Salute (1929)

INFORMATION FROM IMDb

Plot Summary
John Randall is an Army cadet at West Point.
His younger brother Paul is a midshipman at the Naval Academy.
John contrives to help Paul's timid romantic interest
in Nancy Wayne by pretending to be interested in her himself.
Paul, however, takes offense, and determines to beat
his brother in the Army-Navy football game on purely personal grounds.
Meanwhile, Paul and fellow midshipman Albert Price
are hazed and tormented by upperclassmen.
Summary written by Jim Beaver

Full Cast
George O'Brien .... Cadet John Randall
Helen Chandler .... Nancy Wayne
William Janney .... Midshipman Paul Randall
Stepin Fetchit .... Smoke Screen
Frank Albertson .... Midshipman Albert Edward Price
Joyce Compton .... Marian Wilson
David Butler .... Navy Coach
Lumsden Hare .... RAdm. John Randall
Clifford Dempsey .... Maj. Gen. Somers
Ward Bond .... Midshipman Harold
Rex Bell .... Cadet (uncredited)
John Breeden .... Midshipman (uncredited)
Ben Hall .... Midshipman Joel Farragut Gish (uncredited)
Jack Pennick .... Football player (uncredited)
Harry Tenbrook .... Assistant Navy coach (uncredited)
Lee Tracy .... Radio announcer (uncredited)
John Wayne .... Bill (midshipman) (uncredited)

Writing Credits
James Kevin McGuinness dialogue
Wilbur Morse Jr. titles (uncredited)
John Stone
Tristram Tupper story

Cinematography
Joseph H. August

Costume and Wardrobe Department
John Wayne .... costumer: Mr. Fetchit (uncredited)

Other crew
William Fox .... presenter
Schuyler E. Grey .... technical advisor (uncredited)

Filming Location
U.S. Naval Academy - 121 Blake Road, Annapolis, Maryland, USA

Watch this Clip
(Duke and Ward Bond)

[extendedmedia]

Salute, is very significant as it is the the 1st. film that Duke spoke in!
A George O'Brien film, Duke is uncredited,
but plays a walk on role as Bill, a midshipsman.
John Ford used both Duke, and Wardell Bond,
which dealt with the rivalry, between Army and Navy football teams.

John Ford, invited Duke to recruit ballplayers from USC, for the action sequences.
Ford, had them all assembled, and wanted a couple of walk-ons,

Quote

They were both perfectly natural....
So we needed a couple of fellows to speak some* lines,
I picked them out, and they ended up with parts.

Said Ford.

The three men became drinking partners,
and established a relationship, that was to last a lifetime.

Dan Ford, maintained,

Quote

I think my granddad, liked* John Wayne and Ward Bond,
because they stood up to him, from the start.

The younger men also made John Ford, feel like one of the boys,
which flattered him, since his private life, left much to be desired.

Ward Bond was singled out for his performance,
but no reviewers noticed Duke's performance,
and so he continued propping for Fox, with the occasional stunt or double job.
However, his time was to come.

Varietycalled it,

Quote

The best picture of its kind to date

The film concluded with the big game, edited together,
with Fox Movietone Newsreel

It was Fox's best money spinner of the year
The film was a critical and financial success,
and truly significant one for Duke Morrison and Wardell Bond!!

People who worked on the 1929 movie Salute
including Marion Morrison -- later known as John Wayne (on the right).

User Reviews

Quote

Author: marc from New York NY from IMdb
Bad performances by George O Brien and William Janney
as rival brothers who end up playing the big Army-Navy football game
against each other. Steppin Fetchit is given a lot of screen time
and his performance is embarrassing and racist by today's standards,
but he might make you smile occasionally
even while you wince;he is very charismatic.
John Wayne has a few brief scenes as one of a trio of cadets
who haze(very mildly) the hero.
The best parts of the movie are the unusually crisp location
filming of the real Annapolis circa 1929.
The big football game is unexciting and has no surprises.
There is one good performance by Frank Albertson
whose spirited portrayal of the callow roommate who talks back to his C.O.
is the film's highlight.No real John Ford touches in this programmer.

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Quote

The Army/Navy Game
5 February 2012 | by bkoganbing (Buffalo, New York)

Salute is an early talkie directed by John Ford and it will never rank in anybody's list of great John Ford films. He honed this particular genre of military academy films down to a science in much better films like The Long Grey Line and Wings Of Eagles.

George O'Brien and William Janney are brothers raised by different grandfathers, O'Brien by a general and Janney by an Admiral and they both go to the service academies of each. O'Brien being older got to West Point before Janney arrived at Annapolis.

Janney is always playing second fiddle to O'Brien and when O'Brien puts some moves on Helen Chandler who Janney has flipped over, that makes the Army/Navy game a bit more personal than usual.

John Wayne and Ward Bond are a pair of upper classmen in Annapolis who take Janney over the coals. Best performance in the film is from Frank Albertson as Janney's smart mouth roommate.

It was interesting to see both Wayne and Bond before either of them was any kind of a name. The integration of newsreel footage of the Army/Navy game was well done by Ford, very similar to how he used newsreel film from Ireland in The Plough And The Stars. But Salute is a film for John Wayne or John Ford completists.

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