WHAT SILENTS & PRE-CODES HAVE YOU SEEN LATELY?

[Robert Regan]

Thanks, Theresa, those tests are great. Timeless is the word, Wendy. These lovely young ladies, most probably no longer with us, look so alive.

[intothenitrate]

Back to my Warren William movies again.

Hey CCF. I guy I know who has been sharing titles from his (enormous classic movie) catalog wrote to his mailing list to inform us that he was hanging it up. We've got a week to get in our final choices.

You and I have shared an appreciation for Warren William on more than one occasion. I have him in Skyscraper Souls, Employee's Entrance, The Match King, and (the goofy) Satan Met a Lady, among others. I would like to include one more title of William's in this last acquisition, and would really appreciate a recommendation from you. Of the films you've watched, which one would cite as "indispensable Warren William?"

[feaito]

Back to my Warren William movies again.

Hey CCF. I guy I know who has been sharing titles from his (enormous classic movie) catalog wrote to his mailing list to inform us that he was hanging it up. We've got a week to get in our final choices.

You and I have shared an appreciation for Warren William on more than one occasion. I have him in Skyscraper Souls, Employee's Entrance, The Match King, and (the goofy) Satan Met a Lady, among others. I would like to include one more title of William's in this last acquisition, and would really appreciate a recommendation from you. Of the films you've watched, which one would cite as "indispensable Warren William?"

Excusez-Moi for intruding here guys, but an absolute must-see & have among his early films besides some of the above mentioned is "The Mouthpiece" (1932).

My two cents.

[feaito]

Saw this 1922 Kodak color footage on FaceBook...just get pass the ad in the beginning:

Madame La Maven. Wonderful sequences....The lady in the last sequence is Mae Murray. Never had seen her in color. What a treat!

[Robert Regan]

Surely Murray's most subtle performance on film!

[feaito]

Surely Murray's most subtle performance on film!

[intothenitrate]

Thanks Fealto. I'm at work now, but I'll check the list to see if that one's on there. Also looking to hear back from CCF.

[charliechaplinfan]

Never mind the site going down, I couldn't get back on to answer your query any quicker. It's difficult with Warren William, there are many that are very good, I recently watched The Beauty and the Boss but he's a little overshadowed by Marian Marash, my choice would be either The Mouthpiece or The Mind Reader, both are quick moving, precode delights. Any chance of getting two or three movies off him? There are some others out there which are available to buy which I'm sure you know of Lady for a Day, Golddiggers of 33 and Imitation of Life. He really made some classics in this time period.

Thanks to a friend I got to watch a Ann Dvorak precode The Strange Love of Molly Louvain an early picture from Michael Curtiz wit hnot one lull in it. Ann Dvorak plays a girl engaged to a rich boy but once his mother finds out she whisks him away to Europe leaving Molly selling cigarettes in a kiosk in a hotel foyer, she falls into the clutches of Nick Grant (played by her husband Leslie Fenton) whilst being loved from afar by Rochard Cromwell. Nick is a bad boy who pulls a job with her and Cromwell in the car. They escape and move into digs and next door lives a journalist trying to make a name for himself and hot on the heels of Molly Louvain played by Lee Tracy. Say no more. All that and Lee Tracy to cap it off.

[Robert Regan]

Alison, now I've really got to see Beauty and the Boss. Marian Marsh is extraordinarily pretty, but I can't imagine her overshadowing anyone, least of all Warren William!

[JackFavell]

I saw an early Capra film, The Power of the Press from 1928.

It was good, not great. The best scenes are at the beginning, when we see Douglas Fairbanks, Jr. as the big city newspaper's new weatherman, who dreams of getting that 'big story' that will put him over as a real crime reporter. The visual clues as to his status at the paper at the beginning of the film are a riot, very funny, showing what a newbie he is, and his rivalry with veteran newspaperman Dell Henderson is a hoot. I love Henderson's portly presence, he adds great character to the films he's in, as does Spottiswoode Aitken as the scraggly sports editor. The story is the flimsiest of excuses for a movie. I swear I've seen the shot of stacks of newspapers, going up up up over the conveyor belt and back down a hundred times in other movies, I wondered if this was where it originated? It was about the most exciting thing in the movie.

Boy reporter longs for big break, gets it when he sees pretty young girl (Jobyna Ralston, who hardly has a thing to do) climbing out the window of a murder victim's home. She turns out to be the daughter of a politician, running for mayor, his rival is actually responsible for the death and they've framed the daughter so her father will lose the election. Boy reporter falls for girl, goes to great lengths to find real killer (mustachio'd Wheeler Oakman), who's got a gal who knows everything holed up in a hideout out of town. Boy gets smarter, finds gangster moll (a very good Mildred Davis), who is fed up with being held captive, and brings her and the rest of the gang in under arrest. They confess all and the boy finds himself engaged to beautiful girl. Not much, it barely held my attention, but was a good time waster. Very predictable.

[charliechaplinfan]

I really enjoy Marian Marsh in movies but I've only seen her in precodes she's marvellous in Svengali, I think she was partly named after Mae Marsh.

I've watched a couple of Capra silents but they haven't grasped me at all, perhaps he needed sound or perhaps he was honing his craft. One thing is certain I do love Frank Capra's talkies.

[JackFavell]

I was a little surprised that I had trouble sticking with it. Usually his films are eminently watchable. The newspaper part was the best, but the rest ....meh. I actually had to watch in installments, because I got bored with it and would drift off. The filmmaking skills are there, but the story was dull.

[Ann Harding]

I really agree with that, all the silent Capras I watched were well below the quality of his early talkies. Like you say, he needed dialogue to get on!

[Robert Regan]

Alison, I think you're right about Capra. There are a number of major American directors who had some success in silents, but did not really find themselves until sound. In his beautiful book on John Ford, Andrew Sarris suggested, rightly I think, that if the Master's career had ended in 1929, he would be only a footnote today. I also feel that, in spite of some high points in silents, Alfred Hitchcock (forgive me for categorizing him as an American) did not become Alfred Hitchcock until the sound era. And though movies like Fazil and Fig Leaves are not without some charm, the first real Howard Hawks picture most certainly is The Dawn Patrol.

Ann, I'm not sure if the additional factor of dialogue was crucial here. Perhaps with Capra and Hawks, but Ford and Hitchcock both remained essentially silent film directors throughout their careers. I'd really like to hear the thoughts of others on this.

Then, of course, there are many directors who were not successful masking the transition to sound, like Fred Niblo, Alan Crosland, Charles Brabin, Herbert Brenon, and Rex Ingram. Off hand, I can only think of two who were absolute masters before sound who continued to make great films afterwards, Ernst Lubitsch and Frank Borzage!

Though film is only a bit over a hundred years old, there is still so much to enjoy and think about. Can you imagine what it must be like for the art historian or literary scholar?

[JackFavell]

Raoul Walsh, Clarence Brown, C.B. DeMille, King Vidor, Allan Dwan all transitioned smoothly, though I think Dwan made only a few really big movies after sound. He made tons of B's though.

Hawks probably would have done fine without sound, but his films are just a delight to listen to. I can't really imagine him becoming one of the most respected directors without sound.

Vidor transitioned, but I would say that his films totally changed after about 1935, he never again had that brilliance which his early more visual films exhibited.

Lewis Milestone is another who transitioned well, but he didn't really hit his stride until 1928 or so, with Betrayal and The Racket, so I am not sure that he is a very good example.

Walsh to me is the exception to the rule, along with Ford.... he's just as good either way before sound and after. Ford did some really marvelous silents, but his work is far greater after sound, I'll agree. Borzage and Lubitsch had both done exceptional work continuously in silents and went right on. Then of course there's Laurel and Hardy... but that's another fine mess you've gotten me into...

I absolutely agree about certain directors essentially making silents right along into the sound era. Vidor at least till 35, Ford, Walsh, Borzage, Brown, continued with extremely visual cues in their films, lots of extended scenes with no dialogue at all. These to me are the most impressive directors, my favorites actually.