White Legion

Now that Panamanian cinema has had its first screen hit with "Historias del canal" (2014), many of us have realized that there is indeed an endless amount of stories to tell about the Panama Canal, not only during the 20th century when the United States helped the Department of Panamá to separate from Colombia in order to build and control the canal, but from the day someone visualized its route, connecting the Atlantic and Pacific oceans (I do not know who did, but it probably happened in the 16th century) to the frustrated attempt by the French Canal Company, which was the reason why the word "Panamá" was synonym of "evil eye" among the French, due to the large amounts of money lost by those who invested in the work of the viscount Ferdinand de Lesseps.

Consequently different sectors of the American film industry began to film those stories: when the sound era began, while "Marie Galante" (1934) was made by Fox, minor studios as Grand National Pictures and Producers Releasing Corporation also released their own products. PRC made the war thriller "South of Panama" (1941), which has a small cult; and from Grand National came two: "White Legion" (1936) and "Panama Patrol", good examples of those curious fabrications.

Written and directed by Karl Brown, who was once D. W. Griffith's ex-assistant, "White Legion" is a bad melodrama about the struggle of Americans who were in charge of the construction, to control yellow fever, a disease that had already decimated thousands of workers of the French Canal Company. It was produced with five pennies by Benjamin F. Zeidman (check his biography in Wikipedia), an enterprising businessman who had joined the film industry when he was 14 years old.

However, Zeidman did not consider that to properly tell Brown's story he needed more economic resources, so the cash limitation became insuperable evidence. The lush humid tropical flora of the zone, the magnitude of the mechanical extraction of soil being done, the consolidation of American military power in the future Canal Zone and the copious documentation of scientific research of yellow fever, were ignored and turned instead into an unfortunate studio-bound production of small, cheap sets. But if the low budget was a handicap, there were other elements against the production. First, Brown's screenplay is loaded with long dialog scenes (one or two with a couple of witty lines) and it is betrayed by the silly purpose of making a propaganda version of the scientific work, in favor of an American middle-age hunk doctor (Ian Keith), with a highly unlikely solution to end the plague. Then, Brown's mise-en- scene mostly consists of fixed, endless, single takes, in spite of cinematographer Harry Jackson's efforts to add shadows and props to decorate the frame. And last and worst of all (especially for a Panamanian audience) Brown turned to tired Mexican stereotypes to represent Panamá, and homogenize everything "Latino" into a single mold, even when they try to add some "local flavor" by using the Panamanian folk tune "El tambor de la alegría" in a fiesta sequence.

A year after the release of "White Legion" South African scientist Max Theiler succeeded in developing a vaccine for yellow fever, but Zeidman and Grand National did not give up and re-released their turkey with the sensationalist title, "The Hell- Hole Named Panama".

Doctors arrive in the Canal Zone, hoping to eliminate Yellow Fever. It's an international group, with two American men one British doctor, one Mitteleuropean, and one Japanese, in the middle of the jungle under the command of Dr. Ian Keith.

It's a well-meaning Grand National picture, written and directed by Karl Brown. Brown clearly had some serious things to say about the March Of Progress, but he also knew that his audience wanted some romance, some death defying, and a goodly amount of all around melodrama and some comic relief that kept to the main point. the script provides all of that, with the doctors valiantly fighting for the honor of conquering death, Tala Birell (the Mitteleuropean doctor) and Suzanne Kaaren in a low-key match-off for his affections, and Ferdinand Munier as the pompous senator,

It's a little more strident than my taste calls for, and Hugo Riesenfeld provides a pompous little march to presage the doctors as they stride forward to carry out their glorious mission. You can say, however, that it is well-meaning, like the biopics that Warner Brothers were producing for Muni and Robinson at this point.

"White Legion" is a movie about some very brave and important people. Unfortunately, while I enjoyed the movie, the average person probably won't...mostly because of how they tell this story. It's a cheapo production...and should have been better.

The story is all about Yellow Fever and the efforts of scientists to irradicate it....otherwise, the Panama Canal never could have been completed AND the ships never would want to go through such a zone of pestilence. The characters in the story champion Pasteur's germ theory and ultimately are successful. However, in telling this story, they included a few dopey characters (such as the Senator and his daughter) in a feeble attempt to make the story more interesting....and simply telling it without all the melodrama would have made for a better and more realistic portrayal of these events.

Alpha Video provides a valuable service for cinéastes through its fresh release of vintage films. However, as these are not remastered, not all are in good condition, some having soured over time. Nonetheless, Alpha offers new art work, as well as informative liner notes for these films, despite their ofttimes sub-par audio and visual quality. The history of the Panama Canal's construction supplies the background for this film. Following the fruitless efforts of France to complete the project, that was broken off due to the deaths, from yellow fever, of tens of thousands of imported contract laborers, an exceptional medical team, under U.S. leadership, isolated, and then destroyed the disease's carrier, the common mosquito. One-time matinée idol Ian Keith is cast as leader of the research team, an internationally flavoured collection of not inconsiderable scientific expertise. However, a large portion of his efforts are employed to show the way for available U.S. military personnel to coat local waters with oil as means of stymying mosquito movements, including breeding. Keith has the lead here, but merely walks through his turn with a dour performance. Slipping past him is the talented Tala Birell who is given the best passage of the film: when Keith's character tries to become more friendly with Birell's (Dr.Stern), he inquires "Dr. Stern! Is there a first name?" Her reply - "Doctor". Surely this is one of the most perfect squelches within the annals of cinema history. Gathering in the performing laurels here is veteran character actor Rollo Lloyd for a strongly defined Colonel, military commander of the Canal Zone's troops. He effectively handles a disturbance caused by unruly military personnel along with civilians who wish to avoid rules and regulations. Longwhile D. W. Griffith assistant Karl Brown is the director, with his efforts being undermined by his own screenplay, a disordered mixture composed of drama, action, romance and comedy. This makes for an unconvincing storyline, although the script is consistently handled throughout the affair. In sum, the film is denied that which it sorely needs, a secure hand at the helm, to highlight the drama within the story in order to outline the events of a fairly recent period (at the time of the work's release, only about 30 years prior); a missed opportunity, indeed!