William S. Hart bought a realism and sympathy to a genre that in 1915 was considered old fashioned and reviewers couldn't praise his films enough. Trained as a stage actor (he created the role of Messala in "Ben Hur" (1899)), he had always had a yearning for the Old West and jumped at the chance to play the villain in "The Squaw Man" (1907). While playing on the stage in "The Trail of the Lonesome Pine" he went to see a western movie but thought it was awful, however the cinema manager felt it was one of the best he had ever shown. He found in Thomas H. Ince a kindred friend who together would make their sort of westerns.Snobbish Jack Sturgess (George Fisher) gets into a scrape with a young shop girl and when his father gives him an ultimatum - to marry the girl or else, he takes the "or else" and flees to the Yukon. More a melodrama in a western setting, Hart is introduced as "Yukon Ed", a straight shooting prospector but the film has already been going 25 minutes - the establishing city scenes were too long and leisurely. You could say that George Fisher is really the film's star but he has no likable character traits though, just some effete and feeble gestures. From the first scene he is seen smoking and reading "Smart Set" probably to differentiate him from Hart who is seen as a real man's man. But unfortunately it is an action of Hart's being "just one of the boys" that drives "the cad" straight into the arms of Ruby (Enid Markey), Ed's beloved and proprietor of a dry goods store. She has indicated to Ed that, whatever his feelings, she is waiting for her knight in shining armour to come along but along comes "the cad" and his uppity ways (he refuses to drink with Ed at the bar) result in the new dude getting a rough working over by some cowboys. It is all seen by Ruby who takes the weakling under her wing and is soon his willing slave, long after he has started tire of her.Really a western with no action, apparently also known as "Hell Hound of Alaska" - how disappointed would movie goers have been with that misleading title. Louise Glaum, usually so welcome in Hart films, playing vampy dance hall girls with names like "Firefly" and "Bubbles", here has the smallest role. She is Fanny, the sophisticated city girl that Jack happily gives up the poor little department store girl for. Jack is soon married to Ruby but he spends most of his time in the local brothel. One rainy night Ruby finds him passed out in the shrub but her nursing ends up with her bedridden with pneumonia and Jack eager to make a break to return to the city "....ALONE"!! The "cad" finds the opportunity when he is ordered to ride for the doctor - or Ruby will be on "the darkening trail"!! He makes a detour and as the hours go by it is Ed who frantically rides for the doctor and also sees that Ruby's dying wish is fulfilled - that Jack will go with her on "the darkening trail"!!George Fisher had a big career but unfortunately didn't last past the silents. His biggest hit was the Australian blockbuster for 1927 "For the Term of His Natural Life". Nona Thomas who was pretty in the part of the innocent shop girl only made a handful of films - all finished by 1919.

By 1915, Thomas Ince=s pictures were increasingly varied in content, as I outline in my Ince biography. After the 101's departure, Ince's generic preference veered decisively from westerns toward melodrama or "the woman's film." Even William S. Hart's third feature as star (and his first as director), The Darkening Trail (reissued as The Hell-Hound Of Alaska), written by C. Gardner Sullivan, actually belonged much more to this genre than its ostensible Yukon climax. Although credited as the sole star, Hart does not even appear until over one-third of this four reel "Mutual Masterpicture" is over. Ruth, a lonely department store clerk, returns home to find a note indicating her abandonment by the man introduced in intertitles as "the cad," Jack (George Fisher). The letter is eloquent in its lack of concern.Dear Ruth, I'm sorry but I can't do a thing for you. I guess you will come through all right, at that. You, of course, understand that I am not to be bothered further. Goodbye, JackWhen Jack's father learns of his behavior, his ultimatum is to marry Ruth or be disinherited.Jack is next seen landing in Hope City, Alaska (the year is later revealed to be 1897, although the urban setting of the first third of The Darkening Trail appeared to be contemporary). When Yukon Ed (Hart) and his friends haze the tenderfoot, their actions win him sympathy from Ruby McGraw (Enid Markey). Ed is dismayed to realize that he has created a rival, as Ruby becomes Jack's willing servant. Ed's friends come with a parson to the rooms Ruby and Jack are sharing, certain that Jack wishes to marry her, and that their presence will compel him to do so. Ruby realizes her error when Jack begins to return to the saloon, there to get drunk with one of the bar girls. When he staggers out into a storm, Ruby feels she must rescue him. The exposure gives her pneumonia, and Jack realizes selfishly that if he doesn't go for the doctor, she will die and he can return home, a single man. When Ed sees Jack drinking once more, he is suspicious, but cannot bring the doctor in time to save Ruby. The next spring, Ed is broken-hearted, while outside there are headstones for both Jack and Ruby.In the pattern of melodrama, Jack successively takes advantage of two women, his wiles winning their love and destroying their lives. Ruby's affection for Jack is unintentionally initiated by Ed, while his own sincere love is overlooked. Ince's initial uncertainty over Hart's persona as a feature star beyond two reel westerns is evident by placing him in another genre.

What was William S. Hart doing? This isn't a typical Hart Western--it's not a Western. Everyone knows Hart could use some variety to his roles, but this film looks as though it were thrown together haphazardly. The camera positioning and editing are primitive compared to other Hart pictures that I've seen from this period. The plot doesn't make sense. The actors, especially the other lead actor, George Fisher, appear as though they're sleepwalking through their parts. Hart doesn't even appear until it's half over. In two episodes, Fisher's character, for reasons not articulated, is bullied to marry women. Is he the villain, or the victim of bizarre happenings? The two episodes are linked in the loosest of ways. So, Fisher goes to Alaska where Hart forces him to marry the woman that Hart loves, which makes no sense. All the while, these women have some inexplicable infatuation for the dunderhead Fisher plays. What a mess.

Long before Hollywood had thought of the 'adult western' William S. Hart was portraying darkly and ambiguously heroic characters on horseback, and this film is a fine example. Without recourse to special effects and action scenes, his deeply nuanced and complex characterizations and the body language of brilliantly framed shots conveyed so much more than modern films seem able to do with all the technology the current industry has to offer. Bring back the silents! They had *faces* then.