Roaring Rails (1924)
(Tom Forman, US 1924, 60 min., 35mm)
Harry Carey was one of the best known and most loved (by the public and by his co-workers) actors in Hollywood. From his earliest silent films for D. W. Griffith at Biograph, to his star status in Hollywood as a western hero and then B series star, Carey brought warmth, humanity, and a natural ease to film acting. Roaring Rails is a post-WWI story set in the Pacific Northwest with Carey starring as an army veteran returning to his former life as a railroad engineer. Thrown into the middle of a troubled town and the unscrupulous business interests that run it, Carey, in true heroic fashion, saves the day. Filmed well before CGI was ever dreamt of, Carey, his train, and his fellow actors brave the film’s set piece: a real and raging forest fire.
Live piano accompaniment by Dr. Philip C. Carli.