Trail of the North Wind (1924) User Reviews

I hate movies that center on dogs, but this one is an exception!

[JohnHowardReid · 8/10 · 29 November 2016]

I'm surprised to be the first to review this entertaining short in the series, "Little Dramas of the Big Places", made by the same team (namely Nell Shipman and her husband, Bert Van Tuyle) who gave us that remarkable feature, Something New (1920). Both these movies are now available in very good prints on the one Alpha DVD. This time, the hero of the day is not a hard-working motor car, but a hard-working dog who manages to slip away from his sled-bound colleagues and race off to the rescue of our heroine who is endeavoring to help a wounded man to safety during a terrific snow storm. Please note that this is not a manufactured snow storm, but a real snow storm – and it's a real dog running loose through the snowy forests, plains and swimming across a swollen river too! This was the first in a series of these shorts, entitled overall as "Little Dramas of the Big Places". Four more followed, but the series was abandoned when the producer, Bert Van Tuyle, attempted to murder Miss Shipman. She fled to New York and never made another film, although the 1936 movie, "Wings in the Dark", was based on a story she wrote in collaboration with the silent movie screenwriter, Philip D. Hurn. This movie is available as an extra in Alpha's "Something New" DVD.