Steamboat Round the Bend (1935)

Director:

John Ford

Writers:

Ben Lucien Burman (novel)
Dudley Nichols (screenplay) ...

Release Date:

6 September 1935 (USA)

Genre:

Comedy | Drama | Romance

Plot:

A Louisiana con man enters his steamboat into a winner-take-all race with a rival while trying to find a witness to free his nephew, about to be hung for murder.

Plot Keywords:

Steamboat | Witness | Wax Museum | Patent Medicine | Minister

Cast

Will Rogers	...	Doctor John Pearly
Anne Shirley	...	Fleety Belle
Irvin S. Cobb	...	Captain Eli
Eugene Pallette	...	Sheriff Rufe Jeffers
John McGuire	...	Duke
Berton Churchill	...	New Moses
Francis Ford	...	Efe
Roger Imhof	...	Breck's Pappy
Raymond Hatton	...	Matt Abel
Hobart Bosworth	...	Chaplain
Stepin Fetchit	...	Jonah

Also Known As:

Steamboat Bill

Runtime:

USA:81 min (FMC Library Print) | 82 min (copyright length)

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (Western Electric Noiseless Recording)

Certification:

Finland:K-8 | USA:Approved (PCA #1058) | USA:TV-G (TV rating)

Filming Locations:

Sacramento, California, USA

Company:

Fox Film Corporation

Trivia:

The film was released shortly after Will Rogers' death on 15 August 1935 from an airplane crash near Point Barrow, Alaska. Originally, the ending of the film had him waving goodbye to the character played by Irvin S. Cobb, but the ending was changed to avoid the audience thinking he was saying goodbye to them, which may have caused them to leave the theater in tears.

Quotes:

New Moses: I swear henceforth that liquor will never touch these lips.
Efe: Me too!

Movie Connections:

Referenced in Paper Moon (1973)

Soundtrack:

Listen to the Mockingbird

Historic, Nostalgic with Tenderness: genuine America

I first saw this movie with my grandfather fifty years ago. Our small-town theater was having classic movie month and Will Rogers was my grandfather's favorite. For a ten-year old boy this movie made a lasting impression of the freedom and romance once available to us in America but now lost forever. Aside from the instantly believable story line about an uncle and his orphaned nephew going together to buy an aging Mississippi River steamboat the pathos applies superbly to this day. The young man meets a girl, gets in a fight over her and is in trouble with the law. The kind uncle moves heaven and earth to help his deceased sister's son. The characters are all period and realistic according to my grandfather who knew people just like that. America was a religious nation in those days, especially the South, so the use of religious terms in common speech is authentic. The thing to watch for in this film is the steamboat race. In 1935 the steamboat's day was already past, and to find that many operating steamboats to make the film must have been a task. Then...listen closely to the melodious whistles. Different pitches and echoes, made by live steam. Steam power built modern America, and the sound of a live steam whistle, once so common, is all but vanished now. I have to yield to my grandfather's opinion of the movie, not having lived in those times myself, and he said it was quite authentic, down to the use of pitch, kerosene or whatever was handy to get more speed out of the engines. The fact that a regular person felt he could go speak to a state governor in person is also part of our American heritage. There was not the class distinction (at least among whites) that there is today. This movie is a priceless treasure, and youngsters definitely need to see it. Anne Shirley, swamp girl, becomes sweet because she admits she is won over by the tenderness of Uncle John.