TOL'ABLE DAVID (1921)
Special Features: 100th Anniversary. Silent with live musical accompaniment by Andrew Simpson
A critical and commercial sensation in its day, TOL'ABLE DAVID is a timeless David-and-Goliath tale set in late-19th-century rural Appalachia — specifically, the Allegheny Mountains of eastern West Virginia, and it was filmed on location just across the state border in Blue Grass, Virginia. Richard Barthelmess plays David Kinemon, a simple youth who enjoys the pleasures of country life and hopes to one day deliver the U.S. mail like his older brother Allen. Everything changes after the murderous, loutish Hatburns, led by the towering Luke (Ernest Torrence), move in next door and perpetrate a great injustice against the Kinemon family. Torn between avenging his family and preserving it, David must shoulder a great burden as he makes a terrifying passage to manhood. DIR/SCR/PROD Henry King; SCR Edmund Goulding, from the story by Joseph Hergesheimer. U.S., 1921, b&w, 99 min. Silent with English intertitles. NOT RATED
No AFI Member passes accepted.
About Andrew Simpson
Andrew Earle Simpson is an acclaimed composer of opera, silent film, orchestral, chamber, choral, dance, and vocal music based in Washington, DC. His musical works make multi-faceted, intimate connections with literature, visual art, and film, reflecting his own interest in linking music with the wider world, an approach which he calls "humanistic music." One of America’s foremost silent film musicians, he has performed across the United States, Europe, and South America. In addition to composing and performing, Simpson is a professor and head of the division of Theory and Composition at the Benjamin T. Rome School of Music of The Catholic University of America in Washington, DC. andrewesimpson.com
Run Time: 99 Minutes
Opening Date: Thursday, November 18, 2021
Genre: Silent drama