Take One (Sep-Oct 1973)

18,000 soldiers and 3,000 horses. He also supposedly selected passages from over 500 musical compositions to synchronize with the action. According to Lillian Gish, the true story of how Griffith made the picture is more astonishing than the press releases. ‘He made Birth in nine weeks and shot only one take for everything except Mae Marsh's death scene. He wouldn't have shot that twice except that she forgot to tie the Confederate flag around her waist, and she'd had it on in the previous scene. He made the film with 300 men, not 18,000 as they advertised. That was his genius. It's a great man doing a great piece of work out of his inheritance — his father,’ Miss Gish says. In the 60 years since The Birth of a Nation opened, the film has earned more praise (for its technical innovations) and condemnation (for its portrayal of the Negro) than any other motion picture in history. The film is outstanding for many reasons. It was a true innovator, being the first American feature-length film and the second film to be shown in a legitimate theater (although it was the first to employ ushers and theater regalia usually reserved for plays). It was the first film for which $2 admission was charged, the most expensive film made up until that time ($110,000 — $60,000 from the Aitkens and the remainder from private investors) and the first film to make back its own production costs many times over (its gross is estimated at $50,000,000). The Birth of a Nation was the first film to be advertised and reviewed on a national scale and in non-trade papers, the first to be conceived as more than a silent film (Griffith knew he would have music in it, and shot and edited the film with music in mind), and the first to be accompanied by an orchestra playing an original score written especially for the film. (it was not, however, the first film for which music was expressly written. The Assassination of the Duc de Guise holds that honor.) And, The Birth of a Nation caused more controversy than any film before or after it. More important, it was an artistic triumph. Moving pictures could no longer be ‘tagged at the end of vaudeville shows. The Birth of a Nation lifted the motion picture out of the penny arcades, the nickelodeons, and put it into the theater, establishing it not only as popular entertainment, but making it respectable. With the film was born a new art form. Here Griffith used all his innovations in one film. Motion pictures had grown up. The Birth was 12 reels long, making it three times the length of the longest American film (Judith of Bethulia), and four reels longer than the Italian Cabirla (1913), the longest film made to that date. It was, then, the first epic film in length and subject matter, and by its incorporation of historical matter and the filmmaker's intent to show what he considered a true picture of the South during Reconstruction, the first attempt at docu mentary film. Before the film even opened in New York City, the NAACP tried to prevent its screening. After intense pressure from several New York Negro groups, Griffith agreed to cut some of the most offensive scenes (which have never been recovered), including Lincoln's letter to Stanton which revealed his true sentiments about the Negro race — that it was inferior to the white, and that all Negroes should be shipped back to Africa where they belong — and a scene of Negro men attacking white girls. But Griffith was naive to think that this would assuage the Negro’s violent reaction to the film. The list of protests of the movie is endless, ranging from 500 pickets outside a Boston theater in 1915 and the President of the United States’ press secretary apologizing and pleading ignorance for allowing the film into the White House, to demonstrations and cancellations today when the film is shown on college campuses (as late as 1974 at Texas Tech University). When criticism rained heaviest on Griffith for his treatment of the Negro, he supposedly joked to Lillian Gish, “Good. Now you won't be able to keep audiences away with clubs."’ While that may finished, Griffith felt it wasn’t strong enough to convey his outrage at such wrongdoing, and decided to show how such prejudice had been carried on through the ages and eventually led the practitioners to ruin. Thus, his addition of stories set in Babylon, Judea and Medieval France. Griffith knew it had to be a monstrous film, and he set about hiring literally hundreds of actors — 60 credited and hundreds of extras. He then ordered his crews (under the direction of master carpenter Huck Wortman) to build a Babylon set so large that a chariot could be driven across the top; the palace was to have halls so grandiose that an orgy scene would look like ants gathered at a picnic. Additional sets were constructed for Judea and France. The film was two years in the making, and anyone who saw the Babylon set under construction on Sunset Boulevard knew that the picture would be one of unheard of greatness and magnitude. Those who saw Griffith at work on this epic production might have thought meglomania had set in. He attended to every detail, even to how the extras were ‘It's a great man doing a great piece of work out of his inheritance — his father.”’ be a rather crude way of putting it, that's basically what happened. The money came in so fast that the Aitkens couldn't keep accurate account of it. Early into the shooting, Harry Aitken and Griffith set up Epoch Producing Corporation to handle the film's finances. In July, 1915, Harry Aitken persuaded Griffith, Thomas Ince and Mack Sennett (who started as an actor for Griffith) to merge into one company, Triangle Film Corporation. Under this plan, each director would have his own studio and supervise a team of directors, while Aitken would publicize and distribute their films. Griffith's team of directors included John Emerson, Paul Powell, William Christy Cabanne and Edward Dillon (both former actors under Griffith), Chester Withey, Sidney and Chester Franklin, Lloyd Ingraham and Allan Dwan. Griffith's name went on all their films as “superviser,” but he was rarely concerned with either the directors or their work, and went as far as to disavow his connection with them in an interview with Louella Parsons. He was pre-occupied with his next picture, Intolerance (1916), which would tell, in four interwoven stories, of suffering and injustice throughout the ages. Griffith had devised a modern story, a Biblical story, a Babylonian story and a story of 16th century France. He based the modern story on a film he had done immediately after shooting The Birth, called The Mother and the Law, which showed the despotism of a factory owner to his employees. When The Mother was nearly dressed down to their false eyelashes. Determined Intolerance would surpass The Birth in every way, Griffith demanded such luxuries as a $7,000 jeweled costume for the Princess Beloved, a banquet hall scene for the Feast of Belshazzar costing $250,000 — over twice the entire cost of filming and publicizing The Birth — and a $48,000 payroll for four weeks. Aitken was traumatized. After Griffith spent his allotment, Aitken refused to put up another nickel, and Griffith began to eat into the profits of The Birth. As he saw the great sets rise over Hollywood, he wanted to make everything bigger and better. When the profits from The Birth had been exhausted, he realized he had spent nearly $2 million on Intolerance. From all aspects, Intolerance is a masterpiece, and its importance in cinema cannot be exaggerated. Yet when Griffith edited down his eight hours of film to be shown in a single evening, “We knew that he knew that it was not going to be a success, compared to The Birth,” Roy Aitken remembers. That was putting it mildly. Intolerance was a box-office disaster. At first, crowds streamed to theaters to see another picture by the maker of The Birth of a Nation. But, unlike the crowds who attended The Birth, these movie-goers did not come back for a second viewing, and they told their friends why. Roy Aitken: “Intolerance was practically our ruination." Intolerance was a picture way beyond its time. It was simply too much, too soon. 17