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Recommended For Futher Reading  Unvanquished
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The Scarlet Coat
The Scarlet Coat often shown as Redcoat
Color
Directed by
John Sturges
Writing credits
Karl Tunberg
Cornel Wilde .... Major John Boulton
Michael Wilding .... Major John Andre
George Sanders .... Dr. Jonathan Odell
Anne Francis (I) .... Sally Cameron
Robert Douglas .... Benedict Arnold
John McIntire (I) .... General Robert Howe
Rhys Williams (I) .... Peter
John Dehner .... Nathanael Greene
Bobby Driscoll .... Ben Potter
James Westerfield .... Colonel Jameson
Ashley Cowan .... Mr. Durkin
Paul Cavanagh .... Sir Henry Clinton
John Alderson (I) .... Mr. Durkin
John O'Malley (I) .... Colonel Winfield
Anthony Dearden (II) .... Captain De Lancey
Jim Hayward .... Joshua Smith
The Search for Gustuvus
American intelligence is aware that the British have a high level informant codenamed Gustuvus within the upper echelon of the American Army. Known only to Washington, Major John Bolton (Cornell Wilde) is sent to British occupied New York as a counterfeit traitor. Although initially received with suspicion, Bolton gains the confidence of the chief of British intelligence, the dashing Major John Andre (Michael Wilding).
When Andre is captured by American partisans in the backwoods of Westchester County the neutral zone between the Americans entrenched in the Hudson River Valley and the British clinging to New York City, "Gustuvus" is unmasked as the heroic General Benedict Arnold and Bolton must flee for American lines where Bolton argues to Andre's court-martial for Andre's life.
The impassioned plea is not heard. Washington's mind is closed. The traitor Arnold must be returned or Andre must die. Andre's own plea to be shot like a soldier is rejected without comment.
Wilding plays the part of the impeccable gentleman, dilettante soldier Andre with dignity and grace owing to the uniquely British hero. The gallows scene carefully follows the accounts handed down of Andre's nobility.
According to the ballad:
Anne Francis is cast as Sally Cameron, a typically American character, the rambunctious Rebel daughter of a Tory family ready for any opportunity to fight the battle of wits with the British. This was one of Anne Francis' serious roles and was rather well played.
The writers knew the subject matter well and the filming took advantage of the scenic highlands where the original drama was played. Neither American nor British characters are idolized or demonised. I would say that the most enthusiastic Whig and the most hidebound Tory could enjoy the movie together. Yet the movie like most revolutionary war movies did not fare well at the box office. It is occasionally shown on TV under the title Redcoat.
The British are clinging to New York City; the rebels are entrenched in the Hudson River Valley beyond. Both sides are locked in a stalement. An important defection may alter the balance.
He looked both meek and mild,
His face was fair and handsome,
And pleasantly he smiled.
It moved each eye with pity,
And every heart there bled,
And everyone wished him released
And Arnold in his stead.
A Leather Stocking Tale Retrod
The Scarlet Coat is loosely based on James Fennimore Cooper's The Spy of the Neutral Ground (1821). Both lean heavily on the setting in the panoramic Hudson River valley. Scarlet Coat moved the main theatre of espionage from Westchester to New York City and placed the Andre affair at the fulcrum of the drama, but preserved Cooper's touch of multiple ironies, clinical objectivity and probing psychological insight. Like Cooper's spy Harvey Birch, Scarlet Coat's spy Major John Bolton operates in a moral vacuum, although they both are irrevocably committed to the cause. Birch and Bolton discover that a certain moral ambivalence beyond polite semblances extends all the way up to the leader of `The Cause.' Cooper's spy redeems himself by serving as a declared soldier in the next war. Scarlet Coat's spy has no redemption. Major Bolton returns to American ranks to attempt to save Andre, the chief of enemy intelligence whom Bolton sent out to destroy.
Scarlet Coat like The Spy grabs the undercover agent by the heart. The agent too plays a game and is by no means as pure as he will claim. Where does the game end and reality begin? Major Bolton comes to Andre's defense at court-martial as any friend would but of course Bolton is a true blue patriot no friend to the occupying British.
The Scarlet Coat and The Spy Compared
First in War, First in Peace, Last at the Box office
Where the patriots eventually caused too many disasters for Britain and eventually persuaded King George to let them go, literature has been kinder to the Patriots than the box office. The Scarlet Coat (Redcoat) followed in a tradition of box office disasters. Where American literature even before Cooper produced notable pieces of fact and fiction about the conception of the nation, the theatre until the time of the Patriot (2000) produced few successes in turning the icons into flesh and blood and retrieving them from shadowy myths.
Robert Goldstein, the father of all American Revolution films, came to a sorry end in the holocaust, but not before he was jailed exiled and then ignored by the country whose heritage he sought to preserve.
In 1917 filmmaker Robert Goldstein released the silent epic, The Spirit of '76. Inspired by D.W. Griffith?s The Birth of a Nation (1915), "history written with lightning," Goldstein decided to commemorate the true birth of the nation, the Revolution on film. Spirit seems to follow the rather weak story line of Cooper's Lionel Lincoln.
In Goldstein's script, George II's mistress Catherine Montour wanted to be declared "Queen of America." Various historical tableaux depicted Paul Revere's Ride, the signing of the Declaration of Independence, Valley Forge, and, most conspicuously as far as later events were concerned, the British atrocities committed against the American settlers during the 1778 Cherry Valley Massacre. These atrocity scenes showed Redcoats bayoneting a Yankee baby and raping a Yankee maiden. A Hessian mercenary stabbed a saintly Quaker.
The Spirit of '76 premiered in Chicago in May 1917, just one month after the United States entered Britain's war against Germany. Chicago's police confiscated the film at the instance of Woodrow Wilson acting at the request of Britain, America's newly found ally.
Goldstein after trimming offending scenes resumed showing in Chicago. At the LA premiere, like a true American who ignores arbitrary restrictions, Goldstein restored British atrocities to the script.
Charged with Espionage in having incited to mutiny US troops, Goldstein was admant in his plea of NOT GUILTY. Convicted and sentenced to 10 years at hard labor, Goldstein faced a stern lecture from the judge about the many rights and freedoms America offered, before Goldstein was whisked away to begin the term of imprisonment.
Upon release, Goldstein went into voluntary exile in Europe to re-establish himself as a filmmaker. In 1935 Goldstein found himself stranded in Germany unable to raise nine dollars to renew his American passport. Fined 75 marks by a German court, Goldstein was swept up in the Holocaust.
The Spirit may have been pirated by DW Griffith's America (1924) which followed the same rather weak story line. Fragments of the original Goldstein film may still exist.
see
THE TRAGIC ODYSSEY OF ROBERT GOLDSTEIN
The American Rebels Defeated at the Box Office
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