| Photos from Whistle at Eaton Falls |
SEACOAST FILM (1951)
Louis de Rochemont
Long before "Norma Rae", filmmaker Louis de Rochemont dramatized NH labor unions in Whistle at Eaton Falls. Filmed largely in Seacoast, NH, the movie was a box office success and featured a number of stars who became household names. Louise de Rochemont promoted his docum-drama with all the publicity of a Hollywod film. Icluded are nearly still images from the production.
READ: Complete "Whistle" film summary
Oscar-winning documentary filmmaker Louis de Rochemont could smell a good story. His 300 short "March of Time" newsreels were seen by millions of movie-goers each month beginning in the 1930s. De Rochemont had even smuggled footage of Hitler out of Germany in 1940. But after World War II, de Rochemont wanted to make feature length films, and he wanted to make them in New Hampshire where he lived.
With a three picture contract from Columbia, de Rochemont came home to make the kind of movies he liked. They would all be based on true stories, and, when possible, filmed near his ancestral home in Seacoast, NH. Shot mostly around Portsmouth, his 1949 story of racial discrimination in NH, "Lost Boundaries
A truly maverick film producer, de Rochemont was interested in labor unions and their endless battles with the forces of management. As always, he drew his plot directly from real life, this time a case history in the files of a Harvard professor. It was the story of a blue collar labor leader who suddenly found himself appointed president of a failing New England factory.
The conflict was ready-made for the big screen. Forced to close the plant in order to save it, the hero wrestles with his conscience and with residents of the factory town. De Rochemont, in turn, wrestled with his journalistic need to present both sides of the story, and his producer's need to sell movie tickets. So the story includes a little love interest, a little song and dance, a car crash and even a murder. The script by his Academy Award-winning wife Virginia, plays today like melodrama meets industrial training film. Still, the characters, with bits parts played by Seacoast residents, are strong and the plot rings true. There is an unrelenting authenticity to de Rochemont's "nonfiction film" work.
This time the producer combined pieces of Dover, Exeter and Portsmouth, NH into the fictional town of Eaton Falls. De Rochemont populated Eaton Falls with an impressive professional cast, most of whom had or would star in notable motion pictures. They included 20-something Hollywood actor Lloyd Bridges who is married to Donna Douglas, mother of the real-life actor Michael Douglas. Silent film legend Dorothy Gish appears, plus a very young Anne Frances, and an untested new actor just out of the Navy named Ernest Borgnine.
Historically, the film is a valuable celluloid record of life in this NH region, wedged between the Great War and the Cold War. The Cocheco Mill, where much of the filming took place, today is an office building. The factory owner's home, the once grand Sawyer Mansion, was long ago replaced by a Howard Johnson's, which has since given way to a Burger King.
Distributed by Columbia Pictures, "Whistle at Eaton Falls" is currently unavailable except on a few 16mm copies in private hands and library archives. Thanks to television, three of the key actors are remembered for their starring roles in "Sea Hunt" (Lloyd Bridges), "McHale's Navy" (Ernest Borgnine) and "Honey West" (Anne Frances). Here, thanks to the Portsmouth Public Library, are some of the movie publicity stills originally released by Columbia, presented on the Internet for the first time.
By J. Dennis Robinson, originally copyrighted © 1997 SeacoastNH.com
Updated 2005. All use must be attributed
MOVIE STILL COLLECTION
Whistle at Eaton Falls (1951)
Click below for 14 more pictures
© 1951 Columbia Pictures
Photos courtesy of the Portsmouth Public Library
CONTINUE "WHISTLE" FILM STILLS
Movie Stills from 1951 Film (Continued)
Produced by Louise de Rochemont
In his very first movie Ernest Borgnine plays a labor union leader with Lloyd Bridges in the 1951 "Whistle at Eaton Falls". This scene was filmed in Dover, NH by Oscar-winner Louis de Rochemont. Here with a co-star (Lenore Lonergan?) they examine a model of the new automated machinery arriving at Doubleday Plastics.
Union leader Abby (Lenore Lonergan) is accused of being a "scab" as she attempts to break an illegal picket line outside what today is an office and shopping area at the Cocheco Mill in downtown Dover, NH.
The confrontation builds as wildcatters confront returning Eaton Falls workers outside the factory.
Union wildcatter Al Brewster (Murray Hamilton) conspires with competing company production manager Dwight Hawkins (Russell Hardie). Actor Hamilton later appeared in The Graduate, Anatomy of a Murder, Brubaker, The Hustler and two Jaws films, to name a few.)
The actual whistle on the factory at Eaton Falls which symbolizes employment in the battle between labor and management. De Rochemont once said that the protagonist of this film was "the job."
Abby (Lenore Lonergan) and Joe London (James Westerfield) watch as the new automated machinery is delivered to Doubleday Plastics, putting them out of work. Actor Westfield may be familiar from his role as an Irish policeman in the two original Flubber movies. He reprised the role in the original Shaggy Dog film, also from Disney.
Brad's wife Ruth Adams (Diana Douglas), is excited by her husband's rise to power, This shot is not used in the scene where Brad returns from a failed business trip to find his wife driving a new car.
© 1951 Columbia Pictures
Photos courtesy of the Portsmouth Public Library
CONTINUE "WHISTLE" FILM STILLS
Movie Stills from 1951 Film (Continued)
Produced by Louise de Rochemont
A very young Anne Francis, playing Jean London, poses in a bathing suit for her boyfriend Eddie. She is his model for a line of Doubleday's plastic aquarium mermaids. This was Francis' second feature film.
A publicity still of Lloyd Bridges in classic leather jacket shot in Dover, NH in 1950. Already a seasoned Hollywood actor, Bridges took the lead as Brad Adams, the beleaguered young president of Doubleday Plastics in fictional Eaton Falls. The movie was based on a true story.
This publicity still reveals that the square dance scene in Eaton Falls, NH actually took place at the York Beach Casino in nearby York,Maine.
A somber meeting of labor organizers including Ernest Borgnine and the new company president played by Lloyd Bridges. Could the Orson Welles-like figure at the right be producer Louis de Rochemont himself? De Rochemont lived much of his life in Newington, NH.
Love interest Eddie Talbot (Carleton Carpenter) with Anne Francis. They sing a duet just before the big square dance scene. Eddie's inventions lead to a brainstorm that solves the financial crisis at Doubleday Plastics -- saving Eaton Falls.
Dorothy Gish, sister of silent screen star Lillian Gish, plays the widowed Helen Doubleday whose strong will and sage decision-making places Brad Adams in charge after her husband's untimely death. The Gishes (see inset) are considered by many to be the ultimate film actresses of the Silent Era.
From "Whistle at Eaton Falls"
By Louis De Rochemont
© 1951 Columbia Pictures
Photos courtesy of the Portsmouth Public Library