The Last of the Mohicans **** (1920, Wallace Beery, Barbara Bedford, Lillian Hall, Harry Lorraine, Theodore Lorch, Alan Roscoe, James Gordon) – Classic Movie Review 4665

Wallace Beery makes a sterling hero as the Indian runner Magua in this famous 1920 silent movie. Directors Maurice Tourneur and Clarence Brown’s exciting, well-made adventure yarn is based on James Fenimore Cooper’s classic tale of the French-Native American battles in the 19th century.

Barbara Bedford and Lillian Hall play the British colonial sisters Alice and Cora Munro who are rescued by the noble frontiersman scout Hawkeye (Harry Lorraine), and Chingachgook (Theodore Lorch) and his son Uncas (Alan Roscoe), the last of the Mohican tribe, when they attempt to find their British colonel father (James Gordon) in the French and Indian War. The film focuses on the tragic romance of the novel, between Cora Munro and Uncas.

The scenario (by Robert A Dillon), silent film acting, shooting, lighting and editing are all well taken care of in a film that tries to, and succeeds in, staying faithful to the spirit of its author.

Boris Karloff has an uncredited role as an Indian.

Producer-director Tourneur let his protégé Clarence Brown finish the film when he was injured.

It runs 73 minutes in the 1993 alternate version.

The Library of Congress judged the film culturally significant and selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry in 1995.

Other versions:  the 1936 George B Seitz The Last of the Mohicans and the Michael Mann remake The Last of the Mohicans of 1992.

Lillian Hall’s 19-film career lasted only six years (1918 -24).

© Derek Winnert 2016 Classic Movie Review 4665

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