User Reviews

'Chest of Fortune' (quiet in the back, there!) is an American film from the Kalem (K-L-M) Studio, which was the first Yank film studio to publicise the real names of its actors. Before Kalem, all movie actors were either anonymous or required to emote under house names which remained the property of their studio: for instance, before Mabel Normand achieved stardom at Keystone, she acted in Biograph films as 'Muriel Fortescue'. This lurk was to prevent actors from demanding more money as their names became better-known.

I viewed a print of 'Chest of Fortune' from the archives of Nederlands Filmmuseum in Amsterdam; the original intertitles had been removed (a shame, since Kalem often featured very beautiful title cards) and replaced with very prosaic captions in Dutch. The character names which I cite here are the ones in the Dutch print. If it turns out that the original U.S. print gave the characters entirely different names (this sometimes happens), I'm sure that my Internet detractors will dine out on the discrepancies between my review and their own sources.

This movie seems to start out as a war drama: specifically, the American Civil War. The Union forces under Captain Wellington are advancing on a house in Southern territory. While the black 'servants' (white actors in burnt cork) have minstrel-show conniption fits, the family pack up their small boy and a few belongings in a chest (no, the boy isn't in the chest) and attempt to escape in a dinghy.

SPOILERS AHEAD. Just when we think that this movie will be about a Southern family in Civil War days, the action jumps to modern-day 1914, still in the southern United States. Handsome Jack (Guy Coombs) is in love with the fair lady played by Marguerite Clayton. The beauteous Miss Clayton's role in this film is cried Käthe: at least, that's what it says her name is in these Dutch title cards. I'm reasonably certain that "Käthe" isn't her name in the original Stateside prints, but that's what I'm calling her in this review. (Grease up your modems and point out my errors, oh ye Internet critics.)

Jack's rival for the affections of the beauteous Whatsername is Harry Meinling, another name that sounds suspiciously like a Dutch translation. (Whoever he is, he's played by Harry F. Millarde ... whoever HE is.) Jack's job has got summat to do with a dredging machine, and now the dredger pulls up an object which we recognise as that pesky chest from Civil War days. Amazingly, this wooden chest has been underwater for nigh on fifty years, but it's still in good nick ... and the contents are dry, too. Those contents turn out to be quite prosaic, such as a small boy's trousers. From this point onward, nothing much happens ... at least, not in the print which I viewed.

While watching this rather pointless film, I was reminded of a true incident from America's real Civil War. One Confederate family in Kentucky had made their fortune from a brewery. If you know anything about breweries, you know that the flavour of the booze is dependent upon the yeast: the yeast must be cultured and cultivated. It takes decades, even centuries, to perfect a yeast culture: if that culture is destroyed, you can't just substitute any yeast culture at random. Anyroad, a Union regiment came through Kentucky and supposedly robbed this Southern family of everything they owned, except a jug: the family gave up everything else without a struggle, but were ready to defend that jug with their lives. The Union commander assumed that the jug must contain gold or jewels; when he discovered it contained only yeast, he decided that the family were crazy and he left them alone. They got to keep their yeast.

I was reminded of the above (true?) story while I watched 'Chest of Fortune', because the contents of the titular chest in this movie are about as interesting as yeast. Maybe a scene is missing from this print, in which case my Internet critics will let me know about it. I'll rate this drama just 4 out of 10.

I have also seen a Dutch print of this film and unfortunately it does not seem to be entirely complete. To judge from the cast-list, there were early scenes involving the banker and his daughter as a child which are not present and there may have been other early scenes that would help to clarify the civil-war action. However what survives is substantial and the broad lines of the story are clear. Either the other reviewer saw a particularly mangled version or he has simply not understood what he saw.

There are several points of interest in the film. One is the setting. The civil-war action is based on real events - the famous Morgan's Raid of 1863 when Brigadier General John Hunt Morgan (not John Hunter Morgan) managed to terrorise the states of Tennessee, Indiana and Ohio for a month. The setting is in all probability the Ohio wetlands, then still very extensive. The setting figures in several important ways in the film. It explains the particular brutality of the fighting. It also explains the chosen mean of escape (by river), the river-folk who find the young boy in the boat and who subsequently become his foster-parents and also, much later, the dredging project of which the hero becomes the overseer. This allows for a particularly dramatic "wetlands" murder attempt as the climax of the film.

The war scenes are intended to reflect Morgan's guerilla tactics and paint a rather negative picture of the Confederate hero, since what ensues is not merely a battle but a massacre. The father dies defending his house; the mother is killed while escaping; the little boy escapes in a boat with two black servants (who are both then shot by the pursuers) and the chest is at some point lost in the water. The boat drifts on and is discovered by the river-dwellers who rescue the child.

Years later Jack is overseer of the dredging project and in love with the banker's daughter Kate. The point of interest is the reason why he cannot marry her. It is not simple social snobbery. It is because his story is known and he was found in the boat in the arms of a dead black servant. In other words, white as he appears, he may be "black". This is not even just racial prejudice. Such a mixed marriage would have been illegal at this time in a majority of American states.

The chest dredged from the river of course proves the boy's identity. It contains a photograph of him as a child with his parents (we have seen it earlier in the film when the chest was being packed) and he can be identified as the child in the photograph because of the clothes he is wearing, the same ones that he was found in (and which the foster-parents have preserved).

Before, however, he has time to impart this good news to his loved one, he meets a man, Harry Manning, whom he believes to be his friend, explains about the find and takes him back to the dredger where he, rather unwisely, also shows him how the machine works. What he does not know (but we, the audience, do) is that Manning is his rival in love. He has been refused by Kate but knows he will have no hope at all if Jack can prove he is as white as he looks. He knocks him unconscious and steals the photograph. Surprised by Jack's colleagues, he panics, shoves the unconscious body into the dredger and then tries to drown him in the river.

The rescue is effected and all is well.