Success or Snub? Wings/Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans (1st Academy Awards Review Pt. 2)

To see part 1, click here.

Metropolis Suite~Metropolis - Gottfried Huppertz

This blog is where we discuss whether the winner of the Academy Award truly deserved to win or if other movies were snubbed. People decide this through a variety of methods (normally by complaining about them). We will be deciding this by watching as many major films that came out during that same time period as we can and comparing their historical relevance, impact and how they reflected their time period... and also by complaining about them.

        With that said, let’s travel back in time to 1929. Herbert Hoover is the President, you’re expected to wear a 3-piece suit in the middle of the summer, the “booming” economy is built like the bastard child of a Jenga tower and a house of cards, you’re going to lose all your money in less than 6 months and you’re still not allowed to drink. Okay, so life fucking sucks but let’s ignore that for a moment while we head on over to the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel.

The 1st Academy Awards were much, much different from what you would expect out of the present-day ceremony. Modern categories either didn’t exist, were divided up or had interesting qualifications. For example, Best Director was divided between Best Director for a Comedy Picture (which went to Lewis Milestone for Two Arabian Nights) and Best Director for a Dramatic Picture (Frank Borzage for 7th Heaven).

The awards were also tailored specifically to the person rather than the movie itself. (Hell, some people were nominated without a movie attached to them (Joseph Farnham won the Oscar for Best Title Writing without any film attached to show his skills).) The Acting awards were awarded in consideration for all the roles an actor played in a single year rather than a specific role.

The first actor to win the Academy Award for Best Actor was Emil Jannings for The Last Command (which I don’t like) and The Way of All Flesh (which is a lost film). The first actress to win the Academy Award for Best Actress was Janet Gaynor for Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans (listed above), 7th Heaven (which is one of the greatest and most influential silent film romances) and Street Angel (which shows the influence of 7th Heaven as it’s literally the exact same damn movie as 7th Heaven; so much so that I have trouble differentiating the two in my head). (Also, fun fact: since Street Angel was released at the end of this eligibility period and the beginning of the next one, it’s one of only two movies to be nominated for more than one Academy Award period. At the 2nd Academy Awards, it was nominated for Best Cinematography. This would happen again with The Quiet One in the 1949/1950 Oscars.)

It's also interesting that they decided to choose this specific time period as there are two major near misses that were released in the final week of 1926. First was The General

Buster Keaton’s definitive slapstick comedy about a Confederate soldier who goes on a train chase to save his love interest. While I’m not as crazy about this movie as many other film critics are, it’s still a hallmark of amazing stunt work.

The other near-miss was Bronenosets Potyemkin (Eng. Title: Battleship Potemkin),

a Russian epic that is a huge landmark in film editing. The director of the film, Sergei Eisenstein, approached the film as a scientific experiment on how to structure shots in certain orders to get the audiences to cheer and scream at the points he wants them to cheer and scream. It’s often studied in college classes on film for these reasons. The movie itself is basically the Russian equivalent to Wings: a Communist propaganda film that tries to masquerade this fact behind a 3-act structure though it’s not bad, with the scene on the Odessa steps being a highlight.

Now, technically speaking, Battleship Potemkin was actually released in the USSR in 1925 but didn’t make its way to the States until the last week of 1926. According to the Academy’s rulebook, in order for a film to be considered, it needs to be released in the city of Los Angeles during the eligibility period in order to qualify, which… is a fair rule, I suppose. I mean the Academy is based in LA after all.

Either way, onto the main 3 great (and remembered) movies from these 17 months. First is Fritz Lang’s Metropolis (Eng. Title: Metropolis),

a German film that deals with class warfare and is considered one of the early pioneers of the science-fiction genre as well as one of the landmarks of Bauhaus art design and German expressionism. The film takes place in a mechanized city and centers on a looming war between the poor working class and the rich upper class. And if you know anything about Germany in the 1920s, you’ll understand why this film was such a relevant cautionary tale.

(Also, if you think the production and set design in Wings was great for its time, watch this movie. The mechanized city looks incredible and it still holds up. Hell, I’ve seen sci-fi movies that have come out this past decade that don’t look as good as Metropolis.)

Despite being considered a masterpiece of the silent era by modern critics, Metropolis was actually criticized at its release for being a little too hard to follow and, yeah, that is still kind of a problem with it though I have seen far worse movies in this regard. Also, the fact that it was from Germany and not America means that it had a snowball’s chance in Hell of winning the Oscar but we’ll be talking more about that in later chapters. If you’re into sci-fi and want to see where it all began, Metropolis is worth checking out. 

Another big film that year was Charlie Chaplin’s The Circus.

For those who don’t know anything about film history, Chaplin’s character, The Little Tramp, was basically the first film icon and had a long and illustrious career that revolved around him getting into all sorts of hijinks. Usually these hijinks would just revolve around placing him in a certain scenario and then all of the slapstick possibilities that can possibly come from placing him in said scenario (e.g. The Floorwalker (1916), The Immigrant (1917), The Gold Rush (1925), you get the idea).

So, as you can predict, The Circus was one of his biggest-budgeted films as the Little Tramp accidentally joins a circus and becomes their biggest hit, though the gag is that he can only be funny by accident because he’s such a dumbass that he keeps hurting himself on all of the various circus equipment. At the time, this movie was a big deal as it had gone through numerous production troubles and took over 3 years to make. While that’s nothing unusual today, back then, it was unheard of. As a result, there was a lot of gossip and controversy surrounding the film on whether it would be good or not and, sure enough, it did not disappoint.

The Circus is overall one of Chaplin’s better movies. The thing about Chaplin is that I personally believe that he has had more influence on the comedic genre than anyone else (including his silent era contemporaries, Buster Keaton and Fatty Arbuckle). While the Little Tramp was always down on his luck and got into mischief, there was also always a heart to this character and he usually ends up doing selfless things. Throw in some pretty funny stunts that, once again, the guy did himself and you have a pretty good movie here.

But, let’s move onto the biggest and most well-remembered movie of this time period: The Jazz Singer.

Overture~The Jazz Singer - Louis Silvers

The Jazz Singer revolves around a young Jewish boy named Jakie Rabinowitz (Bobby Gordon) who runs away from his stern father, the Cantor Rabinowitz (Warner Oland), who wants him to sing in synagogues instead of jazz clubs. Years pass and a grown-up Jakie (Al Jolson) returns to New York as a successful jazz singer named Jack Robin to score the show of his dreams, even if it means having to reunite with his parents.

When The Jazz Singer came out, it was a big deal. Like a really big deal. Like a R E A L -L Y big deal. Honestly, I don’t think I can overstate how much of a big deal it was. Like if they had a game show talking about with Howie Mandel and 24 identical suitcases, they would call it Big Deal or Big Deal?

Not only did it revolutionize the industry and had Hollywood executives studying it as the way forward, but it also made so much money that, at the time, it was the highest grossing movie ever made. I’m not even exaggerating when I say that it could be considered one of the top ten most influential movies of all time.

Why was it such a big deal? Well, one reason and one reason alone: THE MOVIE TALKS!

Audiences probably popped a cherry seeing this back in 1928.

This was completely unheard of at the time. The Jazz Singer ushered in the era of the talkies (old slang for talking pictures) and was the first and biggest nail in the coffin of the silent film industry. If you ever enjoyed a piece of dialogue or a famous line in a movie, then you owe it all to The Jazz Singer.

Now, contrary to popular belief, The Jazz Singer actually isn’t the first full-on talkie as most of the movie is still told in the silent film format (i.e. the story is told visually with some title cards popping up to indicate what they’re saying). Apparently, the art of recording sound on set was still incredibly difficult (and I’m going to assume expensive) so they could only record so much. But, to director Alan Crosland's credit, the movie's very smart about when and where it uses sound.

While most of the film is told the silent way, the sound comes on whenever Jack Robin is doing one of his song sequences and then goes back to silent when they do normal dialogue. With this in mind, you could make an argument of this not only being the first ever talkie, but also the first ever musical.  This is very smart as the movie is about how much he loves his singing and letting the audience hear just the singing helps it stand out and gives it life.

On top of that, though, The Jazz Singer is a good and (relatively) timeless story. The conflict that Jack has with his father is very easy to identify with and the Cantor is a very 3-dimensional antagonist. He’s not evil, he’s just so set in his ways that he wants to love his son but because Jack doesn’t fit his narrow view of the world, he can’t bring himself to do it. A lot of the side characters are also likable, and the film has some nice moments of comic relief.

I probably should address the elephant in the room when it comes to recommending this movie in this day and age. Specifically, that one of the shows Jack is hired to do is a minstrel show and, in case you’re wondering, yes, he does put on blackface. After the Civil Rights Movement in the 1950s and 60s, blackface has since come to be associated with America’s dark past of racism. The majority of minstrel shows were used to mock African-Americans and stereotype them as buffoons and deadbeats.

It's a good movie outside of this scene, I swear to God.

This scene would never fly today. However, you have to remember that the movie didn’t come out today; it came out in 1928 and in 1928, minstrel shows, while on their way out, were still around and it makes sense that an up-and-coming performer would perform in one. It also cleverly plays into the film’s story as Jack is contemplating embracing his Jewish heritage while seeing someone in the mirror who is very clearly not Jewish. Also, despite being frequently shown as an example of the racism of blackface, Al Jolson was actually one of the earliest supporters of civil rights on Broadway and in Hollywood.

I’m just going to get the race question out of the way for the Golden Age of Hollywood in these next couple paragraphs because if we addressed and had to dissect each and every single one we saw, the page count on this blog would be thick enough to be used as a weapon. I’m also really trying to walk on eggshells here since in a post-2020 world, this can easily be taken the wrong way so please keep in mind that this is 100% just looking at outdated cultural norms of the 20s and 30s and is in no way a celebration of them or wishing for their return. Whitewashing and blackface is not, and has never been, okay but it’s still something that happened. Please do not try to cancel whatever pathetic excuse for a career that I have if you find it disturbing.

If you watch an old movie from the 20s-50s and you see an actor either put on blackface as a gag or for a musical number or see a clearly white actor playing a character who isn’t (besides blackface, there was also brownface (white actors as Indians or Central/South Americans), yellowface (white actors as Asian, usually Chinese) and redface (white actors as Native Americans)), it’s usually a case-by-case basis that you have to judge on their own and remember the time period that these movies were made in. In other words, sometimes the filmmakers might’ve meant well, while other times, it was genuinely disgusting and offensive even by the standards of the time.

The Marx Brothers wore blackface for a gag in A Day at the Races (1937) yet that film had one of the highest number of black actors on screen in a major production at the time and they, like Al Jolson, were strong advocates of civil rights in Hollywood. In The Good Earth (1936), Paul Muni puts on yellowface to play a Chinese farmer but he only did so because he and the producer didn’t think that 1930s America would go see a movie with a Chinese actor as the lead (and they were sadly probably right). Hell, Fred Astaire’s minstrel number in Swing Time (1936) was done to actually pay tribute to his good friend, Bill Robinson (a.k.a. Mr. Bojangles), and his undying respect for the African-American community’s history of song and dance.

At the same time, however, other movies such as Show Boat (1936) have minstrel shows that are clearly done to mock African-Americans. You can usually tell whether these movies are supposed to be mean or not less by who they have playing the culture and more how the culture is portrayed. In A Day at the Races, the black community saves the Marx Bros. from the villains; in The Littlest Rebel (1935), it’s considered a crying shame that slavery ended. In The Good Earth, the Chinese farming community is full of complex characters who try to eke out hard but good lives; in Flying Tigers (1942), the Chinese are dumb simpletons who are too incompetent to fight the Japanese. In Peter Pan (1953), the Native Americans invite the main characters to party with them and thirst for knowledge; in The Last of the Mohicans (1936), they're evil, mindless savages. You get the idea

Aaaaaaaaanyway, that one screaming elephant with musth in the room aside, The Jazz Singer is still an excellent story that broke incredible ground, has held up well throughout the years and can still be enjoyed on some level today, far more so than either Wings or Sunrise. Sooooo, why didn’t it win the Oscar then? Granted, I don’t really know which one it would win since it is a unique and artistic picture but the fact that it was the first movie to talk would probably qualify it for being outstanding but that’s beside the point. The Jazz Singer wasn’t even nominated for either category. Or any category. Why did the Academy ignore The Jazz Singer so bad? Well, TIME FOR ANOTHER HISTORY LESSON!

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences was founded in 1921 to mediate labor disputes in Hollywood. It wasn’t until 1929 that they started handing out awards. The Academy Awards were created by producer and founder of MGM Studios, Louis B. Mayer (he’s the second M in MGM). Mayer’s purpose of founding the awards was to unite the numerous branches of the industry or, more specifically, to consolidate his power. That’s not me saying that by the way, this is his actual quote: "I found that the best way to handle [filmmakers] was to hang medals all over them ... If I got them cups and awards, they'd kill them to produce what I wanted. That's why the Academy Award was created."

You cheeky son of a bitch.

While there was a board of judges set up, according to director King Vidor (same source as above), the voting for the 1st Academy Awards was exclusively in the hands of the founders of the Academy: Louis Mayer, Sid Grauman (the owner of numerous theater chains in LA, including the famous Chinese Theater), Joseph Schenck (a very powerful producer who would go on to found, and be the first chairman of, 20th Century Fox), Mary Pickford (the biggest actress of the 20s) and Douglas Fairbanks Sr. (who was the 1st President of the Academy). Fairbanks in his time was considered the King of Hollywood and was one of the original blockbuster stars, playing famous roles such as Robin Hood and Zorro. 

Remember when I said that The Jazz Singer ushered in the era of talkies and changed cinema forever? While this was an amazing breakthrough in filmmaking, it unfortunately ruined a lot of careers. Many actors found it difficult to make the transition to this new style of acting and filmmaking and found themselves left behind (this was such a phenomenon that some speculate that the eerie ending of The Circus reflects this). And one of these actors was Douglas Fairbanks.

This is getting into speculation on my part, but remember that the 1st Academy Awards didn’t take place until 1929, a full year after The Jazz Singer came out. And other talkies were already out and raking in a lot of dough and many Hollywooders were trying to figure out how to capitalize on it. So, putting yourself in the shoes of Louis Mayer, you’re confronted with the industry being turned upside down so you need to re-enact control and your good buddy is depressed that his career is going down the shitter, what would you do?

Starting a self-absorbed awards show that you invite all of the Hollywood elite to and make sure that your inner group of friends cherry pick what they think should win seems like as good an option as any. Once you see the ceremony as the last gasp of a depressed man trying to save his way of life and portray talkies as nothing more than a fad that would quickly die out, this all starts to make a lot of sense. In other words, the reason why The Jazz Singer wasn’t nominated for anything at the 1st Academy Awards was because one of the reasons why the Academy Awards were founded was to fight against The Jazz Singer.

So remember in the prologue when I asked the question of how far back the trend of the Academy choosing winners based on studio politics instead of what is the actual best movie goes? Well, the answer is allllllll the way back to the beginning.

Honestly, despite my acidic tone here, I do feel bad for Douglas Fairbanks and the Academy did have the good sportsmanship to give The Jazz Singer an honorary award for its impact. Going from being the biggest star in Hollywood to watching your career slowly but surely go up in flames is pretty painful and when you have the resources to try to put a stop to it, you’ll do everything you can. Can’t really blame the guy. (In case you’re wondering why he couldn’t make the jump to talkies, it’s because he’d been smoking 10 packs of cigarettes a day for 20 years and he sounded like it.) And I probably wouldn’t complain if this was just an interesting little historical tidbit: just a one-off thing that happened back in the 20s. But that’s not what happened. 

True to Louis Mayer’s words, people love to get trophies. And when America’s cult of celebrity makes you convinced that you can only be happy and accepted if you get that little gold statuette, you have an industry that’ll want this again and again. So, naturally, these awards continued and flourished and lasted over 90 years from that day back in 1929. 

        Either way, going by the rules we established in the prologue, we do have to make a choice here on success or snub. And while Wings and Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans may have their places in history, The Jazz Singer has a much, much bigger one and it was a far more outstanding picture. Thus that makes this choice a…

SNUB!

    

        For funsies/a nice little bonus, I'm going to end these blogs by listing my personal favorite films of their respective eligibility periods, out of order and alphabetized because I feel that doing an official rank would make me a bit of a hypocrite here and, honestly, somedays I just can't be bothered to rank. While I try to distinguish between what I think are the objectively best films and my own personal favorite ones, I am only human. So just take these as personal recommendations and, hey, maybe you can spot my biases and take them into account here and become an old-school cinephile yourself!

        And for the Hell of it, I'll also be doing favorite heroes and villains since that's always a fun list and the acting awards are the only ones that people care about besides best picture (sad but true). So, if you want some recommendations for movies to check out from 1927 and January-May of 1928, here's what I'd say.

Favorite Movies

• Metropolis (dir. Fritz Lang)
• Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans (dir. F. W. Murnau)
• The Circus (dir. Charlie Chaplin)
• The Jazz Singer (dir. Alan Crosland)
• 7th Heaven (dir. Frank Borzage)

Favorite Heroes

• Chico (Charles Farrell) (7th Heaven)
• Diana (Janet Gaynor) (7th Heaven)
• Freder (Gustav Fröhlich) (Metropolis)
• Jack Robin/Jakie Rabinowitz (Al Jolson) (The Jazz Singer)
• The Little Tramp (Charlie Chaplin) (The Circus)

Favorite Villains

• Rotwang (Rudolf Klein-Rogge) (Metropolis)
• Sergeant Neri (Guido Trento) (Street Angel)
• The Cantor Rabinowitz (Warner Oland) (The Jazz Singer)
• The Tsarist Soldiers (Bronenosets Potyemkin (Battleship Potemkin))
• The Woman from the City (Margaret Hamilton) (Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans)