Tess of the Storm Country
About Tess of the Storm Country
Tessibel Skinner lives with her father, a fisherman, in a squatter village on Cayuga Lake, under the eye of Elias Graves, who wants the squatters off his shore. When a lawyer cannot evict them, Graves bans net fishing. In a clash with his men a man is shot, and Tess's father is jailed for the killing. Frederick Graves, home from theological school, and Tess begin a romance his father will not allow. Frederick's sister Teola is pregnant by Dan Jordan, who dies in a fraternity fire. Tess agrees to raise the baby and take the shame. Frederick shuns her. She carries the sick child to Elias's church for baptism and is refused. Teola tells the truth. The baby dies, the real killer is named, and Tess's father is freed.
Cast & crew
More about Tess of the Storm Country
Edwin S. Porter directed and photographed it for Adolph Zukor's Famous Players. B. P. Schulberg adapted Grace Miller White's 1909 novel. Famous Players released it on a state's-rights basis, with a first release on March 20, 1914, and U.S. theater dates from March 30. Mary Pickford plays Tess. Harold Lockwood plays Frederick, Olive Carey plays Teola, David Hartford plays her father, and William Walters plays Elias Graves. The picture runs 80 minutes, five reels.
Themes
In film history
A five-reel Famous Players drama that moved Mary Pickford from shorts into a starring feature she later pointed to as the start of her career.
Making
Famous Players spent $10,000, a feature budget of 1914, and sent Porter and Pickford to the California coast for the squatter village and the Graves house.
Look
Edwin S. Porter shot the film himself, on the shore at Del Mar and Santa Monica, for the squatter huts and the Graves estate above them.
Preservation
The film survives through the Mary Pickford Foundation and the UCLA Film and Television Archive. In 2006 the Library of Congress placed it on the National Film Registry.
Notes
- Pickford played Tess again in John S. Robertson's 1922 remake.
- She later called the 1914 film the beginning of her career.
- The lake in the story is Cayuga Lake. The shooting was in Del Mar and Santa Monica.
- The Library of Congress added it to the National Film Registry in 2006.
- Richard Garrick plays Ben Letts. Eugene Walter plays Ezra Longman. Jack Henry plays Dan Jordan.
Scenes
- Tess carries Teola's baby into Elias Graves's church and is refused a baptism.
- Teola confesses, the real killer is named, and Skinner is let out of jail.
Influenced by
- Tess of the Storm Country (Grace Miller White novel)
Influenced
- Tess of the Storm Country (1922)
Also available
- Wikimedia Commons (Tess of the Storm Country (1914).webm)
