The Silver Horde
About The Silver Horde
Boyd Emerson and Fraser reach an Alaska village and find two canneries at war, Cherry Malotte's and Fred Marsh's. Boyd is ready to quit a failed hunt for gold. Cherry sends him, Fraser, and George Balt to Seattle to borrow $200,000 from her banker, Tom Hilliard, and rebuild her plant. Boyd's fiancée, Mildred Wayland, wants to marry him anyway, though her father prefers the rich Marsh. Boyd blurts his plans, and Marsh and Wayne Wayland get the loan withdrawn. Cherry sails down, sees that Hilliard knows she loves Boyd, and takes the banker's apartment offer in order to save the money. Boyd thinks Mildred's father did it, then breaks with Cherry when she cannot deny how the loan was got. Balt's crew gets the cannery running for the salmon run. Marsh's men attack on the water. Marsh tells Mildred that Cherry is a known prostitute and that Boyd sent her to Hilliard's bed. Cherry brings Queenie, an old friend, aboard the Wayland yacht and proves Queenie is Marsh's wife, then tells Mildred that nothing happened between herself and Boyd. Mildred wants him back. He goes to Cherry.
Cast & crew
More about The Silver Horde
George Archainbaud directed Wallace Smith's adaptation and dialogue from Rex Beach's 1909 novel, a sequel to Beach's The Spoilers. William LeBaron produced it, with William Sistrom as associate producer. Leo Tover and John W. Boyle photographed it. Otto Ludwig edited it. It premiered in New York on October 24, 1930, and opened in the United States the next day. Location work was done in Ketchikan. The title refers to salmon in the nets. RKO recorded a loss of $100,000 on the picture. A silent version with the same title had been released in 1920.
Themes
Background
Beach's Alaska novels had already been filmed once each. This talking remake keeps Cherry, the woman with a past in the fishing towns, as the top-billed part, ahead of the man who chooses her.
Making
RKO sent the company to Ketchikan for the cannery and the salmon run, then played the Seattle loan, the yacht, and the fight on the water against that footage.
Audiences
RKO's books showed a loss of $100,000.
Look
Leo Tover and John W. Boyle shot the Ketchikan locations and the brawl among the boats when Marsh's men try to wreck the new machinery.
Preservation
The copyright was not renewed. The film entered the public domain in the United States in 1958.
Notes
- Evelyn Brent is top-billed as Cherry Malotte. Joel McCrea plays Boyd Emerson. Jean Arthur plays Mildred Wayland.
- Louis Wolheim is George Balt, Gavin Gordon is Fred Marsh, Blanche Sweet is Queenie, and Raymond Hatton is Fraser.
- Queenie is Blanche Sweet's last screen performance.
- Purnell Pratt plays Wayne Wayland and William Davidson plays Tom Hilliard.
- The copyright was not renewed, and the film entered the public domain in the United States in 1958.
Scenes
- Cherry, Fraser, and Balt break up Boyd's fight with Balt in the village and sit him down to explain the cannery war.
- Marsh's crew hits the new machinery on the water as the Wayland yacht arrives for the run.
- Cherry brings Queenie onto the yacht and shows Mildred that Queenie is Marsh's wife.
Influenced by
- Rex Beach's novel The Silver Horde (1909)
Also available
- Internet Archive (SilverHorde1930)
