I'd Climb the Highest Mountain is a representative achievement of one of Hollywood's most distinguished directors, Henry King. Working from the 1910s through 1962, King compiled a record of unparalleled duration, productivity, and artistry. Henry King's career is so long and prolific, and the documentation so immense, that he has, in effect, defied analysis by scholars. Born in 1886, he died in 1982, and during his 96 years he granted countless interviews, some of which have been published in an oral history; I was one of those so privileged to meet him, while finishing my Ph.D. at the University of Southern California. Henry King was gifted with an extraordinary memory and a skillful intellect that made such encounters particularly memorable. Many of you have probably seen King's commentary in Kevin Brownlow's series on Hollywood in the silent era some years back.
King's films are better known than he is, and he prided himself on his ability to handle diverse stories. Examples range from such contrasting genres as historical adventure, like Romola, The Magic Flame, Lloyds of London, Stanley and Livingstone, Little Old New York, The Black Swan, Captain From Castile, Prince of Foxes, King of the Khyber Rifles, and Untamed; to melodrama, like Stella Dallas, I Loved You Wednesday, Seventh Heaven, Remember the Day, Deep Waters, Love is a Many Splendored Thing, This Earth is Mine, and Beloved Infidel; to westerns, like The Winning of Barbara Worth, Ramona, Jesse James, The Gunfighter, and The Bravados; to musicals, like Alexander's Ragtime Band and Carousel; to war films, like The Woman Disputed, She Goes to War, A Yank in the RAF, A Bell for Adano, and Twelve O'Clock High; and concluding his career with a trio of modern literary adaptations, The Snows of Kilimanjaro, The Sun Also Rises, and Tender is the Night.
For some thirty years, the bulk of his creative period, King was associated with a single studio, Twentieth Century-Fox. He was a courtly gentleman of the old school, and his films reflect this mannered tone and pace. In all of his pictures, even his action films, King is most interested in the mind and motivations of his characters. He had a keen ear for the quieter side of life, and unlike so much of modern cinema, there are no displays of raw emotion. King values the ordinary, daily yet largely forgotten aspects of life, and is attentive to the silences, the pauses, the words left unsaid as well as those uttered. His characters tend to be isolated, even when in a group, and he accepts honest sentiment and is expert at depicting a convincing story of two people in love.
I'd Climb the Highest Mountain is a film that reflects King's greatest achievement, the expression of Americana on the screen. Americana is the dramatic capturing of the values, culture, history, personalities, and character of the nation, a vision of the United States as a living entity of people and ideals. Such films can cut across many genres and ideologies. Among King's films of this type are Tol'able David, Lightnin', Over the Hill, the Will Rogers version of State Fair, Carolina, Way Down East, The Country Doctor, In Old Chicago, Maryland, Chad Hanna, Margie, and Wait Till the Sun Shines, Nellie. King's Americana is more than nostalgia, yearning for the rosy afterglow of a past that never was. He evokes the past in its full light, and memory can prove to be a bitter, wrenching experience, even with the the passing of the years.
King also had a fundamental belief in the efficacy and importance of religious faith; he was a convert to Catholicicism, and his other religious films include The White Sister, The Song of Bernadette, and David and Bathsheba. I'd Climb the Highest Mountain is the key intersection in his work of these themes of faith and Americana, and was based on an old Saturday Evening Post story and filmed in the mountains of North Georgia.
King's films are better known than he is, and he prided himself on his ability to handle diverse stories. Examples range from such contrasting genres as historical adventure, like Romola, The Magic Flame, Lloyds of London, Stanley and Livingstone, Little Old New York, The Black Swan, Captain From Castile, Prince of Foxes, King of the Khyber Rifles, and Untamed; to melodrama, like Stella Dallas, I Loved You Wednesday, Seventh Heaven, Remember the Day, Deep Waters, Love is a Many Splendored Thing, This Earth is Mine, and Beloved Infidel; to westerns, like The Winning of Barbara Worth, Ramona, Jesse James, The Gunfighter, and The Bravados; to musicals, like Alexander's Ragtime Band and Carousel; to war films, like The Woman Disputed, She Goes to War, A Yank in the RAF, A Bell for Adano, and Twelve O'Clock High; and concluding his career with a trio of modern literary adaptations, The Snows of Kilimanjaro, The Sun Also Rises, and Tender is the Night.
For some thirty years, the bulk of his creative period, King was associated with a single studio, Twentieth Century-Fox. He was a courtly gentleman of the old school, and his films reflect this mannered tone and pace. In all of his pictures, even his action films, King is most interested in the mind and motivations of his characters. He had a keen ear for the quieter side of life, and unlike so much of modern cinema, there are no displays of raw emotion. King values the ordinary, daily yet largely forgotten aspects of life, and is attentive to the silences, the pauses, the words left unsaid as well as those uttered. His characters tend to be isolated, even when in a group, and he accepts honest sentiment and is expert at depicting a convincing story of two people in love.
I'd Climb the Highest Mountain is a film that reflects King's greatest achievement, the expression of Americana on the screen. Americana is the dramatic capturing of the values, culture, history, personalities, and character of the nation, a vision of the United States as a living entity of people and ideals. Such films can cut across many genres and ideologies. Among King's films of this type are Tol'able David, Lightnin', Over the Hill, the Will Rogers version of State Fair, Carolina, Way Down East, The Country Doctor, In Old Chicago, Maryland, Chad Hanna, Margie, and Wait Till the Sun Shines, Nellie. King's Americana is more than nostalgia, yearning for the rosy afterglow of a past that never was. He evokes the past in its full light, and memory can prove to be a bitter, wrenching experience, even with the the passing of the years.
King also had a fundamental belief in the efficacy and importance of religious faith; he was a convert to Catholicicism, and his other religious films include The White Sister, The Song of Bernadette, and David and Bathsheba. I'd Climb the Highest Mountain is the key intersection in his work of these themes of faith and Americana, and was based on an old Saturday Evening Post story and filmed in the mountains of North Georgia.