Jean Durand takes a break from split-reel slapstick comedies to direct a two-reel melodrama about two men racing to stake a claim on a gold field in Nebraska. He uses some of his stock company in some of the smaller roles, to produce a a fairly good effort, too.
The tension is kept up by the fact that both men will do whatever it takes to win their race, one traveling by train -- in apparently a very circuitous route -- and the other by whatever means comes to hand: horse, automobile, it makes no difference.
Durand, who certainly was not averse to using a lot of camera tricks in his comedies, particularly the Onesieme series, uses remarkably short cuts for a French picture of this era and shows a real flair for composition, frequently changing the size of the frame not with masking, as was common in this era, but by background and foreground objects and screens -- credit the uncredited cameraman.
Although this is by no means a great movie, it shows up well for its era and I am very pleased that it is on the Kino Lorber set of early Gaumont pictures.