Directed by: D. W. Griffith
This is another example of the fruit of the early years of cinema. Whereas Princess Nicotine; or, The Smoke Fairy (1909) focused on an accumulation of film techniques, A Corner in Wheat showcases storytelling possibilities and creating meaning through editing. The theatrical showmanship is replaced by grounded realism.
The story begins with a farmer sifting through seeds. Everyone and everything else is still in the shot, except for his father in the background who also looks through seeds in his sack. It emphasizes the focal element in the film – wheat. A modern day equivalent would be starting with an extreme close-up of the seeds and slowly panning out. The story follows three groups: farm workers, average citizens and businessmen. The three never intersect but are influenced by the decisions made by those in power (D. W. Griffith was apparently inspired by Charles Dickens’ storytelling structure in this regard). The greed ultimately results in the farmer’s family starving, the citizens rioting due to a lack of bread and the businessman accidentally falling down a shaft and dying. Although there is some sense of poetic justice as the grain – his greed – kills him, the film doesn’t present it as a triumph. The final shot is of the farmer, alone, seeding the field. He stops, sighs and wearily carries on. The damage is already done and its effects continue to reverberate through society.
The film is known for cross-cutting between poor citizens and workers lined up to try and get bread and the rich lavishly celebrating. This juxtaposition attributed new meaning to the footage by inviting audiences to make direct comparisons between the two settings. It is a technique that would be explored and incorporated into theories by Soviet filmmakers Sergei Eisenstein, Lev Kuleshov and Vsevolod Pudovkin.
The camera remains static throughout the film and scenes are predominantly recorded in full shot – a style which seems dated. Nevertheless, the composition of the shots have been compared to the paintings of Jean-François Millet, which might well have had an influence on the visuals of the film.
In general, the film was influenced by Frank Norris’ novels The Octopus: A Story of California (1901) and The Pit: A Story of Chicago (1903) – two of a planned trilogy known as The Epic of the Wheat, incomplete due to the author’s death – and the short story collection A Deal in Wheat and Other Stories of the New and Old West (1903), published posthumously. It also features similarities with the real-life story of James A. Patten who bought over 10 million bushels of wheat and artificially forced up prices from 89.75 cents per bushel in June 1908 to $1.34 per bushes by May 1909. As a consequence, he made a profit of $1 million.
The most surprising thing about this film is that even over 100 years later, it still manages to remain topical.
Bibliography
Edwards, C. (2009). ‘Corner in Wheat (1909)’, Silent Volume, 22 March. Available at: http://silent-volume.blogspot.com/2009/03/corner-in-wheat-1909.html [Accessed: 19 February 2022].
Greising, D. & Morse, L. (1991). Brokers, Bagman, and Moles: Fraud and Corruption in the Chicago Futures Markets. New York: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
IMDb contributors (n.d.). ‘A Corner in Wheat (1909)’, IMDb. Available at: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0000832/ [Accessed: 19 February 2022].
JEC (2020). ‘A Corner in Wheat (1909)’, A Cinema History. Available at: http://www.acinemahistory.com/2020/04/a-corner-in-wheat-1909.html [Accessed: 19 February 2022].
Rideout, T. D. (2017). ‘A Corner in Wheat (1909) – D.W. Griffith’, The Mind Reels, 14 May. Available at: https://themindreels.com/2017/05/14/a-corner-in-wheat-1909-d-w-griffith/ [Accessed: 19 February 2022].
South West Silents (2021). ‘D. W. Griffith’s A Corner in Wheat (1909),’ South West Silents, 24 May. Available at: https://www.southwestsilents.com/post/d-w-griffith-s-a-corner-in-wheat-1909 [Accessed: 19 February 2022].
Ulman, E. (2001). ‘A corner in Wheat: An Analysis’, Senses of Cinema. Available at: https://www.sensesofcinema.com/2001/feature-articles/cornerwheat/ [Accessed: 19 February 2022].
Reel Lessons 