four distinct but parallel stories that demonstrated mankind's intolerance during four different ages in world history.
The timeline covered approximately 2,500 years of our intolerances and ages.
The story themselves are together not just straight forward chronological order...No, Each scene is like it affects somewhere else in a different Era starting with the cruserfiction of Jesus Christ and how religion is affecting us in the modern Era.
The Babylonian period tells the story of the fall of there nation witch resulted in nothing but intolerances between them and the gods. And the massive War machines they plan to build to destroy there Enemies.
The Judean Era is only a short one but it is the Era that will affect most people with the cruserfiction of Jesus Christ, which the intolerance of Romans and Jews lead to that.
The French Renaissance Era in tells the story of Edict of Tolerances' which will lead to the St. Bartholomew's Day Massacre.
The modern Era tells that of the intolerances between Man and his brother and the way life is being affected by Crime and corporal punishment in where an innocent man will be hang at the gallows.
The story themselves will really speak to you throughout the movie not just focusing on massive sets. I admit this is very old but just the story telling is what I love about the movie it's better then what I wrote. It's the editing and the way scenes are put in place to move you as a viewer. And the films' ending is like the 4 different Eras are still alive even though it's past that.
The reason for all this mountains of amazing footage and sets and costumes and locations is that intolerances cost just over $2 million American dollars. Now that is a stunning amount for its time this only happened because of the Birth of a Nation in which that made millions for its investors and associates. But by all accounts this movie was a massive failure at the box office only making 2 hundred thousand back of its 2 million budget. I am stunned that more people didn't see this movie it's like the avatar of the 1910s.
Such fantastic sets for the Babylon era just left me stunned, that camera that moves in from the top to the bottom was just amazing and for it's time of course. Not just that but the massive wall during the invasion scene were they fire arrows down onto the massive war machines just left me thinking how he did it? I mean did he build those walls? Or are they moving miniatures? I don't know the special effects are just that believable. That whole invasion scene in general will go in my favorite film scenes list.
The editing well...It's very hard to do by Griffith it's not the one near liner but more of the Close ups and Long tracking shot's for more of that Era feel to it so you see everything. And the camera moving down into the city was just amazing. The only thing I didn't like about this movie was its assonating length of 3 hours or even over. It's not that the move is boring No I just felt that certain things could have been shortened during the French and Modern American Eras came around in scenes.
The acting is extremely good just the emotions they put into scenes to capture that real silent feel to it. And with a cast of thousands you will see things that will impresses you a lot. I think the music and costume designs were extremely good I just loved how they captured that staggering aspect to the film.
But overall it's nothing short of an assonating masterpiece of the silent Era. With some of the best story telling and special effects I have seen. With such a blend of different editing techniques and even the story themselves.
Keiko's score 97-100
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