Exhibitors Herald (Jun-Dec 1917)

EXHIBITORS HERALD "The Planter" Seven-Part Mutual Special Seen as Season's Feature Big Picture Version of Herman Whitaker's Novel Staged in Tropical Mexico Is Expose of Conditions; Exhibitors to Get Play Featuring Tyrone Power Nov. 1 2 The Mutual Film Corporation announces "The Planter," a seven-part spectacular adventure drama, featuring Tyrone Power, as its first big special feature of the season. "The Planter" will be available at Mutual exchanges November 12. This production is presented by F. M. Manson, head of the company which produced the picture in Southern Mexico. "The Planter" is the picture version of the novel of the same title, written by Herman Whitaker, a well known writer of fiction. Mutual claims for this picture exceptional box office value on its value both as big drama and its decidedly unusual setting and able casting. The picture is said to have been lavishly produced at a big cost as it required the movement of the entire producing company to locations in Southern Mexico, and the use of many hundreds of extras, the destruction of a native village and considerable plantation property. Classed a "Strong" Story "The Planter" may be classed as a "strong" story. It is full of situations similar to those which have found favor, with the public to box office profit in the best of the big outdoor special features. It is a love story and incidentally an expose of life and labor conditions in tropical Mexico. "We are pleased," observed President Freuler of the Mutual, "to have a feature that is full of strength and power and box office value which does not depend for its interest on exaggeration or distortion of its proper sex interest. " 'The Planter' is clean. 'The Planter' is big and must be presented in a big way." The cast includes Lamar Johnston, who as a hero comes close to taking the lead away from Tyrone Power, Lucile King, in the role of a native girl of rare beauty; Louis FitzRoy, famous for his character work; George O'Dell, best known for his able work in earlier Triangle pictures; Mabel Wile and Carmen Phillips. The tropical locations give the action of the drama a highly colored background of extreme faithfulness, conducing largely to the convincing character of the production. The photography is excellent, owing to capable technical work and the abundance of good working light in the tropics. Ad Aids for Picture Reports gathered by Mutual from the public libraries of the country indicate a large demand for "The Planter" in book form and incidentally a growing interest in Mexican fiction and travel books is in evidence. The Mutual publicity department is preparing an exceptional line of advertising aids for the exhibitor in connection with "The Planter." Special music scores will be prepared by Joseph O'Sullivan. Unusual lobby display and posters are also in preparation, in the hands of artists especially retained for work on this production. The paper to be issued will include two one-sheets, two three-sheets, a six-sheet and a special sixteen-sheet. There will be two art slides, a variety of cuts and an attractive window card. The production portrays the adventures of white men engaged in the rubber trade, these being set forth among wild natural surroundings, pictured in the Isthmus country. The story related is that of David Mann, son of a rich widow of Northfield, Maine, who has invested in one of these plantations. Young Mann is sent to the isthmus by unscrupulous promoters as manager, in order that they may hold fuller sway over the financial resources of his mother. He comes in contact with Ludwig Hetzer, the evilly disposed manager of an adjacent estate, a feud growing up between the men which results in the latter's death at the hands of slaves, after David has encountered him in a series of exciting episodes involving a beautiful Mexican girl with whom the young northerner has fallen in love. Moral Angle in Story A fascinating feature of the play is a beautiful young slave girl, who according to the custom of the country, is sent to look after the affairs of Mann's household, and who regards herself as "his woman," being puzzled and chagrined at his refusal to accept her _ as holding that relationship and using every artifice of her sex to overcome his northern scruples. There is a yellow fever outbreak in the native settlement and young David fights through it, white-man fashion, winning his fight and at the same time the affections of the beautiful senorita who has been his good angel through many trials. The exodus of the slaves in the yellow fever panic, the appalling force of a tropical storm, the horrors of a stockade fire and the deadly tangle of a jungle forest, are all vividly pictured. Tyrone Power, star of "The Planter," played Bassanio with Sir Henry Irving in his last appearance at the Lyceum theatre, London, as "Shylock." Lamar Johnstone, one of the best known men of the motion picture stage, plays David Mann to Power's Hertzer, and the two make a very strong combination. Holmes Starts Fifth Film "Uneasy Money" for the Essanay Company Taylor Holmes, former noted stage comedian, now being featured by Essanay in five-reel comedy-dramas, has returned to Chicago after a trip to New York is at work on his fifth picture, "Uneasy Money," a five-part comedydrama adapted to the screen from the Saturday Evening Post story of that title by Pelham Granville Wodehouse. Mr. Holmes takes the part of an English lord in this new feature. The picture will be issued early in December, following "Two Bit Seats" and "The Small Town Guy," Mr. Holmes' latest productions. "Fools for Luck," Mr. Holmes' second picture, was published October 8. 19