1926 our sesquicentennial as a country was a banner year in the career of Lillian Gish, bringing to life two classic roles on the silent screen. She was first Mimi in La Boheme and then took on that favorite of high school English classes, The Scarlett Letter. I well remember having to read Hawthorne's novel as a junior and I can say that if this silent version had been available on DVD back in the day it might have helped as a teaching tool.
Nathaniel Hawthorne who added the "w" in his last name to disassociate himself with his Puritan ancestors who numbered among them Judge John Hathorne of the Salem Witch Trials was writing as much about contemporary attitudes in New England of his day as he was about the beginnings of the Massachusetts Bay Colony and its Puritan settlers. They were a hardy bunch of people, they had to be, coming to a wilderness and making a home in a forbidding land. The land itself as much as the religion of strict behavioral rules made these people what they were.
Hester Prynne is a young woman whose husband disappeared years ago in an Indian raid and is presumed dead. She's a gay young lass, a little to spirited for the Puritan crowd, but she captures the attention of the local minister, the Reverend Arthur Dimmesdale. They fall in love and with both their biological clocks ticking get busy. Of course such things were not known in Puritan times, but in Hawthorne's times they were beginning to be suspected.
Lillian Gish as Hester gets pregnant and for this crime of adultery she has to wear a scarlet A on her dress for all time. She refuses to name the father. Making matters worse is her long lost husband returns played by Henry B. Walthall, Gish's co-star from The Birth Of A Nation.
The part of Roger Chillingworth the husband is a tricky one. He's a nasty sort, a hard man of the times, yet in fact he is an aggrieved party. Walthall strikes just the right balance, he may be aggrieved and you know it, but sympathy is far from what you feel.
Lars Hanson plays Dimmesdale who is not a minister in the tradition of James Bakker or Jimmy Swaggart a couple of fellows who paid dear for a quick moment of passion. Those two would be out of place in this pious community. The dictates of his religion clash with his love for Gish and in the end prove too much to handle.
The Scarlet Letter as played by Gish, Hanson, and Walthall, is a version I think Nathaniel Hawthorne would approve. And I'm betting Judge Hathorne wouldn't.
Nathaniel Hawthorne who added the "w" in his last name to disassociate himself with his Puritan ancestors who numbered among them Judge John Hathorne of the Salem Witch Trials was writing as much about contemporary attitudes in New England of his day as he was about the beginnings of the Massachusetts Bay Colony and its Puritan settlers. They were a hardy bunch of people, they had to be, coming to a wilderness and making a home in a forbidding land. The land itself as much as the religion of strict behavioral rules made these people what they were.
Hester Prynne is a young woman whose husband disappeared years ago in an Indian raid and is presumed dead. She's a gay young lass, a little to spirited for the Puritan crowd, but she captures the attention of the local minister, the Reverend Arthur Dimmesdale. They fall in love and with both their biological clocks ticking get busy. Of course such things were not known in Puritan times, but in Hawthorne's times they were beginning to be suspected.
Lillian Gish as Hester gets pregnant and for this crime of adultery she has to wear a scarlet A on her dress for all time. She refuses to name the father. Making matters worse is her long lost husband returns played by Henry B. Walthall, Gish's co-star from The Birth Of A Nation.
The part of Roger Chillingworth the husband is a tricky one. He's a nasty sort, a hard man of the times, yet in fact he is an aggrieved party. Walthall strikes just the right balance, he may be aggrieved and you know it, but sympathy is far from what you feel.
Lars Hanson plays Dimmesdale who is not a minister in the tradition of James Bakker or Jimmy Swaggart a couple of fellows who paid dear for a quick moment of passion. Those two would be out of place in this pious community. The dictates of his religion clash with his love for Gish and in the end prove too much to handle.
The Scarlet Letter as played by Gish, Hanson, and Walthall, is a version I think Nathaniel Hawthorne would approve. And I'm betting Judge Hathorne wouldn't.