Warner Bros. | 2008 | 94 Mins. | Unrated
These days with the major motion picture studios parts of much bigger business conglomerates, it’s easy to forget that it was individual men who initially built the film business into what it is today. Filmmaker Cass Warner Sperling is the granddaughter of Harry Warner, one of the four founding brothers of the Warner Brothers movie studio.
Harry and his brothers, Albert, Sam and Jack, began in the exhibition business, having acquired a movie projector with the sale of the family patriarch’s gold watch. They opened their first theater, the Cascade, in New Castle, Pennsylvania in 1903. By the end of World War I, the brothers began producing films, and in 1918 the brothers opened the Warner Bros. studio on Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood. “The brother’s credo upon founding the studio was ‘to educate, to entertain and enlighten,” Cass says.
Cass calls herself “the family investigator.” Nearly thirty years ago, she set out to learn more about her grandfather and his brothers. One of the results of that investigation is the fascinating documentary, The Brothers Warner. Written, directed, and narrated by Cass herself, this is a must see film for anyone interested in Hollywood history. Featuring interviews with members of the Warner family, Dennis Hopper, Debbie Reynolds, Norman Lear, George Segal and more, Ms. Warner stays true to the brothers founding credo.
Ms. Warner was spurred on by an event that took place the last time she saw her grandfather: As Harry Warner lay dying and unable to speak due to a debilitating stroke, ten-year-old Cass was brought to see him. Harry took Cass’s hand and held it tight. A powerful and silent exchange took place between the two, but Cass did not fully understand its significance at the time. Years later, Cass came to view that moment as her grandfather’s way of telling her never to break a promise.
Given the family’s history, all of this made perfect sense. In the early 1900’s, the brothers swore an oath to their father Benjamin; nothing would break the bonds of family. As the oldest brother, Harry was left with the heaviest burden: “Harry,” Benjamin would say, “you are the oldest of my sons and it is your responsibility to keep your brothers together. As long as you stand together, you will be strong.”
Years later, the brother’s promise to their father was broken, and their bond shattered after a once unthinkable betrayal. It left the Warner family fractured for decades, and the act of betrayal was rarely mentioned. I recently asked Ms. Warner how and if the family rift had affected the making of this documentary. She said, “What I learned from my family’s way of overcoming obstacles is the ability to turn a barrier or stop into an incentive to do the next thing. With the assistance of my magnificently able editor, Kate Amend, the film surpassed my original vision in the end.”
Through various mergers and corporate takeovers, Warner Brothers is now part of the largest entertainment conglomerate in the world. Only those immersed in film history likely remember that Warner Brothers was indeed started by four real brothers. With The Brothers Warner, Cass Warner Sperling has created an informative and involving documentary about the four men who helped to create the motion picture industry as we know it.
Presented in widescreen, the new interviews are color, while older film clips are shown in black and white. For a standard DVD, the picture is fairly clean, though there are some clips from the 1920’s and so forth, that show some obvious flaws.
The audio is presented in Dolby Digital 5.1, and in this dialogue heavy film voices come across clearly and concisely.
There are no special features.
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