Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/St. Elmo (1914 film)/archive1

The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was promoted by Ian Rose via FACBot (talk) 15:06, 30 April 2015 [1].

St. Elmo (1914 film)

Nominator(s): Squeamish Ossifrage (talk) 22:30, 2 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]

This article is about a lost silent film that may or may not have been the directorial debut of the influential (if now largely ignored) J. Gordon Edwards. At GAC, I opined that I probably wouldn't even bother bringing this to FAC, but have reconsidered that stance. The primary concern left unresolved from the GA process is the deeply anemic plot summary; unlike most modern films, plot summaries for lost films require citations just like everything else (as the film can no longer source itself). Here, I've taken what I could from four different discussions of the plot ... and can still only offer 114 words for what would have been in the ballpark of a two-hour movie. Unfortunately, further plot details (I know there was a "small child" involved at some point, but nothing further there) seem as lost as the film itself. I leave it to the opinions of other editors whether that should be considered a comprehensiveness concern.

As means of disclosure, I am a WikiCup participant and this would be an eligible FA, if promoted. Additionally, I will note upfront that this would be one of the 10 shortest FA articles. I promise my next trip to FAC will be a more robust piece, regardless. Squeamish Ossifrage (talk) 22:30, 2 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Support ~~and comments~~ I'm happy to support as is, just a couple of suggestions Jimfbleak - talk to me? 16:39, 4 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]

I can see some point to red-linking the two companies once, but not a second time—they won't have changed their status during the course of the article
Any idea how this film (or Balboa's films in general) were lost?

It has been my understanding that key topics can (and should) be linked from both the lead and the body. In this case, that makes them stand out a bit, because they're currently redlinks, although I don't intend them to be that way for too long (Box Office will go blue via redirect once I fix the mess that is the current structure for Fox pages; Balboa ... I should probably get a stub together for until I have time to do a full write-up). As for how this film was lost, the problem here really is sourcing. The Jura and Bardin history of Balboa is the definitive work, and even they hedge and provide a non-answer to why Balboa's films have such a dismal survival rate. For this one in particular, since Fox (as Box Office) bought the rights to distribution of the film, and continued to distribute it after Fox Films' incorporation, it's almost certain that it was destroyed alongside the actual Fox films in the 1937 vault fire. But Fox has never publicly admitted just what burned (there were legal issues), and no reliable source (well, no any source, actually) that I can find outright makes that observation. So including it would be original research, even though it's probably correct. I can add some generic text about the fate of silent films in general, if that's desirable. Squeamish Ossifrage (talk) 17:58, 4 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]

I'm happy with those answers. I thought it was possible that the fate of the film was unknown/unverifiable, just checking that there was nothing omitted. Good luck Jimfbleak - talk to me? 07:13, 5 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Images are appropriately licensed and captioned. Nikkimaria (talk) 21:41, 7 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Support. A couple of minor points that don't affect my support:

~~Perhaps mention the name of the unrelated Evans novel in the lead?~~

I should have done so in the first place. Corrected. Squeamish Ossifrage (talk) 15:14, 25 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]

I found a newspaper advertisement of the era crediting "Dad Leonard" rather than "Pop Leonard"; not sure if that's of interest.

Ah, the inconsistencies of 1910s film credits! "Pop" is far more common than "Dad", and I'm inclined to think that too much of this would be out of place in the article for this particular film (he is only the eighth-billed actor, after all). But it's something I'll keep in mind if I ever get around to improving the Gus Leonard article, for certain. Squeamish Ossifrage (talk) 15:14, 25 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, I figured it was probably too trivial for this article; just thought I'd mention it. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 02:07, 26 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]

~~"Balboa was not a film distributor, so in May 1914 contracted with William Fox's Box Office Attractions Company": missing "they" after "1914"?~~

I'm not sure the previous construction is wrong, but done regardless. Squeamish Ossifrage (talk) 15:14, 25 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks -- I could be wrong but I think it will read more naturally to most people that way. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 02:07, 26 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]

"The Fox Film Corporation, Box Office's corporate successor, continued to distribute St. Elmo": it took me a second to realize that you used "continued" because Fox continued to distribute the film after they succeeded Box Office. This might read more naturally as "The Fox Film Corporation continued to distribute St. Elmo after they took over/succeeded Box Office in 19xx".

Rewrote this. Thoughts on the new construction? I'm open to fiddling around with this more. Squeamish Ossifrage (talk) 15:14, 25 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]
That's definitely an improvement. I think the half after the semicolon is fine; the first half might perhaps be improved if you have the sources to be more specific about the nature of the transition: did Fox purchase Box Office? Merge with it? Take it over after bankruptcy? But it works perfectly well as it is. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 02:07, 26 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]

That's an ... interesting question. Ask four sources, get five answers. Koszarski claims that William Fox "reorganized" Box Office into Fox Film. On the other hand, Langman says that Fox was incorporated separately and then "absorbed" its predecessor. Solomon discusses Fox Film's incorporation process in considerable detail, but glosses over how Box Office's fate was handled. Other others provide a variety of vague descriptions of the process, not all of which mean interchangeable things: that Box Office was "replaced" by, "renamed", or "became" Fox. In any case, both were privately held companies owned by the same guy, so the precise details were probably mostly of concern to the corporate lawyers. There certainly wasn't a bankruptcy or an explicit merger of the type that later created 20th Century Fox. I can categorically state that Fox Film was not created through the merger of Box Office and the Greater New York Film Rental Company, despite that being the explanation in many less-reliable sources; that misreading of the timeline apparently first appeared in Wikipedia all the way back in 2001 (although I've recently removed it from the relevant articles). I am ... open to suggestions about a preferred wording here. Squeamish Ossifrage (talk) 17:39, 26 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]
That's quite some variation in the sources. In this article I don't think the reader needs the details if they're going to be complicated, so perhaps your current wording is fine. Alternatively, how about "Box Office Attractions ceased to exist in 1915; Fox Films, also owned by William Fox, inherited Box Office's assets, and continued to..."? Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 01:19, 27 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Well, I went through my sources to see if there was any clearer chronology. No such luck. I've taken another stab at cleaning up this section of text. Hopefully it reads better now? Squeamish Ossifrage (talk) 17:45, 2 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]

~~"was the much earlier": presumably this should be "was much the earlier".~~

The suggested change reads as unnatural to me. Perhaps this is an ENGVAR issue? Regardless, I solved the problem by excising "much" entirely; it wasn't needed. Squeamish Ossifrage (talk) 15:14, 25 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]
OK -- my ENGVAR is mostly BrEng, but I've lived in the U.S. for decades, so I can't be sure which side of the Atlantic my ear for a phrase is on at any given time. But not an issue since cutting it works. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 02:07, 26 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]

~~You don't give the date of the original novel, which wouldn't hurt, and would actually be helpful to the reader when you say it was much later than Beulah.~~

Was given in the lead (1866) but not in the body, which was an error. Added the date of the St. Elmo novel to the discussion of the film's production. Squeamish Ossifrage (talk) 15:14, 25 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Oops -- it was indeed in the lead; sorry. Adding it to the production section is helpful too, though. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 02:07, 26 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]

-- Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 01:29, 25 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Comments.

"Nevertheless, the 1915 Beulah film was "considered a sequel" to St. Elmo.": See WP:INTEXT.

Reworded this to avoid the direct quotation, which wasn't necessary anyway, and added a contemporary source (that I was already using elsewhere, actually) alongside Jura and Bardin. Hope that helps, and thanks for taking a look! Squeamish Ossifrage (talk) 13:48, 16 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]
- Sure, my pleasure. - Dank (push to talk) 14:47, 16 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Support on prose per standard disclaimer. No edits from me. - Dank (push to talk) 16:08, 15 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Comments by ChrisGualtieri

Sorry, but there are few issues to deal with.

First being the fact that AFI did cite Edwards, but they have sense switched back to Bracken as of this writing.Archived version Current version Secondly, The Complete Index to Literary Sources in Film has been wrong a lot of the time for me. It is actually a compilation of other sources and one of the enduring errors traces back to "Theodore Marston" of whom has been wrongly attributed from Jane Eyre (1910 film) to Rip Van Winkle (1910 film) to The Vicar of Wakefield (1910 film). In this case, American Film-Index 1908-1915 was the source and it was addressed in the 1995 work by Bowers however Gobel's 1999 book (the one and the same) still have the errors. While I like the book... I am just not confident in it based on past experience... but the confusion needs to be cited and included. Though "Who's who in the film world" credits Bracken as well.[2]
Additional details from some clippings I got for you. Number of scenes and brief review. Another ad using the 194 scenes. This is certainly from a "canned" advertisement type given its prominence and specific wording... just dig around a bit if you don't believe me. A new film still and account of the film being expensive to show. Another film still with St. Elmo drinking with the Devil. I personally found another still here and there, but the scans were of lower quality and I figure one or two more would be of good use. The low resolution image in the infobox cannot even have the captions be read.
The plot is too light... I could not find any official furnished synopsis in the major sources, but I found what seems to be a tailored review in a newspaper and clipped it for you.See here. This should help you expand the plot aspect or even cite the text for the lost film.
No interest in covering the release schedule or the persistence of the film? This would mostly be clippings and I know this is probably not as interesting or relevant to readers, but I see it advertised into 1916.

Also, I'll get my butt in gear and do the Vitagraph production and start on the company... just to resolve the red link issue. I wanted to hold off on Vitagraph for awhile...but I finished all of Thanhouser's 1910 releases so I can slack off for a bit. ChrisGualtieri (talk) 05:18, 17 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Let me get some of this material integrated. I'd seen the scene count before, and had wrestled with whether to include it. It's not a metric that gets cited by period reviews for very many films, at least in the major periodicals, and I suspected it was more advertising copy than relevant information. On the other hand, I had not scene that film still of St. Elmo drinking with the Devil, which is amazing. And I hadn't noticed that, while I've been developing this article, AFI totally revamped their entry for the film, including swapping their directorial credit. Let me get the plot summary revamped with the new AFI material and that Trenton Evening Times article, take another stab at the director credit issue, and see where we're at with regard to the other topics. And, perhaps most importantly, thanks! Squeamish Ossifrage (talk) 13:55, 17 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Happy to help out. Here is the low-res film poster.[3] ChrisGualtieri (talk) 14:14, 17 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]

I've made several changes in light of the additional sources and the major revision to the AFI listing:

I've completely reworked the plot summary based on the AFI's new content and the Trenton Evening Times (alongside the best of the sources I'd relied on previously). Naturally, no two of these agree on all the details, but I hope this is a more representative overview of the plot.
In light of AFI swapping directorial credit to Bracken, I've rewritten both the lead and the production section to give more weight to the idea that Bracken directed.
I've also added a little bit of Balboa's marketing copy. Modern film articles often include coverage of marketing campaigns, and this is probably the equivalent. Plus, since we've got the poster, we've got a reason to use Balboa's "194 glorious scenes". I went ahead and pointed out that the film was still running in 1916, too. That's not actually all that unusual for (successful) films in the state rights era, but it's certainly a contrast to what readers will know of modern film distribution. I opted to cite the Honolulu paper (from January) which actually had prose dedicated to the showing, rather than the latest pure advertisement I could find (from a much smaller market, several months later). There's no way we can declare when the last runs would have been, so I don't feel any real obligation to use a poorer-quality source just to eke out a later pub date.
Finally, I've reselected images, grabbing that great one of St. Elmo and the Devil from the San Bernadino County Sun and the film poster (which wasn't originally available when I started putting this together... that's what I get for not checking back, eh?). Sadly, I think the still in The Atlantic Constitution is too grainy and dark to be useful, which is unfortunate, since it's the film poster's scene. On the bright side, at least we've got all the content banned by those wacky Chicago censors!

How are things looking now? Squeamish Ossifrage (talk) 19:24, 17 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Much better, here's another review for you. ChrisGualtieri (talk) 14:45, 18 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]

That one's already in there (reference #2). I did fix an error with the author's name that had crept into the prose, I suspect from some overly ambitious spell-checking early on. Squeamish Ossifrage (talk) 15:06, 18 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Coord note -- @ChrisGualtieri and Squeamish Ossifrage: Been a while since the last exchange here, where are we at now? Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 02:01, 7 April 2015 (UTC)[reply]

My issues were all resolved. ChrisGualtieri (talk) 17:06, 7 April 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Okay, tks Chris. Squeamish, I think we still need a source review for formatting/reliability so will post a request at WT:FAC. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 05:20, 12 April 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Crisco comments
1866 eponymous novel. - worth redlinking "eponymous novel" to St. Elmo (novel) or Saint Elmo (novel) (whatever the correct title is). If it's been adapted to film five times, it almost certainly passes Wikipedia:Notability (books). Add that to the commercial success, and...
It is not entirely clear who directed the film - What does "entirely" add here? Also, would "It is disputed" work better?
publically - I believe "publicly" is the more standard spelling
Others consider the film the directorial debut of J. Gordon Edwards. - Do they cite any evidence for this?

Otherwise nothing from me on prose. I did rework a sentence; please check my edits. — Crisco 1492 (talk) 06:59, 25 April 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Source review

I can't see a single thing which needs to be fixed. — Crisco 1492 (talk) 06:59, 25 April 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Closing note: This candidate has been promoted, but there may be a delay in bot processing of the close. Please see WP:FAC/ar, and leave the {{featured article candidates}} template in place on the talk page until the bot goes through. Ian Rose (talk) 15:06, 30 April 2015 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.