WHAT SILENTS & PRE-CODES HAVE YOU SEEN LATELY?

[feaito]

Birdy, It's OOP but some laser disc and VHS editions are being sold on E-bay and Amazon. A friend shared with me her copy.

[drednm]

I have a copy also from a friend. Hollywood is a truly great. Kevin Brownlow told me a DVD update was in the works but didn't look good because of money. So don't hold your breath.

[Ann Harding]

I have enjoyed a silent feast during the past few days.

The Return of Draw Egan (1916, Wm S. Hart) is a splendid western where William is a reformed outlaw and becomes marshall in a small town called Yellow Dog. He accepts the post as he is in love with a young lady (Marguery Wilson)... This is my 6th Wm S. Hart picture and I can now see some similarities in the narrative: reformed outlaw, good girl vs. bad girl, wild small town. But somehow, Wm S. Hart is like a magnet to my eyes. It's not as good as Hell's Hinges, but a nice feature well crafted.

Skinner's Dress Suit (1926, Wm A. Seiter) with Reginald Denny & Laura La Plante. This is a very well made comedy about an suburban commuter (R. Denny). His wife (L. La Plante) would like him to get a raise; but no such luck, instead he gets the sack. Being afraid to tell his wife, he lies to her and she starts spending their savings on a dress suit and a new dress... I was impressed by the acting and pacing of this non-assuming comedy where Reginald Denny ends up in a terrible situation after spending all his money. The whole thing has zest and charm. Worth investigating.

American Aristocracy (1916, L. Ingraham) is a charming Douglas Fairbanks comedy where he gets to drive a car and fly a hydroplane. He has to fight some nasty (A. Parker) to win the lovely Jewel Carmen. Contains the usual mixture of agility, stunts, charm and acrobatics. Great!

Manhattan Madness (1916, A. Dwan) is again with Douglas Fairbanks a westerner visiting New York and complaining of boredom. His friends manage to show him that a city can have its share of madness. Dwan manages to give a mad pacing to the adventures of Steve O'Dare (DF). Again, absolutely charming with Doug giving a wink direct to the camera.

I recorded the newly restored Metropolis on Friday as it was broadcast live from Berlin on Arte TV. I will watch it ASAP. The score is the original Gottfried Huppertz one written for the film. The few bits I listened to sounds very good to me.

[pvitari]

I watched A Woman of Affairs which I recorded from TCM. I don't know how I managed to miss this one all these years considering that cast! Is it just me, or does Douglas Fairbanks Jr. almost steal the movie, even if his reasons for drinking were not exactly credible? I thought the acting was very fine all around (John Gilbert is still IMHO underappreciated as an actor) and absolutely gorgeous to look at -- I loved director Clarence Brown's fluid use of the camera -- but the storyline was more than a little silly. Especially the ending. (Yes, I know it was adapted from a novel that required numerous changes to make it acceptable for movie audiences.) At times I wanted to slap everyone upside the head a bit.

[MichiganJ]

I watched A Woman of Affairs...At times I wanted to slap everyone upside the head a bit....but the storyline was more than a little silly. Especially the ending.

I absolutely agree. But I also think Gilbert and Garbo have lost some of their chemistry especially considering how much heat they generated in Love and especially Flesh and the Devil. Fairbanks is pretty good and I also liked Dorothy Sebastian.

My essay on the film: http://digitalsilents.com/Digital_Silen ... fairs.html

[charliechaplinfan]

John Gilbert was MGM's biggest star at the time yet he took on the role of Neville and was quite happy for it to be Garbo's movie. That's a generous actor and like you say a good one too.

[feaito]

Thanks to Christine I saw "J'Accuse!" (1919). At 166 minutes it's a real tour de force by Abel Gance and an amazing achievement. It's hard to believe that this movie was filmed in 1918. It's so full of innovations and uses modern cinematic language. I saw the first two parts on a big screen, but had to watch the third part on my TV set, since the DVD player of the projection room "refused" to play the 2nd disc! Also, I did not realize until watching the third part that the movie had English subs, but in this way I've realized that my understanding of written French has improved The film is very allegorical and poetic and at the same time, gritty, grim, harsh and very,very dramatic; it's main subject: WAR, and its ultimate uselessness in terms of loss of human lives is still very pertinent. The best pacifist/Anti-War film I've seen along with Bernard's "Les Croix de Bois" (Wooden Crosses) (1932) and Milestone's "All Quiet on the Western Front" (1930). I know both WW were terrible, but I've always found something more horrific about WWI. I was just in awe of Séverin-Mars excellent, complex performance. Thanks for sharing this masterpiece with me Christine.

[Ann Harding]

I am really happy to read your reaction, Fernando. The Flicker Alley print is truly superb. Seen on a big screen, it's even more breathtaking. I hope you'll enjoy La Roue as much as this one.

[feaito]

I am really happy to read your reaction, Fernando. The Flicker Alley print is truly superb. Seen on a big screen, it's even more breathtaking. I hope you'll enjoy La Roue as much as this one.

I'm looking forward to watching "La Roue", but that one will need several bookings , since I believe it runs over 4 hours.

[MichiganJ]

After reading Christine's review of J'Accuse after seeing it at Pordenone, I re-watched the DVD hoping to get more from it than on my initial viewing. While I think it is good, I still find it difficult to see J'Accuse as an indictment of war per se.

The real plot of the film centers around the love triangle between Jean, François and Edith and most of the action takes place in their village. Consider the middle section, where Jean is able to leave the war in order to tend to his dying mother. Soon François is on leave, too, and the love triangle starts up again as the war itself wages on.

The justly famous and often excerpted sequence where the dead rise, feels like it's from another movie entirely and is unearned because Gance barely shows the carnage of war. His early attempts at quick editing during the war sequences, while technically interesting, does nothing to show one the actual horrors endured by the soldiers. In the trenches, Jean and François seem to smoke a lot and pine for home, but their actual suffering is barely shown. It's also interesting that one of the accusations made by the risen dead is infidelity. Isn't that the basis of the entire plot? Edith is having an affair with Jean and François knows.

To me, the character that suffers the most is Edith, and her story is the most interesting. But her character is manipulated as a mere plot device to reignite the love triangle.

These are just quibbles, by the way. I really enjoyed the film both times through and, especially in the context of when it was made, it's quite an achievement. But, with the exception of that stellar risen dead sequence, and the final indictment by Jean (which I love), it's hard for me to see J'Accuse as an anti-war film.

[Ann Harding]

Actually MichiganJ, this was exactly my own reservations about the film when I discovered it on the Flicker DVD. This is true that the film is very ambiguous in its condemnation of war per-se. You have to realise that Gance started it during the war and he had the cooperation of the army. So it's pretty obvious that he slightly shifted his original indictment of the Germans to the indictment of war itself. But, that said, we have to realise that the film came out just after WWI. People didn't have much time to really come to terms with death, ravage and hatred for the enemy. All Quiet was made and written much later. And if you compare J'accuse with the American films of the time about war, it's head and shoulders above the American fare. Taking into account these shortcomings, the film itself remains powerful. As I mentioned before, seen of a big screen (at a slower speed than the DVD), it had a very different effect on me. The masterful piano accompaniment by Stephen Horne certainly helped me to look at the film in a slightly different way. I also feel that on a big screen the acting takes on a different dimension. Séverin-Mars looks at time as if he is chewing the scenery on the DVD. Not so on a big screen. Beyond that, the film is absolutely gorgeous to look at. Léonce-Henry Burel was a master cinematographer, a real poet of the screen.

[charliechaplinfan]

I watched Today We Live, it's quite a mismatch of a movie, Joan Crawford being added to the mix to make it more worthy at the box office. The preview ran to 135 minutes, the film I watched ran to 113min. The script is a strange affair. It's hard to believe that Joan Crawford and Gary Cooper would openly declare their deep love for each other after exchanging a few glances across a cup of tea, nothing is done to build up their love and in the very next scene they're hopelessly in love, with Crawford feeling guilt because she's the fiancé of Robert Young. So it's hard to believe in this desperate romance.

Young's brother is the carefree Franchot Tone, while Robert Young gets his chance to do a fair share of emoting later in the film as his role expands. It's nice seeing these well-known actors at an early stage in their budding careers and still in their prime.

A must for Gary Cooper fans, he and Craford make a gorgeous couple, Crawford's admirers will find that she was at the height of her photogenic, sculptured beauty despite some odd dress designs by Adrian that don't suggest anything but the studio's line of glamor during the early '30s. She wears a boldly designed dress with a strange wing collar that has to be seen to be believed. Still I can usually look past the contemprorary dress in these pictures but some of her earlier designs are hilarious.

The actors all speak in clipped lines. "Good girl," says Franchot Tone on several occasions, trying to sound like Colonel Blimp, I suppose. And the others too adopt a strange way of clipping phrases so they sound more British.

It goes into darker territory in the later war scenes and there director Howard Hawks seems more at home. But for a film in which the Joan Crawford character was added as a last minute script change, she certainly gets her fair share of footage and dominates the first forty-five minutes. But the love angle is certainly a strange one. She treats Cooper with rude indifference several times during their first meeting although his behavior is that of the perfect gentleman. Shortly thereafter, she confesses she's in love with him. This makes the ending really strange and difficult to believe in, how could they be happy ever after when they know the sacrifice that had been made for them.

[charliechaplinfan]

I also watched Min and Bill, entertaining but very dated. I'd expected more from the chemistry between Marie Dressler and Wallace Beery, I'd thought they'd be playing a married couple for some reason but seeing them on screen the age difference is very apparent and the chemistry not apparent. I like the nice Beery, seldom have a seen him portraying a decent guy. I always like Marie Dressler, to not like her would be like not liking your granny. I'm going to give their other films a go.

I watched Gloria Swanson's very best silent last night (well that's my opinion from my very limited viewing). Sadie Thompson is a masterwork from the late silent era. Gloria really grasps the character of Sadie both as the good time girl and as the frightened reformed girl. It's very atomspheric, threatening in some places, gay in others. It's a pity the ending has never been recovered, Kino have given us the option of the ending from Joan Crawford's Rain (must watch that again) but putting into words doesn't convey what two actors like Swanson and Lionel Barrymore could have conveyed. Swanson, IMO, has never looked more beautiful.

[MichiganJ]

Actually MichiganJ, this was exactly my own reservations about the film when I discovered it on the Flicker DVD. This is true that the film is very ambiguous in its condemnation of war per-se. You have to realise that Gance started it during the war and he had the cooperation of the army. So it's pretty obvious that he slightly shifted his original indictment of the Germans to the indictment of war itself. But, that said, we have to realise that the film came out just after WWI. People didn't have much time to really come to terms with death, ravage and hatred for the enemy. All Quiet was made and written much later. And if you compare J'accuse with the American films of the time about war, it's head and shoulders above the American fare. Taking into account these shortcomings, the film itself remains powerful. As I mentioned before, seen of a big screen (at a slower speed than the DVD), it had a very different effect on me. The masterful piano accompaniment by Stephen Horne certainly helped me to look at the film in a slightly different way. I also feel that on a big screen the acting takes on a different dimension. Séverin-Mars looks at time as if he is chewing the scenery on the DVD. Not so on a big screen. Beyond that, the film is absolutely gorgeous to look at. Léonce-Henry Burel was a master cinematographer, a real poet of the screen.

I agree that J'Accuse works better when one takes it in the context of how and when it was made. I don't fault Gance for not showing the horrors of the war. Quite obviously most of the film's audience were more than aware of that and didn't need Gance to show them. But considering the film's length, a relatively short amount of time is actually spent in the war, and therefore, the entire final sequence seems out of balance.

As both Gance and D.W. Griffith had the "benefit" of shooting at the actual front lines, I think Griffith does do a better job at conveying the war in Hearts of the World, than Gance does in J'Accuse, even though much of Griffith's battle scenes are recreated. (Again, Gance doesn't need to, especially for his European audience, whereas Griffith does for his American audience.) Both of them, however, resort to melodramatic stories, which is understandable, and, interestingly, both have the German soldiers as being rapists key plot points. Where Griffith is more interested in a race-to-the-rescue finish to his story, Gance instead, pretty much abandons his story, and presents that awe-inspiring and very powerful final sequence. But J'Accuse could realistically end before that sequence, and sort of does. The sequence can, and often does, stand alone.

I wish I could see J'Accuse on the big screen, but that is unfortunately unlikely. The projection speed issue, for me, is unnoticeable. The DVD presentation seems visually correct and doesn't seem fast or slow.

[feaito]

Re: "J'Accuse!" (1919)...For me the Pacifist sentiment of the film had more pertinence than the love triangle between the three leads. The way Jean Diaz faced life at the beginning and how WWI changed and deeply scarred him is harrowing. I agree Kevin that Edith's character in a way is the most damaged of them all (brutalized by a husband, in love with another man, raped by the enemy and giving birth to a child, manipulated by her father, etc..), but we don't have to forget all the hell Jean and Francois lived through those 4 years in the trenches. BTW, María-Lazare's feelings towards the War reminded me of the German's teacher reaction to the declaration of War in "All Quiet on the Western Front" (1930), Old men who reminisce about "Old Glories" and can't see the evil in the whole concept of War. The men who actually fight in the war and who suffer it first-hand are the victims of the manipulation -many times- of megalomaniac leaders. One thing is to enter into a War to defend or protect your country from an actual aggression and one very different is to begin a War for plain glory, conquest, rule the world, etc. It's a controversial issue and to think that there are lots of businessmen who profit from War, that is really shameful. To win money and to get rich due to the suffering of people is amazingly evil and cruel. As I said before Severin-Mars' performance impressed me favorably, moreso than those of the other two leads (Jean and Edith). I feel Mars' role was much more difficult and complex.