Run Time: 17 minutes. Studio: Biograph. Director: D.W. Grifith. Writer: Edward Bell. Cast: Alfred Paget, Herny B. Walthall, Harry Carey, Lionel Barrymore, John T. Dillion, Kate Bruce, Bobby Harron. Cinematographer: Billy Blitzer.
Though D.W. Griffith is often best known for his epics like Birth of a Nation (1915) and Intolerance (1916), which were massive in both scale and length, I often think that the director's best work is the short films that he made for Biograph.
In this short western film, three outlaws are escaping from a posse by heading into the desert. Here they run across a baby who is about to be eaten by a mountain lion. They rescue the baby and protect it as they continue to travel through the desert.
This film shows Griffith and his team at the height of their filmmaking powers. For a short film, there is a lot of story fit into the runtime. However, The Sheriff's Baby never feels rushed and is never difficult to follow. Rather it is gripping for start to finish. The ending is actually quite moving as the buildup to it is perfect. The technical aspects are top notch here. The use of cutting between scenes is quite impressive for its time and holds up perfectly today. Griffith's films are course greatly remembered today for their pioneering use of cross-cutting and this is a great example of why. The cutting between the posse and the outlaws early on, creates some action scenes that still exciting today. Yet this excellent technical filmmaking is never there simply to show off. Rather every aspect of the technical filmmaking is in compete service to the story. Causal viewers may not notice or think about the great use of crosscutting here, but they will definitely feel it. A cast of Griffith regulars are also at the top of their game here. There is very little of the type of overacting that one might associate with films of the early 1910's. This is a too often overlooked gem in Griffith's filmography.
Movie lovers will easily recognize similarities between this film and the story Three Godfathers. Three Godfathers had five official movie adaptions (the most famous being the John Ford/John Wayne 1948 adaption). This story was written by prolific author Peter B. Kyne had first appeared as a short story in The Saturday Evening Post in November of 1912. In 1913 the story would be turned into a novel. Though records from Biograph report that The Sheriff's Baby has an original story by Edward Bell (he received payment for his story on December 16, 1912), the similarities are too clear to ignore. It is definitely plausible that The Saturday Evening Post version was at least an inspiration for this film.
For anyone who wishes to watch this delightful film, it is available as a bonus feature on the Film Preservation Society's Blu-ray set for the William S. Hart feature film, Wolf Lowry (1917).
Resources Used
Wolf Lowry Blu-ray liner notes by Tracey Goessel
