Tol'able David
About Tol'able David
David Kinemon (Richard Barthelmess), youngest son of tenant farmers in the West Virginia mountains, is told he is only "tol'able," not yet a man, including by Esther Hatburn (Gladys Hulette). Outlaw cousins Iscah Hatburn and his sons Luke and Little Buzzard move onto her grandfather's farm, kill David's dog, and cripple his brother Allen while Allen is carrying the mail. Their father dies of a heart attack on the way to confront the cousins. Put off the farm, David eventually gets the mail hack, loses the bag near the Hatburns, and is shot in the arm when he goes for it. He shoots Iscah and the younger son, beats Luke in a long fight, and drives the hack into town with the mail before he collapses.
Cast & crew
More about Tol'able David
Henry King directed and produced, and wrote the script with Edmund Goulding from Joseph Hergesheimer's 1917 story. Inspiration Pictures made it for Associated First National. Henry Cronjager photographed. W. Duncan Mansfield edited. King, raised in rural western Virginia, picked the locations and used some local people in small parts. The story is set in the Allegheny Mountains of eastern West Virginia. D. W. Griffith had optioned it for Barthelmess and sold it when Barthelmess formed his own company; William K. Everson writes that Griffith did not want another picture so soon after Way Down East. One release date given for the United States is 21 November 1921. The reception record also speaks of a December 1921 opening. Running time 99 minutes.
Themes
Background
The Kinemons are tenant farmers. The feud is with distant Hatburn cousins who take the neighboring farm, and the law in the story is a sheriff the father refuses to trust.
In film history
Voted the Photoplay Magazine Medal of Honor for 1921. In 2007 the Library of Congress placed it on the National Film Registry. V. I. Pudovkin used the film as an example in his writing.
Making
Griffith was holding Hergesheimer's story for Barthelmess and let it go when the actor set up Inspiration Pictures. King scouted country he knew from growing up nearby.
Reviews
Carl Sandburg wrote about it more than once for the Chicago Daily News. Robert E. Sherwood, in Life, said it was the first motion picture to reach real greatness without spectacular effect. Variety wrote that Barthelmess's performance came close to the best he had ever given. In a 1924 Photoplay interview Mary Pickford said that on a first viewing she felt she was watching the tragedy of a family she had known all her life.
Audiences
It was a major box-office success. Motion Picture News, the Exhibitors Herald, and Photoplay all urged exhibitors to book it.
Look
Henry Cronjager shot the picture in Blue Grass, Virginia, standing in for the West Virginia mountains, with townspeople in small roles.
Preservation
A print survives. In 2007 it was selected for the United States National Film Registry. It is on the Internet Archive.
Notes
- Ernest Torrence plays Luke Hatburn. Walter P. Lewis is Iscah. Ralph Yearsley is Saul "Little Buzzard" Hatburn. Warner Richmond is Allen. Marion Abbott and Edmund Gurney are David's parents. Forrest Robinson is Grandpa Hatburn. Laurence Eddinger is Senator John Gault.
- John G. Blystone directed a 1930 sound remake at Columbia with Richard Cromwell in the title role.
- Harold Lloyd's The Kid Brother (1927) reworks a similar plot and also casts Ralph Yearsley. It followed The White Sheep (1924), which had already borrowed pieces of the story.
- Part of the third act of The Tingler (1959) is set in a theatre during a showing of Tol'able David.
- In 1963 John Ford named the film among ten favorites.
Awards
- Photoplay Magazine Medal of Honor (1921)
Scenes
- The Hatburn cousins kill David's dog and cripple Allen on the mail route.
- David's father dies of a heart attack before he can go after them.
- Shot in the arm, David beats Luke and brings the mail into town, then collapses.
Influenced by
- Joseph Hergesheimer's 1917 story "Tol'able David
Also available
- Internet Archive (TolableDavid)
- Wikimedia Commons (Tol'able David (1921).webm)
