The Girl of the Golden West
About The Girl of the Golden West
In the 1849 mining town of Cloudy, the Girl who keeps the saloon likes sheriff Jack Rance, a former New Orleans gambler, better than her other suitors. Ramerrez, head of a Mexican outlaw band and really a city man named Johnson, is nicked while robbing a stage; she binds the wound with her bonnet string, and he later leaves the miners' gold alone once he learns the saloon is hers. A blizzard keeps him overnight in her cabin. At dawn Rance shoots him on the way out, then loses a card game in which the stake is Ramerrez's freedom and, if she loses, the Girl herself; she wins by cheating. Ramerrez is about to be hanged when she tells the town about the game, and she leaves with him as Rance takes to drink.
Cast & crew
More about The Girl of the Golden West
Cecil B. DeMille wrote and directed David Belasco's 1905 play and shared the editing with W. Donn Hayes. He later wrote that the shoot lasted eight days, mostly at the new Lasky ranch, with some work near Mount Palomar. Wilfred Buckland was art director, Jesse L. Lasky headed the company, Belasco was associated, and Paramount distributed the film.
Themes
Background
Belasco's play opened in New York on 14 November 1905.
Making
DeMille's autobiography puts the whole picture at eight shooting days.
Look
Alvin Wyckoff photographed the five-reel film, including the ranch exteriors and the scenes made near Mount Palomar.
Preservation
Prints are held by the Library of Congress, the George Eastman Museum, the Cineteca del Friuli in Gemona, and the Academy Film Archive in Beverly Hills.
Notes
- Mabel Van Buren plays the Girl, who is given no personal name. Theodore Roberts is Jack Rance and House Peters is Ramerrez.
- Anita King plays Wowkle, Sydney Deane plays Sidney Duck, and Jeanie MacPherson plays Nina.
- It is the first of four film adaptations of Belasco's play. Blanche Bates and Frank Keenan had starred in the stage production.
- The Jesse L. Lasky Feature Play Co. copyrighted it on 30 December 1914 as LU4071.
- Moving Picture World reported on 21 November 1914 that House Peters was already at work as Ramerrez, with DeMille producing in Hollywood.
- The release print is five reels, silent, with English intertitles.
Scenes
- The Girl ties Ramerrez's stagecoach wound with the string of her bonnet.
- She cheats at cards against Rance, with his freedom and her own as the stakes.
Influenced by
- David Belasco's 1905 play The Girl of the Golden West
Also available
- Wikimedia Commons (The Girl of the Golden West (1915) by Cecil B. DeMille.webm)
