The video copy of this came from Grapevine Video and it was sort of blurred/over-focussed and splotchy but Grapevine put an engaging soundtrack to the film and it worked. This film seems to have been lost for many decades and the print that was found is seemingly complete. This was a Universal production of 1926 and was shot straight on location in the woods in Log country somewhere presumably in the Pacific Northwest but not too far from Hollywood. It stars Viola Dana & Kenneth Harlan with support from some very good character actors. At times it can remind one of The Big Trees(aka Valley of the Giants) which has been shot numerous times in the silent and sound periods. The story is a simple and routine one. A young man(Harlan) comes to the north woods to his father's logging company with the contemplation of taking it over for dad. He must prove himself amongst the roughneck outdoorsmen as well as his dad that he can cope with the trials,tribulations & corruption of the unscrupulous characters employed in dad's logging firm. The dad doesn't think the son is up to the task. Along the way Harlan meets the wealthy daughter(Dana) of one of his dad's rival logging bosses. The rest of the story is predictable routine sonny-boy-proving-himself-to-dad fair... and he does. The climax of the picture is the big Ice Flood that nearly wipes everyone and everything out. I'm not sure but I'm only guessing that the ice flooding special effects of this picture was supposed to be the big draw of it. Thus the emphasis even in the title. The Ice Flood special-effects, while impressive for 1926 audiences, is pretty rudimentary by modern standards. Think of the parting of the Red Sea in DeMille's The Ten Commandments(1923) or the sand storm/floods in Henry Kings The Winning of Barbara Worth(1926). The Ice Flood is done similarly. But director George Seitz & cast & crew did a competent job in the outdoors and it's fortunate this programmer survives in any form. Perhaps in the future another print will show up or a new restoration can take place. This flick deserves it. This is just the kind of routine but competent programmer that kept the theatres going when the big pictures weren't being made.
Review of The Ice Flood
