The Green Door
- 1917
- 20m
YOUR RATING
A piano clerk in New York City hopes for adventure and ultimately finds romance.A piano clerk in New York City hopes for adventure and ultimately finds romance.A piano clerk in New York City hopes for adventure and ultimately finds romance.
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- TriviaThird release in the Broadway Star "O. Henry Stories" series.
Featured review
Spot the hidden "V"s
O. Henry's short story 'The Green Door' is not among his best-known tales, but it's one of my favourite O. Henry stories (marred only by some unfortunate racial dialect). Rudolf Steiner is a shy piano salesman who longs for adventure. He seems to get some one night in Manhattan's theatre district, when he spots an odd-looking man handing out business cards advertising the services of a local dentist. When Steiner tries to walk past without receiving a card, this man slips him a card reading only 'The Green Door'. All the other pedestrians are given cards bearing a dental advert. Intrigued, Steiner walks past again, and once more he -- and he alone -- is given a card reading 'The Green Door', while everyone else is given an advertisement for the dentist. What's happening? Eventually, Steiner finds a green door. Behind the green door is ... no, not Marilyn Chambers, but a fair damsel in distress. Eventually, in one of O. Henry's more plausible twist endings, Steiner discovers the circumstances that sent him to this lady's rescue.
This low-budget silent film of 'The Green Door' was made by Thomas R. Mills, an English-born actor-showman who appears to have made a speciality of adapting O. Henry's stories for the screen ... possibly because O. Henry's well-made plots were very popular and (most importantly) in the public domain. It looks like a photographed play, with very few cuts and some very stagey camera set-ups.
Intriguingly, the producers of this movie (who helped themselves to O. Henry's story without worrying about petty details such as copyrights) went to a great deal of trouble to protect their ownership of the film prints. At several points in this story, a large serif letter "V" (the logo of the Vitagraph Company) is 'hidden' somewhat obtrusively in the set dressing, to discourage other film distributors from copying this movie and re-releasing it (with new credits and intertitles) as their own work. I had more fun spotting the hidden "V"s than watching this movie, even though the source story is one of my favourites. I'll rate 'The Green Door' 3 points out of 10.
This low-budget silent film of 'The Green Door' was made by Thomas R. Mills, an English-born actor-showman who appears to have made a speciality of adapting O. Henry's stories for the screen ... possibly because O. Henry's well-made plots were very popular and (most importantly) in the public domain. It looks like a photographed play, with very few cuts and some very stagey camera set-ups.
Intriguingly, the producers of this movie (who helped themselves to O. Henry's story without worrying about petty details such as copyrights) went to a great deal of trouble to protect their ownership of the film prints. At several points in this story, a large serif letter "V" (the logo of the Vitagraph Company) is 'hidden' somewhat obtrusively in the set dressing, to discourage other film distributors from copying this movie and re-releasing it (with new credits and intertitles) as their own work. I had more fun spotting the hidden "V"s than watching this movie, even though the source story is one of my favourites. I'll rate 'The Green Door' 3 points out of 10.
helpful•10
- F Gwynplaine MacIntyre
- Apr 26, 2003
Details
- Runtime20 minutes
- Color
- Sound mix
- Aspect ratio
- 1.33 : 1
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