Upstream (1927)

Information from IMDb

Plot Summary
A "backstage drama",the movie is about a Shakespearean
actor and a woman from a knife-throwing act.
The main line of the plot concerns the vain, talent-challenged scion of a well-known
theatrical family who is summoned to London, for his name only, to play Hamlet,
a role for which he is utterly unprepared. But the wise counsel of an aged,
nostalgic tragedian, invoking and imparting the great tradition of Shakespearean performance,
stands the young ham in good stead, and he returns to New York triumphant,
contemptuous, and conceited, only to receive his comeuppance.

Read more
New Yorker

Full Cast
Nancy Nash ... Gertie Ryan
Earle Foxe ... Eric Brasingham
Grant Withers ... Juan Rodriguez aka Jack La Velle
Lydia Yeamans Titus ... Miss Hattie Breckenbridge Peyton
Raymond Hitchcock ... Star Boarder
Emile Chautard ... Campbell Mandare
Ted McNamara ... Callahan and Callahan
Sammy Cohen ... Callahan and Callahan
Judy King ... Sister Team
Lillian Worth ... Sister Team
Jane Winton ... Soubrette
Harry A. Bailey ... Gus Hoffman (as Harry Bailey)
Francis Ford ... Juggler
Ely Reynolds ... Deerfoot
Sammy Blum ... Eric's Valet (uncredited)
Carrie Daumery ... Theatre Audience Spectator (uncredited)
Anita Garvin ... Theatre Audience Spectator (uncredited)
Margaret Mann ... Theatre Audience Spectator (uncredited)

Writing Credits
Randall Faye (as Randall H. Faye)
Wallace Smith story "The Snake's Wife"

Cinematography
Charles G. Clarke

Trivia
Previous thought lost, Upstream was found in 2010 stored in a New Zealand film archive. It was shipped to the U.S. for preservation, funded by original production company 20th Century Fox.

This was the opening film for the
16th San Francisco Silent Film Festival in 2011.

Upstream is a 1927 silent comedy film.

The film was considered to be a lost film,
but in 2009 it was discovered in the New Zealand Film Archive.
It is considered the first Ford film to show some influence of German director F. W. Murnau,
who began working at Fox Studios in 1926. From Murnau,
Ford learned how to use forced perspectives and chiaroscuro lighting,
which the American director then integrated into his own more naturalistic
and direct filmmaking style.

It’s one of only about a dozen films that survive today from Ford’s silent period,
which numbered over 60 titles.

User Review

Quote

Fording the Stream at a Low Point
30 January 2011 | by boblipton (New York City)

I've just come from the American Museum of the Moving Image where the New York re-premiere of this 1927 John Ford film took place with great pomp and circumstance. Donald Sosin led a fine orchestra of four and a singer to cover this short (64 minutes at an announced 21 fps) feature with one of his typically well researched and executed scores.

Unfortunately, despite the high hopes of the small but eager audience, we saw an ordinary programmer without much evidence of individual style or art. Earle Fox is consistently annoying as the talentless scion of a distinguished acting family who gets the big break on his name and never shows a moment of gratitude or humility. Grant Withers and Nancy Nash are competent as the young couple. The real star turns are in support -- which is typical of Ford, I suppose; Ted McNamara and Sammy Cohen as 'Callahan and Callahan', dancing and snappy patter; but mostly Emile Chautard who gets to chew the scenery as the down-on-his-luck thespian who coaches Fox; and even more so, Raymond Hitchcock, who shows us, at the beginning of the second act, why he was such a big star on Broadway for years.

However, despite these grace notes, there isn't much of anything in the story or realization to point to any particular director, and it never rises much above the ordinary. I'm very glad to have seen it, as it's another John Ford movie to cross off my list, but once you've done the same, it's not going to be one you return to.

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