Classics of the silent screen (1959)

Harry Lorraine rescues Lillian Hall from a Huron Indian in one of the many exciting action sequences. The Last of the Mohicans, 1922 It is ironical that the best of the many versions of this popular American adventure tale should have been made by a French director. Perhaps it's because the Europeans often seem to have a higher regard for American history, and folklore than Americans themselves do. They look upon our themes of the West and of the American Indian much as we look upon those classics of the Greeks, the Odyssey and the Iliad. Even the Germans made a fine silent version of The Last of the Mohicans— with Bela Lugosi playing the Indian hero. Now almost forgotten, the 1922 American Last of the Mohicans is not only the best translation to the screen of that particular story, but, I venture to say, the best screen treatment of any of the James Fenimore Cooper stories. Its director, Maurice Tourneur, although he began his career in France and went back there later, spent most of the silent period making films in America. He had a marvelous pictorial sense. Too often it overbalanced plot, acting, dramatics, and everything else, so it wasn't always a 100 percent virtue. But in The Last of the Mohicans it was. Shots of the Indian war canoes skimming along the rivers; an Indian sentinel silhouetted in a cave at dusk; the red-tinted campfires burning through the night, casting dancing shadows among the trees; the picturesque landscapes of forest and mountain; scenes like these all formed a natural background to the action and thus didn't detract one iota from the dramatics. In its adventure material, it was first-class. The Fort William Henry massacre sequence was a real thrillersavage, ferocious, spectacularly staged. And one of the best episodes revolved around the pursuit of Cora by the villainous Indian, Magua, who wants her for his squaw. Finally, at dusk, he corners her atop a high precipice. As he approaches, she threatens to jump. Magua squats and bides his time, waiting for her to fall asleep. The night passes. In the early dawn, Cora, exhausted, falls momentarily asleep. She awakens with a start, as Magua is almost upon her, and leaps over the cliff. But the Indian is too quick for her and grabs her by the wrists. Cora struggles to free herself, so that she may complete her leap to death, and then— suddenly —she sees Uncas the Indian hero (played by Albert Roscoe) stalking stealthily up behind Magua, but still some distance away. Desperate, she now seeks to save herself, and claws at the rock. But Magua, too, has seen Uncas, and he now pries Cora's fingers loose from the rim of the rock ledge. Seconds before she can be rescued, she plunges to her death. It may not be authentic Fenimore Cooper, but it's powerful and poignant movie-making, and has remained in my 42