Menu
Director
John Ford
Credits
Producer: John Ford. Writers: Peter B. Kyne, Elizabeth Pickett, John Stone
Principal Cast
Janet Gaynor, Leslie Fenton, Willard Louis, J. Farrell MacDonald
Category
Feature
Already in his first big production, 1924’s The Iron Horse, Ford had foregrounded the role of Irish immigrants in constructing the trans-continental railway. His main Irishman there was played by J. Farrell Macdonald, whose prolific career playing Irishmen in Ford films extends as far as a key role as barman/musician in My Darling Clementine (1945). Macdonald features in The Shamrock Handicap as loyal servant of an Irish landowner who falls on hard times. The main story is simple: the landowner is driven to sell his horses to America, along with a jockey, whom his left-behind daughter loves. Father and daughter subsequently travel to America to witness the big race, with results that are no less enjoyable for being predictable. A review at the time noted that “Ford loves anything Irish, and he made the most of the little human interest touches.”
Notes by Charles Barr
66 minutes, USA, 1926, B&W
AKIRA (4K RESTORATION) 20.40
AMÉLIE (25th ANNIVERSARY) 13.00
ARCHIVE AT LUNCHTIME: MISSIONS IMPOSSIBLE (PROGRAMME 1) 13.00
FATHER MOTHER SISTER BROTHER 15.50, 18.20
FROM THE VAULTS: GARAGE 18.30
REBUILDING 13.30, 20.50
THE BLUE TRAIL 13.50, 18.10
THE DRAMA 16.00
THE STRANGER 15.40
THE WIZARD OF THE KREMLIN 20.15
The IFI is supported by The Arts Council