Friday, May 06, 2016

"Beyond the Rocks" (1922)

Happy birthday, Rudolph Valentino!

(NO idea how this photo came about, other than I've seen one of him in the same hat
that says it was taken at Palm Springs.  Not from any of his movies, AFAIK.
Definitely not from Beyond the Rocks.  But I wanted to use it anyway.)

I tend to celebrate Rudy's birthday by watching one of his movies, and sometimes by blogging about them, or posting a little tribute to him, or whatever.  He's rather special to me, for various reasons, one being that I'd love to go back in time and make friends with him because I think he could have used a very good friend who wouldn't let him die alone in a hotel.  But that's another story.  Anyway, I love Rudy, and that's why he's up there on my blog header right now, with my other two beloved May birthday boys, whom I'll blog more about later this month :-)


In Rudy's honor, today I'm reviewing his movie Beyond the Rocks (1922), which is based on a novel by Elinor Glyn.  The only thing I know about Elinor Glyn is that she wrote trashy novels that Marion the Librarian mentioned in The Music Man.  Judging by this movie, I won't be reading any of her books.  Not that it's exactly terrible... it's just not very good, either.

(If you want to read my reviews of some of Rudy's really good movies, I've written about The Sheik (1921), Moran of the Lady Letty (1922), and The Eagle (1925) pretty extensively.)

SO I'm going to review it anyway because it's not a total write-off.  I mean, it's still a Rudolph Valentino movie, and we've only got a precious few of those.  It's the only film he and Gloria Swanson made, and as you can tell from the lobby card above, she was kind of a bigger deal than he was at that point. Or the studio thought so, anyway.  In fact, they spelled his name Rodolph there.  (It was originally Rodolfo, and it get spelled several different ways in Hollywood, and nobody ever seemed to care.  Simpler times, my friends.  Simpler times.)  This film was only recently rediscovered -- there were no known surviving copies until someone found a print in 2003, in the Netherlands.  It's been preserved and digitally remastered for the DVD, with a new soundtrack and new English title cards, since the copy they found had Dutch ones.

The print is pretty fair for a film of this age, but there are several places where it was obviously unsalvageable, and gets all bubbly and weird.  However, what we do have is entertaining, especially this one thing I think Rudy does in two different places, which delighted me so much that I'll totally rewatch this for just those moments.  Which I'll tell you alllll about when we get to them.

So anyway, it all begins with this chick, Theodora (Gloria Swanson), out for a row in her boat.  She's waving to her beloved, aging father, who's watching from the shore.


For no fathomable reason whatsoever, except for the fact that she handles the oars like she's never been in a rowboat before, she falls out.  Nearby, there's this handsome, sophisticated man about town, Lord Hector Bracondale (Rudolph Valentino).


Obviously, he's going to dive over the side of his own natty boat and rescue the drowning wench.  Even though he's been saddled with a completely dreadful name like Hector Bracondale, he's still a Nice Guy.


He rescues her, carries her ashore, comforts her over the resultant bedraggled condition of her clothing, pats her hand, and generally behaves as if it's perfectly natural that her heavy lipstick and eye makeup haven't smudged a bit after all that thrashing about in the water.  Maybe it's because his clothes seem to have dried instantly, and he's hoping she won't notice.


Logic has no place in this story.  (Simpler times?)  But narcissi do!  She gives him a droopy, forlorn narcissus that somehow stayed attached to her clothing through all the watery heroics, and he sniffs it appreciatively.


Now, Theodora has two much older half-sisters from a love affair her father had a long time ago.  They sit around making snide remarks and trying to marry her off to someone rich.


And by snide remarks, I mean that they say this sort of thing about Rudolph Valentino:


I'm rather disappointed that the restoration committee didn't do a better job with the title cards.  These are really boring and flat and generic and horrible.  On the other hand, this movie is fairly flat and generic itself, so they do kind of match it.  But anyway, those sisters did get the "wonderful" part right about Rudy, so I can't write them off as complete morons.

They find this old guy (Robert Bolder) who is super rich and named Josiah Brown (which is a way better name than Hector Bracondale, if you ask me) and throw Theodora at him, and he likes her because she's young and pretty, and her dad needs money for whatever reason, so she agrees to marry him even though he makes her lips curl with disdain.  But it turns out everything makes her lips curl with disdain, so maybe she doesn't dislike him that much after all.


So even though she's just been rescued from a watery grave by Rudolph Valentino, she agrees to marry Josiah.  We don't see the wedding, just the wedding dress, which does not look comfortable, does it?


We also get treated to a lingering shot of a train entering a tunnel, which I'm pretty sure is supposed to symbolize the wedding night.  Kind of an overused visual metaphor these days, but in 1922 it was probably very edgy and fresh.  You can see here what I mean about the film being badly damaged in some places -- and this is one spot where you can actually still see some of what is happening.  There are a couple places where it just dissolves into bubbly goop.


Annnnnnnnnnnyway, Josiah and Theodora honeymoon in the Alps.  Where there's festive dancing.  Who doesn't enjoy a bit of festive Germanic dancing?


Also at that same little Alpine lodge, we meet up with... Lord Hector Bracondale!  (I keep wanting to drop the 'r' from his name and call him Lord Bacondale.  I'm sorry, Rudy -- I honestly don't view you as just a morsel of salty goodness!  Truly!)  He's there with his mom and this chick his mom wants him to marry.  He's attentive and charming and everything I'd like to imagine Rudy would have been in real life if he went out to dinner with you and wanted you to have a nice time.

Hector conveniently gets hold of a handkerchief dropped by Theodora, which has conveniently been doused in Eau de Narcissus by some random maid, but he can't figure out what the scent reminds him of, so he just looks attractively puzzled, then shrugs it off.


Theodora makes friends with this older lady while in the Alps, and they decide to go mountain climbing.  Which involves some pretty impressive scenery, I must say.


This, of course, is what all well-dressed ladies wear while mountain climbing:  tight skirts and high-heeled boots.  Very sensible.  Mmmhmmm.


It comes as no surprise to anyone in the audience with a lick of sense that Theodora promptly falls over a cliff.


Happily, who should be hiking about that same mountain at the same time but dear Lord Hector?  Complete with a rifle that has a rather exciting-looking scope mounted on it.  Alas, he never gets to use the rifle for anything, just hands it to his buddy and goes to rescue yon damsel in distress.


He doesn't actually recognize her at first, but she remembers him (who wouldn't?!?), and neither of them makes any snide remarks about each others' wardrobe decisions that morning, so they spend a merry interlude waiting for help to come rescue them both, because you see, Hector didn't so much rescue her as just lower her and himself down to another ledge and then send his buddy and her friend to find actual help.  But how much can you really expect of a man named Hector Bracondale, after all?


Okay, so then they get really rescued at last, and she goes off to her husband.  He gets hold of her handkerchief again somehow, smells it, and then... oh then...


...he breaks the fourth wall.  Looks straight into the camera.  Very deliberately.


And then he grins at us!  Makes this little, "Aha!" gesture, like we're sharing a secret with him or something.  It's 100% adorable, and half the reason I will definitely be watching this movie again.  (I have to admit, though, that I'm only guessing he's breaking the fourth wall here -- on my TV, that's how it looks.  On the big screen, he might be focusing off into the distance a bit more, but I'll probably never know that.  I prefer to believe he's looking Straight At Me, thankyouverymuch.)


Anyway, Theodora and Josiah leave because he's all freaked out that she almost died while on a mountain climbing expedition he was too old and tired to go on.  Hector's infatuated with her now, and gallantly kisses her hand farewell.


Josiah and Theodora go to Paris, where she is bored silly because she married a boring old man.  Dude, Theodora, what did you expect?


Her dad shows up, though, and takes her out to supper.  Good dad.


Guess who else is there?  Yeah, Hector's basically stalking her at this point.  I simply can't like Hector.  My deepest apologies to Rudy.  He's actually doing some of the best acting I've seen from him -- he's got some lovely, nuanced scenes, and seems pretty relaxed during a lot of it.  But his character... no thanks.  He actively pursues a married woman.  Bad Hector.  Bad, naughty, evil Hector.


I'm not sure why he even wants her.  She's always making faces like this:


In fact, on a whole, I was not impressed by Gloria Swanson here.  The only other thing I've ever seen her in is Sunset Boulevard (1950), but I am not inspired to seek out more of her movies.  She's four years younger than Rudy, but looks and acts like she's ten years older.  She never seems to be attracted to him, even though her character is supposed to be falling in love with him, and most of the time she looks like she's just enduring his presence and waiting for the scene to end.


Rudy, in turn, does some acceptable acting with her, but his best scenes are the ones she's not in.  Maybe he was intimidated by her, since she was a bigger star at that time?  Maybe she was annoyed that he was getting a lot of press and attention because The Sheik had made such a big splash the year before?  Who knows.  All I know is, he had much better chemistry with Agnes Ayres, Vilma Banky, and Dorothy Dalton than he does with her.


But just when we start to feel moody and depressed at how boring this movie has gotten, in comes Hector's sister Anne/Ann/Anna (June Elvidge).  The title cards tell us she and Hector have always been good pals and confidants.


Oh.  My.  Goodness.  Why couldn't they have made more movies together?  Because she and Rudy have a wonderful, natural rapport!


Look at that bright smiles!  There's nothing like that in the scenes with Gloria Swanson.


Once their mother leaves, sister Anne/Ann/Anna (the title cards can't make up their minds) asks Hector what's wrong, and he gets all pensive and swoon-inducing.


In earlier scenes where he was supposed to be sad about leaving Theodora, he mostly looked vaguely tired and did droopy things with his eyebrows.  But here, he looks genuinely sorrowful.  Man, this scene between them is just soooo good.


Don't you want to help the poor guy?


(I mean, no, I don't want to help him, because he's mooning around over a married woman, and that's wrong.  But I want to give him a hug and cheer him up.)


Anyway, more plot happens, and the movie drags on another like forty minutes.  Josiah and Theodora and Hector all end up at the same house party.  Nobody has a good time.  Including me.


Hector is reduced to lovingly caressing the back of the couch where Theodora's hand rested for a while.  Which briefly makes me wish I was a couch.


After some silly other plot nonsense, he goes home.  Where he has a dog.  I'm wondering if this was one of Rudy's own dogs?  I know he had several, and it kind of looks like one I've seen him pictured with a lot.  Anyway, it's a sweet dog.


And then there's this whole mix-up with letters that got mailed to the wrong people.  I'm so tired of the plot by this point that I'm not going to bother detailing it anymore.  It's so lame, it needs crutches.


So I'm only mentioning this scene because Rudy breaks the fourth wall AGAIN!!!  He looks straight at the camera and mouths "thank you" when he gets a letter addressed in Theodora's hand.  Which is the other half of why I will watch this again one day.


However, poor Josiah also got a letter from her -- a malicious person switched the letters Theodora sent Hector and Josiah, so now Josiah knows that she loves Hector, though she says that she's going to remain faithful for him, and has broken with Hector forever.  Blah blah blah.  Poor Josiah!


Heartbroken to learn she doesn't love him, he goes off on an archaeological expedition to the Sahara, like any sensible person would.


Archaeology ensues.


Also, there's a big battle with a bunch of Bedouins who like to ride around shooting people.  They're probably the same bunch that attacked Rudy in The Sheik.

And then Josiah breaks my heart by committing suicide-by-Bedouin.  He just puts down his pistol, says goodbye to Theodora's picture, and walks out of his tent into a bullet.  Theodora and Hector and Theodora's father have been rushing to find Josiah, and of course they arrive just in time for him to die in Theodora's arms.


Not only that, but he joins Hector and Theodora's hands and tells them to be happy together.  Guy oughta get a sainthood, I tell you.


Personally, I think it would have been way more interesting if he'd recovered, and Theodora discovered she loved him after all, and they'd lived happily for the rest of his shy, nervous years.  And Hector was left lonely and alone, which would serve him right for running around after a married woman, the cad.

But nooooooooooo, we have to have a proper Hollywood ending, and so we got a shot of Hector and Theodora a year later, getting cozy on a boat, having passed beyond the rocks of sadness into the open water of joy, or some such fiddle-faddle and rot.  And for once, Gloria Swanson actually looks like she's glad to be standing near Rudolph Valentino.  If she'd been this cute and saucy the whole movie, we'd all have been better off.


And now you're wondering why I just spent a couple of hours screencapping this clunker and then writing a minutely detailed review of it.  All I can say is, it's because any Rudy movie is better than no Rudy movie.


Time to talk costumes a bit more!  Because this is made in the early 20s, we get some doozies.  Here's a close-up of the wedding dress.  Isn't it a lulu?  She looks like her veil is going to strangle her.


And the fabric looks like um... wood?  Is it supposed to look like wooden boards, with rings and knots and stuff?  I don't know.


Rudy, of course, wears absolutely everything well.  The man would make a potato sack look studly.


Get a load of this hat!  I think she's going for the Vamp look here, how about you?


This hat's cute, I think.  Rudy's is cuter, though.


Here's a cool shot of the back of the dress she wears at that house party where no one has any fun.


And some detail of it from later that night.  Look how plastered-down her hair is!  It's as slick as Rudy's.


There is Absolutely No Reason At All for Rudy to be wearing a pith helmet in this scene.  They're still in England, hanging out a someone's house in the country.  But he looks like he's off on a safari in darkest Peru or something.  And still looks wonderful.  He needed to wear short sleeves more often, cuz he had really nice arms.


I've got no use at all for this dress, but look at that staircase!  I wants it, Precious!  I love big, open, curvy staircases.


So there's also this daffy interlude where Hector tells Theodora a story about courtiers in Marie Antoinette's day, and it gets acted out by Rudy and Gloria.  Because any excuse to stuff Rudy into period clothing?  And the weirder, the better, I guess?



There's also a play put on during the house party that's set in the 1800s, and if you've ever wondered what it would be like to have Rudolph Valentino in an adaptation of one of Jane Austen's novels (I can't be the only one, right?), wonder no more!  This is what he would have looked like as Mr. Darcy, I'm sure of it:


Okay, enough is enough.  Happy birthday again, dear Rudy, and thank you for not making more movies like this one.  Next year, I'll highlight one of the good ones instead.

29 comments:

  1. I probably enjoyed this review more than I would enjoy the movie . . . but oh, my goodness, did I enjoy this review! Had me laughing throughout (and Rudolph is not hard on the eyes, that's for sure!).

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    1. Anne Elisabeth, that's very likely :-) Only a Valentino fan could enjoy the movie, I'm afraid, and only because he's in it. Unlike some of his movies, which are actually quite good, or quite fun, or sometimes both.

      (And yes, yes, he certainly is not!)

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  2. Hamlette,
    This made me laugh so hard (inside, because there were other people around when I was reading it), but still I nearly did burst out laughing! Thank you, thank you, THANK YOU! It was just what I needed after a long day. :)

    I can't get over it though - what a crazy story! I've never seen it but I agree here and now that Josiah should have recovered and Hector What's-his-horrible-name- have been left to woe, 'cuz Those Types of Stories Are The Sweetest. Howsoever that may be, the dog scene and the one with his sister do look very well done! And of course, the screenshots are perfectly delicious. :)

    Thanks again for sharing this terrific review, I know what a lot of effort and time the detail must take, but oh is the result splendid!

    *Eowyn now goes off to laugh herself to sleep*

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    1. Eowyn, awwww, that's quite awesome that it made you laugh inside! Thanks. I hope I sent you off to have happy dreams.

      Yeah... that story. Like stuffing every cliche you can think of into a bag, shaking it, and letting them drift out however they like.

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  3. Okay, so am I the only one who likes the name Hector Bracondale? It's got a good ring to it and it's fun to say. LOL.

    Well, they can't all be winners, can they! I've seen parts of this one, because I remember the "rescue" in the mountains. Did we watch part of this once?

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    1. Yes, DKoren, you are the only one. Hector is bad enough, but Bracondale?

      We might have it on our J discs? I know I watched several of his less-than-stellar movies in a clump. I know it has showed on TCM.

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    2. ROFL! I'm okay with that. What's wrong with Hector? I have a co-worker named Hector, and Trojan War Hector is great And I want to steal Bracondale for one of my stories. Only I'd spell it Brakendale or Brackendale. Or Brasendale for an alternate pronunciation on the C. (Just wait... it will pop up somewhere now and you will groan and go why why why!)

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    3. Okay, Brackendale is actually cool. I just... kept reading it Bacondale and cracking up. I really did.

      But no, I don't like the name Hector.

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  4. Oh wow. This review had me laughing and was much more entertaining than the movie would be, I'm sure.

    I haven't actually seen any Valentino movies, so I probably should at some point. Probably won't start with this one, though. :)

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    1. Thanks, Hayden! Valentino is definitely worth seeing, and a lot of his movies are available free online. I'd recommend The Eagle or Moran of the Lady Letty as good places to start. My personal favorite is The Sheik, but Rudy is purposely overacting in that one, and it can be a little goofy...

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  5. Hamlette, this is a great review! Okay, the dog with Rudy/Hector is one of his own, I believe it is Sheik (the other German sheperd was named Marquis). Rudy's pith helmet scene, he'd just played polo.

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    1. Thanks, Rudyfan! I *thought* that looked like one of Rudy's dogs, but I didn't know their names. Thanks! And ahhh, okay, that does make sense that he'd been playing polo :-)

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  6. Loved your review, so funny, especially the couch comment which made me laugh out loud! I saw a reply Valentino wrote to a fan where he commented that he didn't want to make another movie like this! I love this movie because it was lost for so long, I ignore all the plot flaws and just buy into the romance of it all, though Valentino and Swanson don't actually kiss, do they? Maybe it was in a destroyed part of the film. Thanks for writing this review, loved it!

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    1. Mags Williamson, I'm so sorry I never responded to this comment! I suspect it got eaten by Blogger -- sometimes it just doesn't show me comments. So weird.

      Anyway, I love that Valentino said he didn't want to make more movies like this! I don't blame him. But I agree, it's cool that they finally found it. I hope more of his lost films turn up in the future -- too many of them are gone! I'd love a complete print of The Young Rajah too, while we're at it, as the only one I've seen is very bits-and-pieces.

      Glad you enjoyed the review!

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  7. Oh my goodness, if my mother and father and sisters weren't asleep right now I would be laughing *very* loudly! I love this review! Although the movie looks pretty lame ;) I just saw 'The Eagle' with Rudolph Valentino and I really liked it, although unfortunately the quality was pretty awful. I'll definitely be watching more of his movie soon!

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    1. Grays Harbor, glad you got a kick out of this!

      The Eagle is one of his best. I really dig that one. Try to find Moran of the Lady Letty! It's got some really cool stuff going on, and there are decent prints out there. And if you like purely escapist fluff, the two Sheik movies are extremely fun. Especially his dual roles in Son of the Sheik as father and son.

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  8. I just finished watching The Sheik, and the day before I watched Moran of the Lady Letty. I loved them both! Although Mr. Valentino had some pretty creepy smiles going on there near the beginning of The Sheik ;D But the rest of the movie was really dreamy and lovely, so that made up for it ;) Moran of the Lady Letty was very lovely as well.

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    1. Grays Harbor, how wonderful! Isn't Moran just a delicious movie? And yes, he does do some really creepy things with his eyes and smile in The Sheik... I've read that the director told him to overact there because this wasn't supposed to be a realistic movie, and they wanted to um... I forget, like, emphasize his character's change or something.

      But the rest of the movie is dreamy. And so is the sequel, tho I prefer the original just a smidge.

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  9. It is! Roman was really nice (besides seemingly not being bothered by his, um, less than legal goings-on with smugglers ;).
    Well, if they wanted to emphasize the characters change, it certainly worked. He was a creep in the beginning and and awesome hero by the end, so it was all good ;D I'll have to watch the sequel sometime soon.

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    1. I feel like smuggling got a bit of a pass in the '20s because of Prohibition, and so he's less phased by it than we would be? Not sure.

      You're making me be all in the mood to watch Rudy's movies right now :-) Might have to pull out one or two.

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  10. Haha, yeah, maybe the directors and writers were all in favor of stealing and smuggling alcohol ;D
    Well good! ;) Just one last question. I was wondering if The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse and Blood and Sand were any good. I finished most of the other movies you wrote about, so I'm kinda desperate ;) Thanks!

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    1. Grays, that's extremely probable.

      Don't let it be the last question! I'm enjoying discussing Rudy with you!

      I VERY much like Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. I also liked The Cobra pretty well -- don't think we've mentioned that one here. And his version of Camille. Blood and Sand, I have only seen once, and that was many years ago. I liked it okay, but IIRC it was a little depressing.

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    2. Oh, hey, if you're interested, there's a really good biography of Rudy called "Dark Lover" by Emily W. Leider. I like it so much, I own a copy.

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    3. ;D
      Oh, I'm glad! My sisters are prejudiced against silent movies, so I can't talk to anyone about them! I told them that they hadn't ever seen *Rudolph Valentino* in a silent movie, but they still don't want to watch one ;D
      Oh, okay. Thanks. I'll have to look some of those up.
      Thanks!

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    4. I didn't get into silent films until I was in college, and I only had one friend who really enjoyed them there, so I feel you there. Maybe they'll come around if they "accidentally" see part of one or something? My dad randomly got into Harry Potter because he happened to channel-surf past one of the movies, recognized an actor in it, stopped to watch, and became fascinated. It does happen.

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  11. Actually, yeah, that's a good way to get someone to like something. If you ask them to watch it a lot of the time they're convinced to not like it, so you have to 'accidentally' play the best part while they're walking through the room ;D I started watching 'The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse' last night and I'm not exactly in love with it, because of his little fling with the married lady, so if you could spoil that for me, it would be great. Does he ditch the lady? I really wanna see the World War I part, but I just don't dig Rudy running around with another man's wife, if you get me.

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    1. Hmmmmmmmmmmmm. It's been several years since I watched that one, but I remember being pleased by the way it ended up, and I'm not a fan of adultery storylines either, so I feel like they don't stay together, but I'm afraid I don't remember for sure :-( Sorry!

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    2. Haha, okay, thanks. I guess I'll take a chance and watch it! Good World War I movies are so cool!

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    3. Let me know what you think of it when you finish it!

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