| Harry Revier | |
|---|---|
| Born | March 16, 1890 Philadelphia, United States |
| Died | August 13, 1957 (aged 67) Florida, United States |
| Occupation | Film director |
| Years active | 1914 – 1957 |
Harry Jack Revier (16 March 1890 – 13 August 1957) was an independent American director, producer and first generation exploitation film maker best known for his sound films; The Lost City (1935), Lash of the Penitentes (1936) and Child Bride (1938).
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Born in Philadelphia in 1890, some sources state that Revier gained early experience as a cinematographer in Europe, but as his name is absent from passenger lists from that time. Revier’s earliest known screen credit is as director for the Victor Film Company’s The Imp Abroad (1914), starring James Cruze. Although Revier worked in the film industry for about 40 years, he had only occasional contact with major studios. Most of Revier's output consisted of States Rights distributed, one shot features or serials, often for companies organized only to make one film. A notable exception is the two Tarzan films that Revier co-directed for Edgar Rice Burroughs; one of these, The Son of Tarzan (1920) was a considerable hit. Shortly after, he discovered actress Dorothy Revier, whom he married and launched in her film debut, The Broadway Madonna(1922). Though Dorothy Revier did go on to some popularity in the 1920s, it was without her husband as they divorced in 1926. With the dawn of sound, Harry Revier travelled to England to make a quota quickie and worked on a couple of routine westerns. Revier scored notoriety with the poverty row serial The Lost City (1935) featuring William “Stage” Boyd, an actor known for his alcoholism who died shortly after the film’s completion; The Lost City is sometimes called “the worst serial ever made.” With Lash of the Penitentes (1936),Revier discovered some ethnographic footage of flagellant monks shot in Mexico and built a racy feature around it, with star Marie DeForrest presented in a nude crucifixion scene. Child Bride followed, the first film produced by notorious exploitation mogul Kroger Babb who marketed it as an educational film; its signature scene was a lengthy skinny dipping sequence featuring pre-pubescent starlet Shirley Mills. Afterwards, Revier disappears from the rolls of feature production, but reappears for a final time in 1953 with Planet Outlaws (1953). Through the use of creative editingRevier converted the 1939 serial Buck Rogers into an Atomic Age, Cold War context. Revier died in Winter Park, Florida at age 67.
Harry Revier did the bulk of his film work in the silent era, and most of that output is lost. Confirmed extant is the serial The Son of Tarzan (1920) and the melodrama What Price Love? (1927) starring Jane Novak. Among the missing is the predecessor to The Son of Tarzan, The Revenge of Tarzan (1920), The Challenge of Chance (1919) starring prizefighter Jess Willard and at least one of his talkies, Convict's Code (1930). Some of the sound films are to some extent compromised as well; censors savaged Lash of the Penitentes and in its longest known version, held at the Library of Congress, only 42 minutes remain of its original 65 minute running time. Moreover, one of the feature length condensations of The Lost City -- there were at least four—has been lost as well. Although Revier's remaining output is slim, his films are quite unlike other films of the time; lacking technical polish, Revier's work is wholly without regard for the production code and prefigures the far better known work of Edward D. Wood in its scripting and handling of actors, though it shares little of Wood's artistic ambition.