The Adventures of Mark Twain (1944)

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(1,518 ratings)

Dismissed by critics as corny and obvious in 1944, this overlong but sincere biopic looks pretty good when seen today, cliches notwithstanding. Fredric March, 47 at the time, convincingly plays American author Sam Clemens, aka Mark Twain, from his early 20s to his death at 75. In typical… More Dismissed by critics as corny and obvious in 1944, this overlong but sincere biopic looks pretty good when seen today, cliches notwithstanding. Fredric March, 47 at the time, convincingly plays American author Sam Clemens, aka Mark Twain, from his early 20s to his death at 75. In typical movie-biography fashion, every single incident that happens in Twain's life is an INSPIRATION: he hears the depth-indication call "Mark Twain" while working on a riverboat and his face lights up; he engages in a jumping-frog contest against Bret Harte (John Carradine) and comes up with his first popular published story; and so on. Alexis Smith is better than usual in the role of Twain's wife Olivia Langdon, even keeping a straight face while Twain courts her in Fluent Quotation ("Everybody talks about the weather but nobody ever does anything about it", he says during a Hollywood-romance cloudburst). Though the script barely touches upon the dark side of Twain's nature, we are not spared his financial reverses (brought about by bad investments and his struggle to publish Ulysses S. Grant's memoirs. The closing sequence, with Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn beckoning the spirit of Mark Twain to heaven as Halley's Comet fills the skies, may seem laughable on paper, but works quite well on film; even director Irving Rapper expressed amazement at the effectiveness of this scene! ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

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Rating, Runtime: Unrated, 2 hr. 10 min.
Directed By: Irving Rapper
Genres: Documentary, Drama

In Theaters: Jul 22, 1944 Wide
On DVD: Nov 10, 1993
Studio: Warner Bros

Critic Reviews

Emanuel Levy, EmanuelLevy.Com
Bearing strong physical resemblance to the character, Fredric March gives a solid performance in this overly long, episodic and simplified biopicture of the famed novelist.
Dennis Schwartz, Ozus' World Movie Reviews
Solid but conventional biopic.
Steve Crum, Dispatch-Tribune Newspapers
Loving, beautifully photographed tribute to Twain with stellar March performance.

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Cast

            Fredric March as Mark Twain

            Alexis Smith as Olivia Langdon

            Donald Crisp as J.B. Pond

            Alan Hale as Steve Gillis

            C. Aubrey Smith as Oxford Chancellor

            John Carradine as Bret Harte

            William Henry as Charles Langdon

            Robert H. Barrat as Horace E. Bixby

            Walter Hampden as Jervis Langdon

            Joyce Reynolds as Clara Clemens

            Whitford Kane as Joe Goodwin

            Percy Kilbride as Billings

            Nana Bryant as Mrs. Langdon

            Dick Jones as Sam Clemens at fifteen

            Kay Johnson as Jane Clemens

            Jackie Brown as Sam Clemens at twelve

            Michael Miller as Tom Sawyer

            Joseph Crehan as Promoter

            Cliff Saum as Prospector

            Harry Tyler as Assistant Editor

            Roland Drew as Editor

            Douglas Wood as William Dean Howells

            Willie Best as George

            Burr Caruth as Oliver Wendell Holmes

            Brandon Hurst as Ralph Waldo Emerson

            Davison Clark as Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

            Monte Blue as Captain

            Paul Newlan as Boss Deckhand

            Ernest Whitman as Stoker

            Emmett E. Smith as Repeater

            Pat O'Malley as Captain's Mate

            Chester Conklin as Judge

            George Lessey as Henry H. Rogers

            Dorothy Vaughan as Kate Leary

            Lynne Baggett as Susie

            Carol Coombs as Clara as a Child

            Joyce Tucker as Jean

            Paul Scardon as Rudyard Kipling

            Diana Barrymore
            
            Thurston Hall
            
            Harry Hilliard as John Greenleaf Whittier

            Robert E. Homans
            
            Bobby Larson
            
            Frank Mayo
            
            Lee Powell
            
            Frank Reicher
            
            Frederic March
            
See full cast

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