the silent film thread

Enoch Arden (1911) is one of the more formally intriguing Griffith shorts... first two-reeler? (It was shown in two parts due to exhibitors refusal to run it all for one admission.)

More closeups, particularly when the departing seafarer's lips can be read telling his wife "I'll come back."

https://backtothepastweb.wordpress.com/2017/03/05/enoch-arden-1911/

Coeur fidèle (Epstein, 1923) is playing this weekend at the National Gallery of Art, with accompaniment by Alloy Orchestra. Is anyone else going?

no, but same show tnite at Lincoln Center

good performance -- not sure it's a *great* film but an absorbing and stylish one

A standard melodrama, told through breakneck cutting and editing. And I still haven't heard an Alloy Orchestra accompaniment I didn't like.

You know you're watching Laurel & Hardy's Bacon Grabbers with a specialized audience when Edgar Kennedy gets a hand on his entrance. (In other shorts, so did James Finlayson and Jean Harlow.)

nerds

watched Griffith's True Heart Susie yesterday -- only Lillian Gish can convincingly pour her secrets out to her cow.

I'm midway through watching Intolerance right now and wow is it confusing, even more than was expected, was DW Griffith on a coke bender or something?

This is wonderful news for the silent film community. @tcm affirms its commitment to our arcane art form by appointing a leading scholar in the field, Jacqueline Stewart (@ProfJStewart), as the host of its weekly Silent Sunday Night program.https://t.co/h5lcSYgAJX

— Dave Kehr (@dave_kehr) September 10, 2019

Cool

Very pleased by this development. Let's hope it's matched by programming of films outside of the rather short list of silent titles TCM keeps rotating.

Motion Picture Classic September 1928 recently came
across this article entitled, "Is Time Rotting Our Film Records?"
by LynnFairfield, which was basically a true prophecy of the future loss of the films being made at that time. Fascinating read pic.twitter.com/QtEUwXuW0j

— cyprian du faur (@Cyprian_DF) September 10, 2019

there is a Harry Langdon fest this weekend in Fremont CA

http://nilesfilmmuseum.org/?tv=4997833899900928

https://silver.afi.com/Browsing/EventsAndExperiences/EventDetails/0000000011

The 2019 AFI Silver Silent Cinema Showcase. (I've a bone to pick with the programmer over certain reruns, but I am going to order a series pass as soon as I can log in to their web page.)

New podcast episode!

What did film SOUND like in the "silent era"? Film scholars Rick Altman and @SignalsToNoises take us on a sonic journey back in time.https://t.co/H9F67NNc6q

— Phantom Power (@PhantomPod) November 1, 2019

https://silver.afi.com/Browsing/Movies/Details/f-0100002740

AFI Silver has just announced that Friday's screening of The Oyster Princess is going to be free. Anyone else interested in going?

my friend has written an Arbuckle book

https://travsd.wordpress.com/2019/12/16/rediscovering-roscoe-a-terrific-new-book-on-the-films-of-fatty-arbuckle/

Thompson checks in with '29

http://www.davidbordwell.net/blog/2019/12/26/the-ten-best-films-of-1929/

Ben Model streaming a silent-comedy watch party Sunday at 3pm Eastern time

https://www.silentfilmmusic.com/streaming-a-silent-film-show/

great idea, definitely watching. ta for the tip.

bump

in 5 mins

enjoyed that, the lofi-ness of the presentation fit with the films somehow. could do without the mouse pointer on screen though lol.

Aaaaand Maryland theaters (and restaurants) have been ordered completely closed as of 5pm today. Just as AFI was about to open its Fox Film Corporation 1915-1935 series.

also sunk: the MoMA Edison/Biograph series

first 'official' show this Sunday w/ three shorts; they will rerun the Hank Mann vehicle

https://www.silentfilmmusic.com/watch-party-01/

Watched Ford's Four Sons las night, a rather sprawling WWI narrative for a 96-minute film. His last silent? Certainly shows the Murnau influence, and the strength/bluntness of the actors' gestures shows perhaps why vets like him (he made silents for get accused of allowing hammy performances in the talkie era... it worked well here, and was probably hard to throw out of your toolkit.

one of the most dreamlike of films

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AfmH7WyWXg8

Ben Model stream begins in 3 minutes

update: they've experienced a YT snafu

search on YT for "the Silent Comedy Watch Party"

now set for 3:30 pm EDT

this is the new link

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2UE0j2WeFbo&feature=youtu.be&fbclid=IwAR0zbjXxfGc3-JFxPKe3LQqGmVwT3m89K6zi6IVnIYXeUlzzTZyKyxEznGI

oh, just search

I've been slowly watching Haxan in installments over the past few months. Really hit the spot this morning

this weekend's show (will be archived):

https://www.silentfilmmusic.com/watch-party-02/

today's program:

https://www.silentfilmmusic.com/watch-party-5/

An empty Paris.
A world on the verge of stopping completely.

No it's not today, it is 1925's sublime PARIS QUI DORT (THE CRAZY RAY) by René Clair. With English intertitles (and French sub). It's for free, it's avalailable worldwide & it's only on Henrihttps://t.co/CZAV3LVE94 pic.twitter.com/ak0TrcdP5C

— La Cinémathèque (@cinemathequefr) May 5, 2020

Thank you, will watch this tonight (aka At 3:25).

Harold Lloyd fuels his Model T with stolen heroin around 15:00 here (the short is one of his best)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v1-kR7o34cA

also little Sunshine Sammy Morrison, later of Our Gang, steals all his scenes, and no racial stereotyping

Harold Lloyd On Heroin would be a good band name.

btw there is now The Roscoe Arbuckle Appreciation Society easily findable on FB, tons of links to online films

triggers: mother-in-law, cat in oven, man eating dishware (and that's just the first 8 minutes)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4kR5ouegUmg

^This film was selected to the National Film Registry, Library of Congress, in 1995.

with an accent on Biograph:

During the month of August, we’ll be streaming treasures from MoMA’s film archive and sharing fascinating cinema history—with a new selection of films released each Thursday. We’ve chosen films that everyone—from famous filmmakers and actors, curators and eminent scholars, to high school students just discovering cinema studies—asks to see again and again. You’re gonna get a little Warhol, a lotta Dada, and more about the landmark early Biograph studio than you knew you wanted to know.

https://www.moma.org/calendar/exhibitions/5239

After a recent series of events, I've decided to embark on a strange writing project involving shorts, and boy did reading this thread make me miss Morbz and wish he was here to advise.

sorry, silent shorts. I smoked some weed.

I’ve been slowly going through the Buster Keaton shorts when he played second fiddle to Fatty Arbuckle. My brother noted that Keaton definitely outshone Arbuckle (the bigger star at the time) from nearly the beginning, especially with his physical skills. He hasn’t quite hit on the Great Stone Face yet but his star talent makes him far more compelling than Arbuckle’s cornier comedy.

So, <I>Safety Last!</I> is pretty great. Who knew?

https://www.wbur.org/artery/2021/07/08/alloy-orchestra-has-disbanded

Creative differences.

"After three decades, Alloy Orchestra is no more. Winokur has exited; Donahue and keyboardist Roger Miller, who joined in 1998 after Sampson’s death, continue on under a new moniker, Anvil Orchestra. Larry Dersch, who’d played with Miller in a previous band, Trinary System, will take Winokur’s spot in the new group."

"Winokur, who started thinking about leaving the Alloys in late 2018, continues on with another film scoring outfit, the Psychedelic Cinema Orchestra, specializing in music that accompanies short films made by Ken Brown during the late 1960s for rock club The Boston Tea Party. He’s joined by Jonathan LaMaster and, at present, Vapors of Morphine saxophonist Dana Colley."

I've loved every Alloy Orchestra accompaniment I've heard (haters who refer to the "Annoy Orchestra" can suck my left one).

i'm in a silent movie kind of mood this week. i don't want to hear people yapping. i've been watching stuff on the criterion channel: harold lloyd shorts, hitchcock's the lodger.