WHAT SILENTS & PRE-CODES HAVE YOU SEEN LATELY?

[Western Guy]

Here's a question (and maybe my one complaint against THE CROWD). What if it had concluded on an unhappy note? Would that have added to the overall power of the film? Geez, I hate to think of myself as a pessimist but -- that happy ending, to me, kinda sucked, given all that had come before. Seemed to be building up to something that just didn't happen. As if Vidor said, let's throw all the crap we can at this nice but desperate guy but still bail him out at the end -- rarely a real life scenario. What if ALL QUIET ON THE WESTERN FRONT had ended with Lew Ayres not moving his fingers forward to touch that butterfly (granted, a marvelous piece of symbolism)? Would that film retain the power it still does today? Having just watched THE CROWD past the midnight hour (here in Canada), I enjoyed teasing myself with the thought would I have gone to bed so peacefully had the movie ended on a more dour note. I can say this: It's impact would have stayed with me longer.

Let's hear your thoughts about such "happy endings" in movies that overall don't proceed in that direction.

[JackFavell]

Personally, I don't see it as a happy ending at all, I see it as life continuing in a state of flux. Up, down, whatever it throws at you, and you just have to go on.

[charliechaplinfan]

I don't remember it as a happy ending either although I remember feeling a bit thrown by the ending, I didn't expect that ending but I didn't see it as a happy one but as a lull in the downs of their lives, if I remember, I need to watch it again too, although they had reconciled to go to watch a film, they still had all their issues unresolved, yet then ending does give us the chance of hope they could carry on together as best they can as is suggested here, rather than being driven further apart. Like I say I need to watch it again but that's how I remember feeling. Some of the shots from te movie I'll never forget, the men working in the office, the family at the beach, the child running to it's doom and the couple at the pictures at the end.

I don't know whether it's just me but some of the images from silent cinema resonate far more than anything seen in the talkies, yet I really don't know why this is.

[Western Guy]

True, I suppose. It does suggest that life does go on. But the fact that his wife decides to stay with him and they appear all laughs at the close, even as their figures become lost amongst the crowd, somehow doesn't quite ring true to me. Heck, if I may, that sure wasn't the case when my first marriage dissolved . . . and (horrors!) there was a family interference involved in that, too.

[charliechaplinfan]

Do you think it's the times? People were more likely to stay together through thick and thin because it was harder to go it alone in those days. I can't remember clearly, did they still have a child left at the end? I'm thinking they did but maybe I'm wrong.

[Western Guy]

Yep, their son is seen sitting with them at the theater at the end.

[charliechaplinfan]

I thought so, I really need to watch it again but I seem to remember feeling that it wasn't a certainty that the husband would keep his equilibrium but now I'm doubting my memory. The only thing I'm certain of is that it's a wonderful film. The other scene that stays in my mind is when she tells him she's pregnant, they fall out don't they? About little routine things? Life, the same things that we actually do fall out over but are usually too mundane for movies. But he comes back and she tells him, that I remember.

[Western Guy]

They just look sooooo happy in that final scene. There should have been just a shadow of doubt that either they might not stay together (due in no small part to those meddling brothers-in-law) or a suggestion that their relationship still needed a lot of repairing. Again, this is something that was very close to my own life and the shift in attitude from the wife prepared to walk out that afternoon to her having the time of her life next to her husband at the theater just does not ring true. A note of ambivalence would have helped.

[charliechaplinfan]

I really am going to have to watch it again, for a film I loved and had a huge impact, I've only seen it once.

[CineMaven]

SILENT KNIGHT...

[JackFavell]

Surprised they aren't showing Ben Hur this year, it's one of my favorites. Or did I miss it on the sched?

[CineMaven]

Hey Wen...nope, I didn't see it on the schedule. Is it more so Easter fare? I'm not sure how good the bio on him is.

[JackFavell]

Oh yeah, maybe it is more easterish. It's really great if you get a chance to see it. I don't know about the bio.

Happy Holidays! Have a great Christmas, T.

[charliechaplinfan]

I've heard differing reports on the Novarro biography, of course it's a story with a sad ending and that's put me off reading any further, a pity really because he was a good actor and an interesting man. Perhaps I should read it and stop before the final chapter.

[CineMaven]

That's one way to go Alison. His life must have been very interesting navigating through Hollywood of the 20's.