"BIRTH OF A NATION"

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXX, Issue 21496, 20 May 1933, Page 11 (Supplement)

"BIRTH OF A NATION"

EARLY MASTERPIECE REVIVED SOUND EFFECTS ADDED D. W. Griffiths' 16-year-old masterpiece " The Birth of a Nation " has been revived. " The Birth of a Nation " was the initial movie spectacle, and bocause it was the first it has remained in the minds of many as the greatest. It was in this production that D. W. Griffith aphieved a fluidity and a speed that the movies had not known before. Of the 24 important players in the cast, 17 are still active in some branch of the movies. One is a concert singer, three have retired, and three have died. Lillian Gish, Henry B. Walthall, Miriam Cooper, Ralph Lewis and Walter Long are still acting. Seven of the cast, including Raoul Walsh who played John Wilkes Booth, have become directors. Mary Alden is in concert. Mae Marsh, Spottiswoode Aiken and Jenny Lee have retired. Wallace Reid, who played the blacksmith; Robert Harron and George Seigeman have passed on. " The Birth of a Nation," was made in 1914. Its gross income is said to be greater than any other film, —audiences all over the world having paid in excess of 20,000,000 dollars to see it. The film has had sound effects and a musical score added. Colour has been put into some of the later sequences to heighten the effects, but most of the 12 reefs are in their original black and white. The technical task of fitting sound to the film has consumed almost a year. Much of the action was restaged solely for the microphones, including rules or the klansmen and the mob and battle scenes. Nearly as many players and horses as appeared in the picture were used to obtain the sound.