WHAT SILENTS & PRE-CODES HAVE YOU SEEN LATELY?

[Gagman 66]

I have a lengthy review of THE RED MILL from March of 2007 when it debuted on TCM. I will try to round it up and post here. All I can say is I loved this movie from start to finish! I felt personally that it was every bit as good as SHOW PEOPLE, and THE PATS! I had waited to see this picture for seven years, and I was anything but disappointed! In-fact, it far exceeded my expectations! The print was beautiful, The story was cleaver, the supporting cast tremendous! The film itself was laugh out loud funny! The new score by Michael Picton outstanding! What more could you have wanted?

I was pleased that Warner Archive released the film, but don't anticipate seeing THE PATSY or SHOW PEOPLE released in this way. I thought those would probably be included as part of the long post-poned King Vidor Box-set instead. I would love for TCM to score a few more Davies Silents. Especially, THE FAIR CO-ED, and THE CARDBOARD LOVER. BEVERLY OF GRAUSTARK (1926) was Marion's most successful Silent for MGM. And I really liked TILLIE THE TOILER too. Any of those would be very good choices. Wonderful to see Marion featured as Star of the day in Augest. However, that would have been the perfect time to premier something new.

[Gagman 66]

My Review of THE RED MILL from April 9th 2007:


A Priceless Treasure Unearthed!


Wow! I am left totally breathless! This long forgotten Silent Classic made it's World Television Premier tonight on TCM here in the states! I had waited to see this comedy for a long time, but it vastly exceeded my wildest expectations! What a marvelous Easter gift!

Firstly the print seems to have been digitally restored, and is one of the finest looking Silent film restorations ever! Almost 100% of it is totally pristine from start to finish! The photography is often breath taking! TCM really outdid themselves with this one!

So was Roscoe Arbuckle a true comic genius, and a brilliant director? Beyond doubt! This film is an absolute delight equal to anything done by the big three Chaplin, Keaton, and Lloyd, during the 1920's! Truly a Masterpiece of Comedy! I laughed until I could barely breathe! The screenplay is credited to the great Francis Marion, but the film is all Arbuckle!

laugh.gif The story is so outrageous, and perhaps at times slightly predictable, but it is such great fun, none of that even matters! It hooks you quickly and reel's you in right away! The well trained pet Mouse that lives in a shoe, (a worn one at that), is always up to something! Imagine anyone coming up with anything that original today? Forget about it!

Marion Davies who I have dubbed as "The Mistress of Pantomime" is simply phenomenal! Her performance here as Tina, an overworked Dutch maid is equal to anything she ever did in her entire career! So overall you may ask, is THE RED MILL as good as Marion's two best know Silent films from the following year THE PATSY, and SHOW PEOPLE? You bet it is! Maybe even better! I continue to be blown away at the degree of excellence of Ms. Davies films! The ones I have seen are all outstanding!

The supporting cast of THE RED MILL was tremendous! Owen Moore, Big Karl Dane, Louise Fazenda, and Snitz Edwards, hard to beat that group! This film was apparently a huge success for MGM in late 1926-early '27, but has not been widely seen at anytime since! A genuine buried treasure, that is just now seeing the light of day again! Shinning as brightly as ever too!

Michael Picton, who won the Annual TCM Young Film composers competition with this excellent score for Garbo's THE TEMPTRESS, in 2005 turns up again here. At first I thought the score was going to be a real downer, but much of it, as it turned out was quite good! This is a guy TCM needs to keep around for other projects! Films like THE FIRE BRIGADE (1927), and THE COSSACKS (1928), need musical scores, and they needed them yesterday!

I personally feel that Picton's score to THE TEMPTRESS ranks second only to Marcus Sojwell inspired effort on the SOULS FOR SALE (1923), score last year, in the history of this competition! Both these guy's should be used allot to score some of the other MGM, Warner Brothers and First National Silent's stashed away in the vast TCM vault! They are mighty gifted guys! True Picton's score to THE RED MILL may be somewhat anti-typical, but it works!

Hey, who knows what other wondrous finds are still lost in obscurity, but hopefully soon to be unveiled to the world once more! That big TCM vault could still be chuck full of them?

[charliechaplinfan]

I've been reeading a biography of Howard Hawks. I read the chapter about Scarface and knew I just had to see it. We're somewhat numbed to the death counts in gangster films these days (the 1980's Scarface being one of these, bearing little resemblence to this movie) I can see what had Jason Joy and Will Hayes up in arms but it doesn't glorify the gangster. Tony Camonte is a despicable man, as are all his cohorts but it is great entertainment, the story with his sister might have ignited temperatures a bit further. I thought the direction was excellent and through reading the book I could see the motive of X appearing throughout the film. I was a little unsure of Paul Muni as a gangster, but his performance was good. I was even less sure of George Raft, I'm presuming this is before he became famous. He looks a little like Valentino but doesn't really have a personality, I find it difficult to see what it was about him. The Hawks biography mentioned that he was so greatful to Howard Hawks and it sounds like he was the kind of actor he needed a good director to get a good performance out of him. Admittedly I have seen little of his other performances, so I am not the best judge. I liked him in Some Like it Hot.

I'm now watching Twentieth Century.

[feaito]

We are alike Alison, while reading Hawks' biography I wanted to see again each of the movies profiled in the different chapters!

[charliechaplinfan]

I've just seen Twentieth Century, it's was much better than I remembered it. One thing the Hawks book brought home to me was the pairing of Barrymore and Lombard. John Barrymore's reputation went before him and Carole was called on to spar with him and in one scene kick at him, she had starred in films but this was the film that made her. The Hawks book is great but aggravating because it seems that Howard Hawks has claimed credit for a lot of things over the years, some can be proved, some are plainly false and others, well who knows. He seems to have been central to getting a brilliant performance out of Carole Lombard. I'm getting quite fond of John Barrymore, his reputation for being a drunkard precedes him these days but from the films I've seen his other reputation as a great actor is equally true. i think Oscar Jaffe pips it as his best performance. A pity it didn't give his career a shot in the arm.

I just loved the guy who was running up and down the train putting Repent stickers everywhere. That's the kind of added that really makes me laugh.

[myrnaloyisdope]

CCF - Scarface is pretty grand stuff, might be my favorite pre-code gangster film, though Beast of the City is right there too. Muni's performance is pretty remarkable given the fact that he was an unknown, and that he was pretty much the antithesis of Tony Carmonte in real-life. Love the chemistry between him and Ann Dvorak, absolutely compelling yet reprehensible at the same time. As for George Raft, well he's more or less a still but he sure looks good on camera, and the coin-flip became one of his trademarks...even being parodied in Some Like It Hot. I'd much rather watch this version than the Pacino one. Ooh, if you watched the DVD, did you check out the alternate ending? It's so heavy-handed and over the top that it would've undermined the rest of the film.

I watched a few silents in the past couple weeks:

The Racket - Another silent gangster film capitolizing on the success of von Sternberg's Underworld. Thomas Meighan is the tough and no-nonsense cop who goes up against Louis Wolheim's gangster and city corruption. Marie Prevost is the tough dame who brings it all down. George E. Stone plays Wolheim's younger brother and goes from being a fresh faced college kid to a lechorous drunk in no time, thus provided the impetus for Wolheim's downfall. I found the plot somewhat convoluted as it turns from a simple redemption story about Meighan into a complex series of interactions that lead to the destruction of a political machine. Stone's turn from nice guy to moron is a little hard to take, and Prevost doesn't get enough to do. In the end Wolheim turns yellow, and his attempts to buy his way and legally maneuvre his way out are rebuffed.

I think what I've realized about the pre-Public Enemy gangster films is that the plot usually goes to great lengths to make the gangsters seem yellow, from Cagney's snivelling snitch in Doorway To Hell, to Chester Morris' ridiculous breakdown (I mean he's practically crying) in Alibi. I understand why this was done (in order to make crime seem unappealing) but I find it undermines the character development of the gangsters. So all of the sudden this tough hoodlum who's fought and scraped his way to success turns totally p*ssy at the sight of a copper pulling his gun. It's hard to take.

I also have issues with the idea of cops breaking the law as in The Racket when in a climactic scene, the cops rip up the Habeus Corpus writ produced by Wolheim's lawyer. Even if the legal system is being used and abused, I find the idea of a cop breaking the law reprehensible. The ends don't justify the means...despite what Dirty Harry has taught us.

Haxan: Witchcraft Throughout the Ages: Pretty grand pseudo-documentary from Benjamin Christensen. It's my first of his films, and I was very impressed. There's some great photograpy and composition, and I really liked the blending of past and present to tell the story. I found the documentary aspects to be the most fascinating as some of the artwork is very compelling. I've always found the middle ages fascinating so to see old images from the time, as well as torture devices of the era is pretty compelling. As a modern viewer the documentary component is doubly fascinating because the film is from 1922. So I felt I was watching history unfold despite the fact that there was a 400 year difference between the materials shown and the actual filming.

As for the dramatic aspects, I thought they were well handled. I was a little disappointed that the film wasn't strictly a documentary, but the individual scenarios were all quite engaging. I also found the sympathetic portrayal of mental illness in the finale to be quite surprising. Essentially Christensen points out that in days of yore, mental illness was often seen as a sign of witchcraft, but in the modern age things like sleepwalking, kleptomania, twitching and nervous tic aren't seen the same way. I haven't seen such a sympathetic portrayal of mental illness in such an early film.

The Land Beyond the Sunset - Another film from the National Film Registry, this film really knocked me off my feet. It's a one-reeler from 1912, sponsered by the New York Fresh Air Fund, a group devoted to providing outdoor opporunities for city kids. The film focuses on a poor newsboy who's abused by his alcoholic grandmother (she beats him and takes his money). Eventually he ends up going on a day trip to a oceanside with the Fresh Air Fund. There he picnics with other kids and organizers, and is eventually read a story about a poor boy who is abused by a witch, and eventually with the help of fairies is able to escape and sale to the Land Beyond the Sunset. Whilst hearing the story, the boy pictures his grandmother, and in a great superimposition she is shown beating him, and it appears the boy's mind is made up. So while everyone leaves he sneaks off to the oceanshore and finds a boat and sails off to the Land Beyond the Sunset. The final shot is this lone boy on a tiny boat, amidst the vast ocean, with the sun setting in the distance.

Here's a screenshot:



Just a brilliant ending, that totally resonated with my recurring fantasy to escape the real world somehow. The ending is made infinitely more surprising (and powerful) due to the fact that the film is from 1912, is 13 minutes long, and was designed as a promotional film. Anyway it's a glorious little gem, that thankfully is available in the Treasures of the American Film Archives boxset.

[charliechaplinfan]

I did check the alternative ending on Scarface, I pity the poor people who had that ending. It's so obviously tacked on and Paul Muni is nowhere to be seen. I did find his accent unusual at first, it didn't sound quite what I'd call Italian American but what do I know, I've probably seen too many modern gangster movies. The modern Scarface was too bloody for my liking.

I was very impressed with Haxan when I watched it, I was enthralled by the storytelling.

[phil noir]

Just recently I've been having a mini-Janet Gaynor and Charles Farrell film festival. On Saturday I watched Seventh Heaven (1927), which - well, what is there to say about it that hasn't been said? - I absolutely loved it! It's no surprise it was a huge hit in its day and made Gaynor and Farrell big stars. Comedy, romance, apparent tragedy, redemption: what more could you want?

The story and characters seemed peculiarly suited to a silent film somehow. Charles Farrell working in the sewers didn't seem to matter when you couldn't hear the slosh of the drain water. And Janet Gaynor's fear that when he asked her to stay, Farrell would expect her to share his bed was so delicately done by gesture and apprehension; dialogue would have killed it stone dead.

Then last night I dug out an old tape I had of Sunnyside Up (1929). Hard to believe now, but it was actually broadcast on U.K. television, back in the early '90s. It was Gaynor and Farrell's joint talkie debut, a musical comedy with songs and script by DeSylva, Brown and Henderson. Creaky, of course, but very charming, not least because of the distinct lack of singing ability from either of the stars. Good songs: If I Had a Talking Picture of You; I'm a Dreamer; Picking Petals Off a Daisy; and the title song with its cheerful, surreal lyrics ("Stand up on your legs/Be like two fried eggs/Keep your sunny side up")

[charliechaplinfan]

I think British TV has changed a great deal since the early '90s. I can't imagine any channel putting on that kind of film these days, more's the pity.

Seventh Heaven is a lovely movie, wonderfully done, dialogue would have killed it stone dead.

[phil noir]

I think British TV has changed a great deal since the early '90s. I can't imagine any channel putting on that kind of film these days, more's the pity.

It certainly has. I find it amazing to think that Kevin Brownlow's Hollywood - The Pioneers was originally shown at nine p.m., on a weeknight, on ITV. I remember watching it when I was at school. The idea that ITV would do anything like that now is just mind-boggling!

[charliechaplinfan]

ITV, my goodness it's changed so much and not for the better. Hollywood is a great series, I find it such a shame that people like Kevin Brownlow cannot get their products to a popular market anymore. You would think with the increase in digital channels there would be more place for niche programmes. BBC4 does some good programming but very little on classic movies nevermind silents.

[myrnaloyisdope]

I have the wonderful 2-DVD set of The Life Story of David Lloyd George from the Welsh film archive, and in the Kevin Brownlow interview on the disc he talks about how attempts to show the film on British television were rebuffed because the film wasn't commercial enough. I mean here you have a film which had been unreleased for almost 80 years, and which Kevin Brownlow insists would have revolutionized British cinema, and the response was "no, thanks". Ugh, what a shame.

I was very surprised today to find one of the nation-wide sports networks showing the wonderful baseball documentary series "When It Was A Game", a compilation of old 8mm and 16mm baseball footage taken from 1925-1961. This is the kind of thing that used to get shown with some regularity in the the early-mid 1990's, but has since been completely neglected in favor of poker, endless sports highlights and crummy attempts at comedy and hipness.

Even the so-called artsy network, Showcase has resorted to showing blockbuster movies every weekend. I'm immensely thankful that TCM exists (even with their limitations) simply because no one else seems to be willing to do what they do.

[Gagman 66]

Justin,

Hey, there has been no evidence that you ever received any of the movies that I sent you several weeks ago. I have not heard anything from you, and you haven't reviewed any of the titles here either? Please keep me updated.

Everyone,

Incidentally, I already have the John Gilbert set. Flicker Alley sent out advance copies. because we pre-ordered directly from them last month.. Again the $10.00 discount is still valid for another week or two I believe? Still you had better hurry. I received mine on Monday.

Last night I watched MONTE CRISTO, and while the ending was somewhat disappointing the film overall was amazingly good! Gilbert probably gives one his finest and most dramatic performances. A young and exceptionally beautiful at the time Renee Adoree Jack''s future co-star in THE BIG PARADE, THE SHOW, and THE COSSACKS, has a small part in MONTE CRISTO. My mouth literally dropped half-way to the floor when I saw her in the film, She looked so stunning! Wow! Never had seen Renee look like that before. and I love her in all her films. I would post the captures here, but they are to large, and already reduced in size considerably.


Oh, how I hope there is a print of HONOR FIRST someplace so we can see John Gilbert's first pairing with Renee as his leading lady. The picture looks rather soft here, but most of the film is quite sharp. Although not as good a quality as BARDELYS THE MAGNIFICENT. There are repeated Jump-Cuts. Apparently, this is what is left of a 1927 re-issue print of MONTE CRISTO, not the original 1922 release. And it was found in th Czech republic like HIS HOUR. The Vidor film is much more escapist type fun by comparison. The earlier picture is a very serious movie and Gilbert gives one of his best dramatic performances.

The Mini-documentary is fascinating. Even if it doesn't actually contain any film footage, only Stills. Basically Gilbert's daughter reflecting on her Father. It would be nice if TCM would eventually run the footage, and expand it by another 45 minutes or so, with clips from some of the really rare films

I'll probably catch some flack for saying this? To be honest, I was rather disappointed at first in the new Mont Alto Motion Orchestra score to BARDELYS. Especially after I had heard such raves from the live performance at the Annual Kansas Silent film Festival back in February. So I was expecting allot. I actually liked the Antonio Coppolla piano score used on the France 3 Broadcast quite a bit better. However, the second half of the Mont Alto score really picks up the pace significantly and is excellent. I thought their selections on the first half of the picture didn't work well with the movie at all, and were frankly rather dull. The score didn't seem to be going anyplace. Almost like night and day with the second half of the film though. In any case, both scores are included in this DVD set so that definitely makes it nice.

[myrnaloyisdope]

Jeffrey,

I received the DVDs about 10 days ago. I haven't watched anything yet, primarily because I'm working through some films on my hard drive.

[Gagman 66]

Everyone,

Just follow this link to the Renee Adoree fan group on VLN, and you can see the captures from MONTE CRISTO.

http://vintagelifenetwork.ning.com/grou ... neeadorree