Hart’s new contract with Zukor not only certified his status as one of the screen’s greatest stars, it also (at least in Hart’s mind) validated the highly idiosyncratic approach to Western films he had championed against everyone from Tom Ince to Tom Mix. Never closely identified with the West before he began playing such characters in the theatre, by 1920 Hart had completely absorbed the style and substance of the romantic hero he had created. While this might have been expected of Mix (a real cowboy), his other main rivals – Broncho Billy, Dustin Farnum, and Jack Holt – were all happy to put their spurs away when off camera. The Testing Block appears to be yet another of those films in which the Hart character, an outlaw, is civilized through contact with a good woman. It was celebrated at the time for the excellence of its fight scenes, “a typical Hart picture of the good old days”, according to Wid’s. But this time the woman is not the usual Victorian innocent, but an actress, a travelling player who enthralls “Sierra Bill” through her talent on the violin. It would seem no coincidence that Hart’s own romantic associations, from his road company days with Julia Arthur and Margaret Mather, were almost entirely limited to the actresses with whom he worked (Eva Novak was one of several co-stars to whom he proposed marriage). In The Testing Block the “reformed outlaw” plot of Hart’s earlier films blends with the “creating a family” vision more prominent in his late work. Unfortunately, such a situation adds romantic jealousy to the list of aggravations liable to ignite one of “Bill’s” testosterone-driven rages. Perhaps marrying an actress might not be the solution to this character’s alienated wanderings after all.

Richard e Diane Koszarski