• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to footer
San Francisco Silent Film Festival

San Francisco Silent Film Festival

The San Francisco Silent Film Festival is a nonprofit organization dedicated to educating the public about silent film as an art form and as a culturally valuable historical record.

MENUMENU
  • Events
    • Events

      May 6 Pandora’s Box at the Paramount

      July 12 – 16 San Francisco Silent Film Festival

    • Live Music

      Musicians
      Learn about our incredible musical partners

  • Support
    • SUPPORT SFSFF
    • Become a Member
    • Donate
    • SFSFF Preservation Fund
    • Grantors and Sponsors
    • Volunteer
  • Preservation
    • SFSFF Preservation

      SFSFF Preservation restores and preserves silent era films

      • The SFSFF Collection
      • Support Preservation
      • Film Loans
  • Library
    • Library

      • Browse the Library
        Read program articles from past SFSFF events
      • Our Musicians
        Learn about SFSFF’s incredible musicians
      • Screening Room
        Watch videos from SFSFF Preservation and past live events
      • Event Archive
        Explore past SFSFF events
Sign In Become a Member
Sign In
  • Essay
  • Festival 1996

Gretchen the Greenhorn

Essay by Melissa Chittick and Stephen Salmons

Also presented in this program: Original coming attraction trailers from the lost films The Patriot (1928), directed by Ernst Lubitsch and starring Emil Jannings, which won the 1929 Academy Award for Best Screenplay; Beau Sabreur (1928), which starred Gary Cooper, a sequel to the 1927 version of Beau Geste; Just Another Blonde (1926), a Louise Brooks film; the recently discovered last reel of The Village Blacksmith (1922), an early feature directed by John Ford; and a Pathé Frères short from 1904, The Wrong Door, directed by Ferdinand Zecca.

A beautifully photographed melodrama from 1916, Gretchen the Greenhorn is the charming story of Gretchen, a Dutch girl as “fresh as the tulips of her native fields,” who immigrates to America to live with her father. The film chronicles their struggles with poverty in the overpopulated tenements of New York and their exciting adventures with a gang of ruthless counterfeiters. “Magnificently depicted from all picture standpoints,” Gretchen the Greenhorn is “a corking popular priced feature.” (Variety, August 15, 1916)

Gretchen is played by Dorothy Gish, whose career has often been overshadowed by that of her more famous sister Lillian. A talented actress in her own right, Dorothy’s popularity was so great that in 1918 Paramount offered her an exclusive million dollar contract. Remarking “a million dollars—at my age, why, it would have ruined me,” she rejected the offer and went on to appear in a number of highly successful light comedies known as the Dorothy Gish Artcraft Series. Today, Dorothy is best remembered for her work in the classic D.W. Griffith films Hearts of the World (1918) and Orphans of the Storm (1922).

Melissa Chittick and Stephen Salmons are the founders of the San Francisco Silent Film Festival.

Presented at SFSFF 1996 with live music by Michael Mortilla

Details

DirectorChester M. Franklin and Sidney A. Franklin
CountryUnited States
Year1926
CastDorothy Gish, Ralph Lewis, Eugene Pallette, Frank Bennett, Kate Bruce, George Stone, Violet Radcliffe, Carmen De Rue, Beulah Burns, Francis Carpenter, Tom Spencer
Production CompanyFine Arts Film Company 1916, released by the Triangle Film Corporation
Print SourceUCLA Film and Television Archive

Footer

How can we help?

info@silentfilm.org 415-777-4908
MENUMENU
  • WRAPPER
        • True Art Transcends Time

        • ABOUT

        • About Us
        • Press
        • Resources
        • SOCIAL

        • Facebook
        • Twitter
        • Instagram
        • Subscribe

        • Photos by Pamela Gentile and Tommy Lau.
          Copyright © 2019 San Francisco Silent Film Festival Privacy Terms