Mary Pickford was one of the leading ladies during the silent era and one of the most powerful, influential females in Hollywood. Not only did she star in dozens of silent movies, but she often produced them as well. Sparrows, a 1926 silent film that she both starred in and produced, is the story about a young woman who rescues a baby from kidnappers. Legendary director William Beaudine directed the movie, which was one of several hundred films he directed in forty years.

In Sparrows, Molly (Mary Pickford, Daddy-Long-Legs, Sleep My Love) who is looking after and taking care of around ten kids that are orphans in the swamp. She is avoiding a nearby farm that is run by Grimes (Gustav von Seyffertitz, The Bat Whispers, Mr. Deeds Comes to Town) who would either sell the children of dump them into quicksand in the swamp!  Meanwhile a baby girl has been kidnapped by Joe Bailey (Lloyd Whitlock, Blonde Venus, The Whispering Shadow) and his associate and are hiding out in the swamp until the baby’s father, Dennis Wayne (Roy Stewart, Fargo Express, The Lady from Hell) brings the ransom money. Molly saves this poor child and she along with the other kids get chased around the swamp where not only are Bailey and Grimes after her but there are some hungry gators roaming around, too!

Sparrows is a fantastic silent film with Mary Pickford stealing the show as Molly. The acting by the cast, both by the adults and the children is excellent. The cinematography for this movie really stands out, with a wealth of beautiful shots. Hal Mohr, Charles Rosher, and Karl Struss were the men responsible for the lush cinematography.

VCI Entertainment has released William Beaudine’s Sparrows onto Blu-ray. As they mentioned in their video description both after the film plays and, on their website, “Sparrows was reconstructed by the Library of Congress from the best quality film elements, a 35MM nitrate print and a 35MM safety dupe negative. Additional lab work was performed by Colorlab. The Mary Pickford Foundation scanned the preservation elements in 4K, and worked closely Roundabout Entertainment, Inc. to complete all digital work, addressing imperfections to ensure that Sparrows is presented in its best possible form for a modern audience”.

As one would expect with this restoration, Sparrows absolutely looks fantastic and is quite remarkable just how good an obscure film from 1926 can looks when extra time and care is put into the restoration process of a Blu-ray release. Outside of some speckles and one blip there hardly any print damages. Vertical lines are minimal. The grayscale looks perfectly balanced with dark blacks and rich whites that make this release look so good. Even the scenes where colors were used such as dark blues look exceptionally clean. There is a lot of details and strong textures to the scenery and the characters’ faces during close-ups.

For their Blu-ray, VCI Entertain offers two audio tracks, English Dolby Digital 2.0 and English Dolby Digital 5.1, background noises and the music scores by Cameron and Taylor Graves for both tracks are clear without any hissing, crackling or other age-old anomalies detected. The 2.0 track to me sounded a bit more potent and robust, but both are perfectly fine for a positive listening experience.   

Extras for this release include a 16-page booklet featuring rare photographs and essays by the Mary Pickford Foundation. There is also a rare outtake from Sparrows entitled “Angel” and original theatrical trailers for Sparrows, Fanchon the Cricket, and Little Annie Rooney.

A DVD is also included in the package for people that still are only collecting DVDs.

Sparrows is a divine film that gets as good as a release that it will probably get for the foreseeable future. The 4K scan and restoration has done wonders for the film. The audio options are also excellent. It might be a little short for collectors who are extras junkies but for those who prefer a good viewing and listening experience for this movie, it doesn’t get any better. Highly recommended!

Sparrows

Director- William Beaudine  

Cast- Mary Pickford, Gustav von Seyffertitz

Country of Origin- USA

Distributor – VCI Entertainment

Number of Discs – 2 (one Blu-ray and one DVD)

Reviewed by – David Steigman

Date –9/26/2022