R.F.D., 10,000 B.C.
About R.F.D., 10,000 B.C.
On Valentine's Day in prehistoric times, mailman Henry Saurus and favored suitor Johnny Bearskin compete for Winnie Warclub. The figures are jointed mannequins, moved a frame at a time.
Cast & crew
More about R.F.D., 10,000 B.C.
Willis H. O'Brien produced and animated the stop-motion short, billed as a Mannikin Comedy and a Conquest picture. Forum Films released it in 1917 as part of Edison Conquest program no. 3, under the title G.F.D., 10,000 Years B.C. Other titles are On the R.F.D., 10,000 B.C. and R.F.D. 2,000,000 B.C. The Library of Congress times a copy at about 13 minutes at 18 frames per second. There is no human cast.
Themes
Making
O'Brien posed jointed figures for each frame instead of using actors. The joke is a rural-mail courtship set among cave people, with a dinosaur-age mailman on a Valentine route.
Look
O'Brien shot the mannequins in stop-motion. The Library of Congress copy is timed at about 13 minutes when run at 18 frames per second.
Music
Silent.
Preservation
A print is in the George Kleine Collection at the Library of Congress. It is in the public domain in the United States.
Notes
- The George Kleine Collection catalog calls it an animated mannequin comedy, also known as an O'Brien plastic stop-work comedy.
- Henry Saurus is the mailman. Johnny Bearskin is the suitor the family prefers. Winnie Warclub is the woman.
- The Library of Congress holds it in the George Kleine Collection.
- Silent Era lists the release as July 1917 and the length as one reel.
- A Wikimedia file is titled with the year 1916. The Conquest release is 1917.
Scenes
- Henry Saurus, the cave-age mailman, and Johnny Bearskin both pursue Winnie Warclub on Valentine's Day.
Also available
- Library of Congress (R.F.D., 10,000 B.C.)
- Wikimedia Commons (R.F.D. 10,000 B.C. (1916).webm)
