Editing The Wind (1928 film) (section)

==Production==
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{{quote box|width=30em|bgcolor=cornsilk|fontsize=100%|salign=center|quote= Actor Lillian Gish on being directed by Victor Seastrom in ''[[The Scarlet Letter (1926 film)|The Scarlet Letter]]'' (1929): “His direction was a great education to me. In a sense, I went through the Swedish school of acting. I had gotten rather close to the Italian school: The Italian school is one of elaboration; the Swedish is one of repression.”— from Albert Bigelow Paine’s ''Life and Lillian Gish'' (1932).<ref>Jacobs, 1967 p. 332: Quoted here, see footnote same page for Paine reference and page number in his biography (p. 225) See Bibliography p. 592</ref>}}

Gish came up with the idea of making a film adaptation of the novel of the same name. [[Irving Thalberg]] immediately gave her permission to do so. Gish recalled wanting [[Lars Hanson]] as her leading man after seeing him in a Swedish film with [[Greta Garbo]]. She also assigned [[Victor Sjöström]] as the director herself. Sjöström directed Gish before in the 1926 film ''[[The Scarlet Letter (1926 film)|The Scarlet Letter]]''.<ref>Turner Classic Movies - Interview with Lillian Gish previous to the start of the feature</ref>

In the original novel, the heroine is driven mad when the wind uncovers the corpse of the man she has killed.  She then wanders off into a windstorm to die.  According to Gish and popular legend, the original ending intended for the film was the unhappy ending, but it was changed in response to the decree, by the studio's powerful Eastern office, that a more upbeat ending be shot.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.tcm.com/this-month/article/62579|title=The Wind|work=Turner Classic Movies|access-date=April 19, 2016}}</ref> It is rumored that this tampering caused Seastrom to move back to Sweden. Mayer's biographer rejects this on account that the "sad ending" is not known to exist in any form, written or filmed. Regardless of whether an unhappy ending was originally intended, in the resulting film the "happy" ending replaced the original ending against the wishes of both Lillian Gish and Victor Sjöström.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://moviessilently.com/2013/02/03/the-wind-1928-a-silent-film-review/|title=The Wind (1928) A Silent Film Review|work=moviessilently.com|date=February 3, 2013 |access-date=April 19, 2016}}</ref>

The film was shot partially near [[Bakersfield, California|Bakersfield]] and the [[Mojave Desert]], [[California]].<ref>Internet Movie Database, Filming locations, ibid.</ref>