The tone of the movie was too negative

I've seen many versions of Tom Sawyer over the years, though not the 1920 silent, and I have to say that despite an overall able cast, this one fell short of the mark. It was negative in many ways, especially with the always irritated and hostile Becky Thatcher (also miscast in looks and seeming age), a Huck who seemed totally down on life (the way the lines were written, not the acting). Hannibal was conceived as a really primitive bunch of shacks (I've been to Hannibal and everything indicated it was a nice river town with painted houses and gardens during Twain's youth and the magical hill that he described as the place the kids loved to play on was still intact).The whitewashing scene seemed both rushed and cut short, and there are other things but this is long enough.

There just wasn't the sense of joy and fun one usually finds in Tom Sawyer adaptations.
I think perhaps the director was striving for some kind of "realism" but in the process, lost the spirit of the piece.