''The Squall'' is a 1929 American
pre-Code
Pre-Code Hollywood was the brief era in the American film industry between the widespread adoption of sound in film in 1929LaSalle (2002), p. 1. and the enforcement of the Motion Picture Production Code censorship guidelines, popularly known ...
drama film
In film and television, drama is a category or genre of narrative fiction (or semi-fiction) intended to be more serious than humorous in tone. Drama of this kind is usually qualified with additional terms that specify its particular super ...
directed by
Alexander Korda
Sir Alexander Korda (; born Sándor László Kellner; hu, Korda Sándor; 16 September 1893 – 23 January 1956)[Myrna Loy
Myrna Loy (born Myrna Adele Williams; August 2, 1905 – December 14, 1993) was an American film, television and stage actress. Trained as a dancer, Loy devoted herself fully to an acting career following a few minor roles in silent films. ...](_blank)
,
Richard Tucker
Richard Tucker (August 28, 1913January 8, 1975) was an American operatic tenor and cantor. Long associated with the Metropolitan Opera, Tucker's career was primarily centered in the United States.
Early life
Tucker was born Rivn (Rubin) Ticke ...
,
Alice Joyce
Alice Joyce Brown ( Joyce; October 1, 1890 – October 9, 1955) was an American actress who appeared in more than 200 films during the 1910s and 1920s. She is known for her roles in the 1923 film '' The Green Goddess'' and its 1930 remake of ...
and
Loretta Young
Loretta Young (born Gretchen Young; January 6, 1913 – August 12, 2000) was an American actress. Starting as a child, she had a long and varied career in film from 1917 to 1953. She won the Academy Award for Best Actress for her role in the fil ...
, and based on the 1926 play ''The Squall'' by
Jean Bart
Jean Bart (; ; 21 October 1650 – 27 April 1702) was a French naval commander and privateer.
Early life
Jean Bart was born in Dunkirk in 1650 to a seafaring family, the son of Jean-Cornil Bart (c. 1619-1668) who has been described variously a ...
.
Plot
In Hungary, a beautiful, young gypsy girl, Nubi, seeks shelter during a sudden squall. Nubi is given shelter by a well-to-do farmer and his family. The farmer and his family hide the girl when a brutish, older gypsy lover arrives to claim the girl and take her away. The older gypsy leaves, and Nubi is allowed to stay on with the family as a servant. Nubi does little useful work as a servant in the house, and instead proceeds to use her feminine charms to entice and bewitch various male members of the household, leading to many scenes of discord, anger, and jealousy. The spell that Nubi has put on the house is only lifted at the end of the movie when the older gypsy returns, and carries Nubi away—with the farmer and his family no longer willing to offer protection to the troublesome gypsy girl.
Cast
![Loretta Young The Squall](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/2f/Loretta_Young_The_Squall.jpg)
*
Richard Tucker
Richard Tucker (August 28, 1913January 8, 1975) was an American operatic tenor and cantor. Long associated with the Metropolitan Opera, Tucker's career was primarily centered in the United States.
Early life
Tucker was born Rivn (Rubin) Ticke ...
as Josef Lajos
*
Alice Joyce
Alice Joyce Brown ( Joyce; October 1, 1890 – October 9, 1955) was an American actress who appeared in more than 200 films during the 1910s and 1920s. She is known for her roles in the 1923 film '' The Green Goddess'' and its 1930 remake of ...
as Maria Lajos
*
Loretta Young
Loretta Young (born Gretchen Young; January 6, 1913 – August 12, 2000) was an American actress. Starting as a child, she had a long and varied career in film from 1917 to 1953. She won the Academy Award for Best Actress for her role in the fil ...
as Irma
*
Carroll Nye
Robert Carroll Nye (October 4, 1901 – March 17, 1974) was an American film actor. He appeared in more than 50 films between 1925 and 1944. His most memorable role was Frank Kennedy, Scarlett's second husband, in '' Gone with the Wind''.
...
as Paul Lajos
*
ZaSu Pitts
Zasu Pitts (; January 3, 1894 – June 7, 1963) was an American actress who starred in many silent dramas, including Erich von Stroheim's epic 1924 silent film ''Greed'', and comedies, transitioning successfully to mostly comedy films with the ...
as Lena
*
Harry Cording
Hector William "Harry" Cording (26 April 1891 – 1 September 1954) was an English-American actor. He is perhaps best remembered for his roles in the films '' The Black Cat'' (1934) and ''The Adventures of Robin Hood'' (1938).
Life and career ...
as Peter
*
George Hackathorne
George Hackathorne (February 13, 1896 – June 25, 1940) was an American actor of the silent era. He appeared in more than 50 films between 1916 and 1939.
Hackathorne was born and educated in Pendleton, Oregon. Despite his mother's wishes ...
as Niki
*
Marcia Harris
Marcia Harris (born Lena Hill, February 14, 1868 – June 18, 1947) was an American actress. She appeared in 48 films between 1915 and 1932.
She was born in Providence, Rhode Island, and as an amateur acted primarily in male lead roles wi ...
as Aunt Anna
*Knute Erickson as Uncle Dani
*
Myrna Loy
Myrna Loy (born Myrna Adele Williams; August 2, 1905 – December 14, 1993) was an American film, television and stage actress. Trained as a dancer, Loy devoted herself fully to an acting career following a few minor roles in silent films. ...
as Nubi
*
Nicholas Soussanin
Nicholas Soussanin (born 16 January 1889, Yalta, Taurida Governorate, Russian Empire (present-day Crimea, Ukraine) – 27 April 1975, New York City) was an actor from the Russian Empire who settled and worked in the United States. He was married ...
as El Moro
Production
The film was Korda's first
talkie
A sound film is a motion picture with synchronized sound, or sound technologically coupled to image, as opposed to a silent film. The first known public exhibition of projected sound films took place in Paris in 1900, but decades passed before ...
, although his two previous films ''
Night Watch'' and ''
Love and the Devil'' had featured
sound effects and
music
Music is generally defined as the art of arranging sound to create some combination of form, harmony, melody, rhythm or otherwise expressive content. Exact definitions of music vary considerably around the world, though it is an aspe ...
as part of the gradual transition from
silent to sound film. The film was shot at night at the
Burbank studios, as the only
sound stage
A sound stage (also written soundstage) is a soundproof, large structure, building, or room with large doors and high ceilings, used for the production of theatrical film-making and television productions, usually located on a secured movie or ...
there was used by
Warner Brothers
Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. (commonly known as Warner Bros. or abbreviated as WB) is an American film and entertainment studio headquartered at the Warner Bros. Studios complex in Burbank, California, and a subsidiary of Warner Bros. D ...
during the day.
Preservation status
The film survives intact with its
Vitaphone
Vitaphone was a sound film system used for feature films and nearly 1,000 short subjects made by Warner Bros. and its sister studio First National from 1926 to 1931. Vitaphone was the last major analog sound-on-disc system and the only one ...
soundtrack and exists in the
Library of Congress
The Library of Congress (LOC) is the research library that officially serves the United States Congress and is the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It is the oldest federal cultural institution in the country. The library ...
and 16mm print survive.
[''Catalog of Holdings The American Film Institute Collection and The United Artists Collection at The Library of Congress'' by The American Film Institute, c. 1978.] The film has been released to
DVDR on the
Warner Archive Collection
The Warner Archive Collection is a home video division for releasing classic and cult films from Warner Bros.' library. It started as a manufactured-on-demand (MOD) DVD series by Warner Bros. Home Entertainment on March 23, 2009, with the inte ...
label.
References
External links
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''The Squall'' at SilentEraAllmovie synopsis of ''The Squall'' with DVD picturePre-Code lobby poster for ''The Squall'' featuring Myrna Loy's character
Films directed by Alexander Korda
First National Pictures films
American films based on plays
Films set in Hungary
1929 drama films
American black-and-white films
1920s English-language films
1920s American films
{{1920s-drama-film-stub