Just a few intertitles into "Hell's Hinges," I said, That must be by Gardner Sullivan. I stopped the movie -- which I was watching at YouTube.com -- and came to IMDb to see the credits: Sure enough, C. Gardner Sullivan wrote the story and the screenplay.
Mr. Sullivan produced some of the most poetic intertitles in all of silent Hollywood, and went on to write some talkie screenplays, too.
His prose coupled with the drama of the story and the acting of William S. Hart and a talented large cast and with the excellent directing of Charles Swickard as well as Mr. Hart and Clifford Smith make "Hell's Hinges" one of the most gripping of silent westerns.
It is, in fact, so classic and so iconic that the great Jon Tuska included it in his PBS series, "They Went Thataway."
That TV show was probably my introduction to William S. Hart, and when I moved to Los Angeles, one of my first missions was to find the (now defunct) Silent Movie Theatre, run by the lamented John Hampton and his wife, and beg for William S. Hart movies.
Alas, the Theatre never showed any, but I was able to rent "Tumbleweeds" in a 16 mm. format to project in my tiny living room. (It's also available at YouTube and I urge you to see it.)
I have been a Hart fan really since Jon Tuska's introduction, and my admiration has only grown with each Hart movie viewing.
"Hell's Hinges" is almost 100 years old at this writing, 21 August 2015, and it holds up extremely well, although I do recommend the "A cinema history" print at YouTube rather than another, which plays some Beethoven piano reductions as the music score, which is, of course, beautiful but really not appropriate.
Also, the print by "A cinema history" is clear and crisp.
Hart looked young and even chubby-faced, especially as compared to his craggier later looks, as in, for example, "Tumbleweeds." A trained stage actor, he was always able to portray his needed emotion or thought or action beautifully for the camera, and one can just look at him and realize why an entire town would be cowed.
When you watch this, do remember the context: It was produced in 1916, and styles of acting and writing were different. Not worse, in fact in lots of ways better, but decidedly different, so remember context.
Frankly, I LOVED "Hell's Hinges," and am so grateful to YouTube and "A cinema history" for posting this excellent movie and allowing me to watch it, and watch it again in the future.
