"The Wind" Original Ending Certainly Irretrievably Lost?

[odinthor]

Somehow, I had managed not seeing The Wind until last night. Ye gods, talk about a riveting film, certainly one of the most intense movie experiences I've ever had! I have a habit of reading the various on-line comments after a show, just to ponder them and sharpen the focus of my own opinions; and so it is that we come to my subject. Everyone hates the happy ending which was imposed on The WInd. Yes, most certainly the ending as originally planned would have been more harrowing and had a greater impact, without a doubt; but, in truth, I can accept and appreciate the concept of this happy ending . . . if only they hadn't milked it quite so much, and if only that final shot weren't quite so artificial and posed. I'm not so sure that stumbling out of the theater completely numbed is really the true shekinah of the perfect movie-going experience; even Greek tragic drama had its exodos in which--if it didn't make a happy ending out of a tragedy, at least it did try to bring us to a feeling of philosophic calm befitting finality. Is the footage for the original ending certainly irretrievably lost? The feeling of the original ending could I think be restored by simply ending the movie with the sequence in which Letty watches in horror as Whit's body is slowly exposed by the wind. But does the sad ending really provide an aesthetically fulfilling experience; or is it just in effect pouring more salt into our wounds? I don't have any set opinions on this yet. I'd be interested in your thoughts and discussion.

[greta de groat]

I know the party line on this until recently was that it was butchered by philistines, blah blah blah. Gish certainly went on about it that way. But, unlikely as the happy ending is, i like it. It's beautifully shot and Gish actually looks like a woman. Salt in the wounds is a good description of what i think the tragic ending would be like. Over the years i'm come to regard most tragic endings as a cop out--a cheap trick to try to make the work look profound or serious or artistic or something. It's really much more heroic to get on with your life than to off yourself.

Also, with this film it's come to have extra-textual meanings as well, given Gish's later performances of sensible older frontier women, i imagine her almost as symbolically leaving behind her silent persona and looking forward to the rest of her career. Yes, i know that wasn't the meaning of the filmmaker, but it means that to me.

greta

[Gagman 66]

Greta,

I agree 100%. It's better to be positive. find faith in something and endure, than concede to defeat and death. I would seriously resent the the original grim ending. No matter how the novel went. To me the the way the picture ends is appropriate to the story. It's implies maturing and coming of edge. And also embracing love rather than fear and hate. Instead of giving up and wallowing in self pity and madness, There is acceptance, growth and understanding.

[Roseha]

I thought I read somewhere (on this board?) that the happy ending was in the original "script?" in other words, a tragic ending to the film was never intended to be made?

[odinthor]

I'm on a Sjöstrom jag right now, and just--the night before--had viewed the similarly magnificent The Phantom Carriage. Quite so, in the words of Gagman 66, "It's better to be positive. find faith in something and endure, than concede to defeat and death," and that ultimate positivity and hope is indeed what happens in The Phantom Carriage. The happy ending of The Wind has a certain analogy to that of the earlier movie; I can't think that Sjöstrom would have been seriously unhappy with it. I can't see the necessary aesthetic fulfillment in the sad ending. I wonder if there's more to this of the "we wanted a sad ending, but..." than we know...? So, yes, Greta and Gagman 66, count me in on the "I prefer the happy ending for The Wind" movement. Where do I sign [brandishes pen]?

By the way, it's based on a novel. Does anyone know how the novel ends?

[Mike Gebert]

Based on a quick perusal of mentions of the novel online, it seems pretty clear that it has the unhappy ending. The author published it anonymously, apparently, because she expected everyone in her native Texas to hate the bleak picture it offered of the region.

[Changsham]

i am fairly neutral to the concept of happy and unhappy endings as long as they are true to the story. I found the ending to THE WIND a bit of a cop out as with so many Hollywood films but not unexpected. I do like films that skilfully add some ambiguity to whatever ending is shown that keep the viewer thinking for a while.

[mndean]

i am fairly neutral to the concept of happy and unhappy endings as long as they are true to the story. I found the ending to THE WIND a bit of a cop out as with so many Hollywood films but not unexpected. I do like films that skilfully add some ambiguity to whatever ending is shown that keep the viewer thinking for a while.

I also like the humorous ending which leaves the future uncertain, which is sometimes mistaken for a happy ending.

[WaverBoy]

I'm pretty sure I read on this board that, despite what Gish said, there was only one ending ever filmed for THE WIND. And I agree with the detractors; the ending nearly ruins the film. It feels totally tacked on and thoroughly unbelievable, much like the ending of the otherwise superlative CITY GIRL.

[Rodney]

I'm pretty sure I read on this board that, despite what Gish said, there was only one ending ever filmed for THE WIND. And I agree with the detractors; the ending nearly ruins the film. It feels totally tacked on and thoroughly unbelievable, much like the ending of the otherwise superlative CITY GIRL.

I actually understood and appreciated the ending of City Girl, with much the same reasoning as Greta for The Wind. In the real world, you live with the life that comes at you, and make the best of it. You do your best to accept family, flaws and all, since you can't choose them. Sometimes getting the harvest in is more important than standing up for principles.

[odinthor]

It's interesting to compare The Wind with yet another of Sjöstrom's films, Berg-Ejvind och hans hustru, alias The Outlaw and His Wife. (For anyone who hasn't seen it, and who wants to experience its ending fresh and not first through my blather, consider this sentence a Spoiler Alert...) Mrs. The Outlaw, aka His Wife, goes out into the snow in rather the same state of mind or out-of-mind as Letty in the sad ending of The Wind would have done except with L. it was the (windy) desert. But, in this earlier film, this was not completely bleak, as, shortly after, Mr. The Outlaw joins her permanently (or permafrost-nently)--that is, the dead frozen version of her--and so it becomes a testament to their dedication to and love of each other.

Just to glance at two other of Sjöstrom's films which I have under my belt, to ponder the endings: Ingeborg Holm, which I think it would be fair to call a "weeper," nevertheless ends on a hopeful note; and Terje Vigen, alias A Man There Was, ends with our hero's spiritual redemption. While a story's a story and the director doesn't necessarily mandate the outcome of a movie, it can at least be pointed out that Sjöstrom's shows--at least, the ones I've seen!--characteristically end with the realization of what David Holm, in The Phantom Carriage, hopes for: I pray my soul comes to maturity before it is reaped. In the sad ending of The Wind, this does not happen; in the happy ending, it does.

[Arndt]

Well, let's count our blessings. At least they did not give THE SCARLET LETTER a happy ending.

[Richard M Roberts]

Well, let's count our blessings. At least they did not give THE SCARLET LETTER a happy ending.

Indeed, it could always be like THE SEA BEAST, Melville's MOBY DICK with a romantic interest AND a happy ending!


RICHARD M ROBERTS

[Roseha]

Much as I love Barrymore (and he was certainly born to play Ahab), THE SEA BEAST is the wildest mis-interpretation of a famous novel I've ever seen on film!

[Christopher Jacobs]

I thought that I had once read somewhere in some trade or fan publication from 1927 a pre-release description of the tragic ending with a comment to the effect that it was powerful drama but the theatres wouldn't like it. I have not been able to locate the source again, however. I did find Photoplay's November 1927 comments, a full year before the general release, naming it one of the best of the month and Gish's performance as one of the best of the month. In fact, they were so impressed they wrote a sonnet about Gish's performance! They don't really get into the ending in any of these notices, however. Below is what appeared...


THE WIND—Metro-Goldwyn –Mayer
OUT where men are men and weather is weather. Where life is a constant battle against wind and sand. That's the background for Lillian Gish's newest emotionalism.
Miss Gish plays a little orphan Virginia girl who is taken into a cousin's home. To escape the distrust and hatred of the cousin's wife, she enters into a loveless marriage with a rough young rancher. Does she come to love her diamond in the rough? Of course, but not until she kills a scoundrelly cattle buyer who attempts to attack her.
As the lonely, distraught girl, Miss Gish gives a fine emotional performance, reaching genuine histrionic heights. Lars Hanson, as the rancher husband, displays an excellent sense of repression and wins your sympathy. It is Montagu Love who supplies the convincing menace.
- PHOTOPLAY, Nov. 1927, p. 52

"WIND, THE"—M.-G.-M.—From the story by Dorothy Scarborough. Scenario by Frances Marion. Directed by Victor
Seastrom. The cast: Letty, Lillian Gish; Lige, Lars Hanson; Roddy, Montagu Love; Cora, Dorothy Cummings; Beverly, Edward Earle; Sourdough, William Orlamond; Cora's Children, Carmencita Johnson, Laon Ramon, Billy Kent Schaefer.
- p. 159


WIND, THE—Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.—Lillian Gish in a fine and impressive drama of life on a Texas ranch. Excellent support by Lars Hanson and Montagu Love. (November.)
-capsule review published monthly after November's issue


Lillian Gish
as
LETTY
in
The Wind
A Sonnet Impression
of the Month's Best
Performance—

A fragrant flower, frail and fine as lace,
Against the wind of hatred and desire,
Singed by the passion of the sun's keen fire,
Beaten by rain that sweeps the garden place.
A flower with a fragile April grace
That, scarcely hopes to rise, or to aspire
To any more than sweetness. . . . Nor acquire
More than a smile upon some passing face!
The wind is cruel—it rises in a manner
That leaves the garden crushed and grimly bare
Save for the single flower clinging there,
That holds its beauty like a gallant banner.
A flower that, in trust and hoping, lives
Just for the loveliness its blooming gives!

-PHOTOPLAY, Nov. 1927, p. 69

[Frederica]

Much as I love Barrymore (and he was certainly born to play Ahab), THE SEA BEAST is the wildest mis-interpretation of a famous novel I've ever seen on film!

Word. Then there was Troy.

[WaverBoy]

I'm pretty sure I read on this board that, despite what Gish said, there was only one ending ever filmed for THE WIND. And I agree with the detractors; the ending nearly ruins the film. It feels totally tacked on and thoroughly unbelievable, much like the ending of the otherwise superlative CITY GIRL.

I actually understood and appreciated the ending of City Girl, with much the same reasoning as Greta for The Wind. In the real world, you live with the life that comes at you, and make the best of it. You do your best to accept family, flaws and all, since you can't choose them. Sometimes getting the harvest in is more important than standing up for principles.

Yeah, but the problem is, as depicted in the film, the above sentiments aren't remotely believable. All of a sudden everyone's all smiles. BS. At least the rest of the film is crackerjack.

[Spiny Norman]

Much as I love Barrymore (and he was certainly born to play Ahab), THE SEA BEAST is the wildest mis-interpretation of a famous novel I've ever seen on film!

Word. Then there was Troy.

Who says the Iliad wasn't the ancient equivalent of an action movie (mass entertainment)?

[Battra92]

I love The Wind. I think it's a great film but I don't understand the happy ending. Why would she suddenly fall in love with Lars Hanson after really only marrying him to keep from starving?

Tragedy is as much a part of theater as comedy. The Greeks, Romans, English, French etc. all have long histories of plays with sad endings. Some of Shakespeare's greatest and most well known works (Julius Caesar, Macbeth, Hamlet, Romeo and Juliet etc.) are tragedies. For some reason, completely and totally foreign to my thinking, film audiences must have happy endings.

While comedy and happy endings have their place, films don't require them and by having every movie with a happy ending it many times can spoil a movie because I know that the main characters are in no real danger and the guy will get the girl and all is well. Mix it up some times and show, as Louis Feuillade called it, "La Vie telle qu'elle est."

[odinthor]

Everyone has personal preferences, and I have no quarrel with that. Me, I go back to the earlier-mentioned "soul coming to maturity" idea. With the sad ending, Letty has not developed as a person; because things are not just the way she wants, she chooses victimhood and surrenders her existence to a cruel environment (on both the real and metaphorical levels); to me, looking at it from an aesthetic point of view, that just seems blunt and unfruitfully sensationalistic. With the happy version--while I'll grant you a cynic could say that she's still in a way a victim surrenduring to her environment--Letty has come to a new maturity: She is adapting to the reality of the situation, and learning to appreciate what she has and what is attainable. And love? Well, love is unsearchable even in the best of circumstances. Lige has shown his commitment to her, and has demonstrated a sensitivity to her feelings; in her new maturity, these qualities certainly open the door pretty wide to developing or realizing feelings of love. I'm not in any way a "happy ending" junkie; but the happy ending here, to me, shows an appropriate and satisfying dynamism, while the sad ending would be just another iteration of "bad choices lead to bad stuff." Now, if at the end they had started singing Breeze, Blow My Baby Back to Me http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aMFafwmIs4A" target="_blank" target="_blank" target="_blank" target="_blank , well, OK, that would have been too much...

[Christopher Jacobs]

Much as I love Barrymore (and he was certainly born to play Ahab), THE SEA BEAST is the wildest mis-interpretation of a famous novel I've ever seen on film!

Word. Then there was Troy.

Who says the Iliad wasn't the ancient equivalent of an action movie (mass entertainment)?

I split the TROY/Iliad section of this thread into its own thread "Classic literature and movie adaptations" in "Talking About Talkies," as it is an interesting discussion by itself.