WHAT SILENTS & PRE-CODES HAVE YOU SEEN LATELY?

[silentscreen]

Hi Jeffrey!

I got both Mare Nostrum and Scaramouche from Kyle. I liked the latter the best. It's my favorite Novarro silent, though I've not seen him in a sound film.

Brenda

[Gagman 66]

Brenda,

Please note, I sent you an E-mail, but it bounced???? I'm sure that I sent Kyle SCARAMOUCHE too. However, it has aired a few more times since then. This was probably back in 2004 or 2005. They have run it a couple three times since 2006.

A couple nights ago, I watched SKINNERS DRESS SUIT (Universal, 1926). It was very funny. This is the first I have ever seen of Reginald Denny in a Silent film. Laura La Plante is just adorable as "Honey" his perky spouse. This is a brand new release from Sunrise Silents, it has only been out about a month or so. The print though scratchy has very good contrast. It is Multi-tinted, sharp and clear. The score is no great shakes, I will probably dub my own eventaully. Denny was very popular during the 20's, but his films have been forgotten. SKINNERS is A cute and enjoyable little movie. Though the motto of the story seems to be "Never level with your wife, things may eventually turn out OK regardless?" LOL!!!!

[feaito]

Rex Ingram was a grand director and both "Mare Nostrum" (1926) and "Scaramouche" (1923) are very good pictures, especially the former, which is very artistic and has allegorical qualities which appeal very much to me.

Thanks to Christine last week I watched "Condemned" (1929), an interesting early talkie. First of all, I can't believe that Maltin (or one of his ghost writers) wrote on his TV Guide that this film was a "stiff" early talkie. Did they saw the picture? Please!! It is one of the least stiff early talkies I have ever seen. In fact it is not stiff at all. Good camera movements, outdoor scenes, good pacing, etc. Ronald Colman and Ann Harding make a very fine couple and have lots of chemistry going on. It is a real pity that they did not do more pictures together. They could have been an ideal screen couple.

Colman plays a convict who's been sent to Devil's Island for theft. There he becomes the "houseboy" of the Prison Warden's wife (Harding), eventually falling in love. Dudley Digges plays the colorful warden and Louis Wolheim a fellow convict. Amusing photoplay with much action. Recommended. It should be restored and put on DVD.

Yesterday I watched the snappy Precoder "Union Depot" (1932), a swiftly paced and highly entertaining movie starring Doug Fairbanks Jr. and Joan Blondell. Lots of things take place in this 68 minutes programmer, which is filled with familiar faces in small roles: Charles Lane, Ethel Griffies, Claie MCDowell, Lucille LaVerne, Lillian Bond, Mary Doran, Frank McHugh, Dickie Moore, Maude Eburne et al, plus Guy Kibbee and Alan Hale in featured roles. An absolute knockout! Thanks Alison![/b]

[silentscreen]

Fernando,

I agree about Condemned. A very good precode, and some fine character acting as well.


Jeffrey,

What email bounced? I got it at my private email. I'll write you back tomorrow.

Brenda

[myrnaloyisdope]

Feaito, haven't seen Condemned, though it sounds interesting. I like watching 1929 talkies because they are so all over the place in terms of quality. I find it fascinating to see (and hear) how people adapted to sound.

As for Union Depot, I'm a pretty big fan. It's a forgotten gem, possibly the best of the Grand Hotel imitations I've seen. Any movie with Joan Blondell, counterfeit money, and a creepy old pervert is worth my time.

[feaito]

Brenda & Myrnaloyisdope, Thanks for your feedback. I think that "Condemned" is one the best talkies from 1929 I have seen.

And Yes Myrnaloyisdope, anything with sassy Ms. Blondell is worthwhile to watch!

[drednm]

The usual comments about early talkies being "stiff" or "lifeless" is mostly a crock. I have not seen condemned but I watch 1929's SEVEN KEYS TO BALDPATE and was amazed at how fluid the camerawork was even though the film was "stagebound" because it used mostly one set (the inn). Sure there were bad early talkies or bad scenes in good talkies. But the common idea is that ALL early talkies were like filmed stage plays.

[feaito]

Yes drednm, I'm afraid that some critics who've written about certain early talikes have not actually seen the films

Today I watched a beautiful print of Rouben Mamoulian's "Song of Songs" (1933), a star vehicle crafted for Marlene Dietrich. In my opinion, the plot is secondary in the appreciation of this film; it is far more interesting visually. It's a tremendously handsome Paramount film, with great cinematography, camera work and beautiful close-ups; it could well have been a Silent, because visually, with its Pre-Code aspects, the film tells more about the story and what's going on than the actual dialogue. Brian Aherne and Marlene Dietrich make a credible, very handsome couple. I wonder if they had an affair while doing this film, because I could feel the tension and the attraction between them, in their scenes together. Thanks Christine.

Its "Galatea" plot reminded me of another film, about a man who wanted a woman more to display her as a cherished possession, rather than loving her; and to transform her into something she wasn't. I can't recall the name of the film, but it had a connection with this picture in that aspect.

[Ann Harding]

Fernando, it's a thrill to read that you liked Condemned (1929). I find the film unbelievably good and underrated. The real story behind the script is equally interesting. Song of Songs, like you say, is pure bliss to the eye.

[charliechaplinfan]

Christine sent them both to me, I agree with all the above comments. Especially regarding the beauty and chemistry of Song of Songs.

Thanks to Fernando I got to watch The Smiling Lieutenant. What a magical experience. Maurice Chevalier, Claudette Colbert and Miriam Hopkins in one film. I know others have spoken about it on this thread. I'll just add this, Miriam Hopkins, she's so funny. She's Carole Lombard before Carole Lombard climbed to the top of the screwball comedy tree. She's also undeniably an original. Sounds like I've contradicted myself but I know what I mean

[feaito]

I'm glad you liked "The Smiling Lieutenat" Alison. It's superb! Wouldn't it be great to have the chance of watching the French version that was shot simultaneously?

Today I watched "Lady Windermere's Fan" (1925) and although not a Wilde expert by any means, its is commendable what Lubistch did with the story, without using Wilde's dialogues and with very few intertitles indeed. A fine comedy of manners from the XIXth Century, cleverly set in the 1920s. Irene Rich is superb as Mrs. Erlynne; it's almost her film. Ronald Colman plays sensitively a man who's fallen completely in love with the married Lady Windermere (May McAvoy).

[Synnove]

I've been visiting the film house in Stockholm again. I saw four rare silents.

Two were short films about a constantly drunken sailor named Captain Grogg. The first one, from 1916, tells the tale of the captain and his mate's voyage to Africa. They meet a mermaid, survive a storm, and finally get washed up on land. There they are attacked by a lion, who chases them up a palm tree. The captain, cool as anything, takes a swig from his flask and lights a pipe. But a monkey picks him up and throws him down. He gets eaten by the lion, who consequently passes out from stomach ache. He cuts himself out from its belly, and is discovered by an African, who (whom?) he shares a drink with.

This film has some superbly drawn scenes, like the scene of the ship in the moonlight during a peaceful night at sea. However, the animation is primitive. The films feels almost like a series of stills. Films like Phantasmagorie (1908) and Windsor McKey's work have a much more fluid animation style.

The second Grogg film from 1917 is much better animated, and incredibly inventive. The real life animator, Victor Bergdahl, would like to draw pictures of nude women all day long (as a matter of fact there are a lot of bare breasts in these films) but he has to paint portraits. Enter captain Grogg, an animated character. He wants his picture painted. However, he is unhappy with the result (particularly the big round Rudolph nose, which might look Disneyesque, but is a result of heavy drinking in the captain's case. There's a lot of grog consumed in these films too) and he chases Victor around the house. At one point he angrily shakes the live-action man. This sequence is superbly done, for a film this age! Here are a few grainy stills:

http://www.stumfilm.no/bergdahl_naer_ka ... s_stor.jpg

Next, I saw the feature film Flickan i Frack (The Girl in the Suit), a gender-bending comedy from 1926. It was directed by a woman named Karin Swanström, who can be seen as an actress in The Saga of Gösta Berling. She was a pioneering woman in Swedish films. The Girl in the Suit is the story of a girl named Katja, whose family is so poor, that her father doesn't see the necessity of giving her money for a proper ball gown. He lets her pampered brother have all the clothes he likes, even though Katja dotes on him, takes care of the house and gets good grades in school. He tells her it's because her brother is a boy that he gets a nice suit. Angered at the unfairness of this, Katja dons her brother's suit to the ball. Scandal ensues.

In the end it develops into a Cinderella story, as Katja is brought under the protection of a rich young count. She has to be officially forgiven for her sins in order to move on. The movie doesn't actually condemn her though, and she doesn't show much in the way of repentance. The film gets in a few sharp digs at the hypocrisy of a small town and sexist prejudice, although the ending tones down these themes in favour of the idea of forgiveness all around. It's an illuminating film. We're used to thinking of the 20's as a period of liberation for women, and it certainly was, or else this movie could not have been made, but the story it tells shows that they still had a long way to go.

If it were remade today, I think it would probably be the other way around. It would be the son who couldn't afford a nice suit, who would wear girls' clothes to the ball and cause a scandal, wouldn't it? Just a thought.

Earlier in the week I saw the film Livets Vår (Life's Spring) This movie from 1912 was rediscovered at the Cinemateque Francais in 2006. It's notable for being the earliest surviving Swedish feature film, and for starring both Victor Sjöström and Mauritz Stiller as actors. Typically, Sjöström is the good guy, and Stiller the bad guy, in an impossibly melodramatic story about a girl who gets abducted, resqued by a student and seduced by a millitary man. The men duel over her, but she abandons them both to become an actress. After a decade or so, she gets a chance to be reunited with the student, and her long lost father, but then there is a fire at the theater where she works...

It's a fun movie, and a great rediscovery. I particularly enjoyed the shots of old-time Stockholm, and Sjöström's low key performance. It isn't a masterpiece, but I am very grateful to the Cinemateque for discovering it again!

If these films were released on DVD I would be really happy. Nothing beats seeing them on a big screen with an audience though.

[charliechaplinfan]

Synnove, those films sound great. I envy you getting to see them.

I watched Scaramouche, thanks silentscreen. I could tell it was a Rex Ingram film despite only having seen The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse before. I do like Ramon Novarro, can't really get ito Alice Terry though. The costumes and sets were worth watching the movie for.

[silentscreen]

Alison,

Alice Terry was rather wooden in that film. She's better in "Mare Nostrum."

[rogerskarsten]

I had the chance to see a couple of films last night starring Henny Porten, who was one of the top female stars of early German cinema.

PERLEN BEDEUTEN TRÄNEN (translated: "Pearls signify tears"; 1911) is a fairly conventional story of an officer and his wife. The officer's mother sends a string of pearls as a gift for the young bride. The enclosed letter reads "I know it's said that pearls signify tears, but for me they've always brought happiness." Well, as it turns out, the officer has a fondness for gambling and ends up in debt. The creditor comes a-calling, and Henny decides to pawn her pearl necklace in order to help her husband. She does this in secret, though, since she doesn't want her husband to find out. The husband is relieved when the money-lender tells him that the debt has been paid. Now, not only is this husband a gambling wastrel, but he's also a womanizer, since we then find him flirting with a certain dancer. She tells him she'd like a pearl necklace as a token of his affection. He heads off to the same pawn shop where his wife hawked the pearls, and lo and behold, the salesman shows him a very familiar-looking item of jewelry. He returns home with the pearl necklace, puts it around his wife's neck, and all ends happily.

DER SCHATTEN DES MEERES (translated: "The Shadow of the sea"; 1912) was a much more interesting film. The setting is a seaside village, where the fisherman Nansen (played by Curt Stark, who also directed the film), lives with his fiancee and mother in a secluded cottage. Evelyne (Henny Porten) is a painter from the city who is at work on her latest seascape. Unfortuantely she finds herself stranded on a rock as the tide comes in, and Nansen heroically rescues her. He takes her to his home, where she is given dry clothes by Nansen's mother. Nansen develops quite a crush on the beautiful Evelyne, much to the distress of his fiancee. But when Evelyne realizes the extent of his infatuation, and the pain that it is causing the fiancee, she decides to return to the city. This is a crushing blow for Nansen, who, after Evelyne's departure, rows himself out to sea to meet his fate. The boat breaks up on the rocks and Nansen dies. Some time later, Evelyne writes a letter to Nansen, remembering fondly the time she spent at his home. The letter is returned, undeliverable. Concerned, Evelyne returns to the cottage and learns that Nansen indeed is dead; his mother blames Evelyne for her son's death. Nevertheless, Evelyne's expression of sympathy is received as genuine, and she asks to stay overnight at the cottage. The fiancee warns her, though, that at night the ghost of Nansen will return and take Evelyne with him back into the sea. Evelyne doesn't believe it. That night, though, Nansen rises out of the sea, approaches the cottage, and knocks on Evelyne's window. She seems to be placed under a trance as she willingly goes with him, back to the sea, into the boat, and down into the depths.

These were the first films starring Henny Porten (1890-1960) that I had seen. Here is her "mini biography" from the IMDb (written by Denny Jackson):

"Henny Porten was born January 7, 1890, in Magdeburg, Germany. She had one of the longest careers of any German actress and was highly sought after because of her wonderful thespian skills. Henny's career would stretch over six decades, from 1906 to 1955. Her first film was in Apachentanz (1906), making her one of the earliest film actresses anywhere in the world. At the age of 65, Henny filmed her last production entitled Die Schätze des Teufels (Fräulein von Scuderi, Das (1955)). Henny died in Berlin, Germany, on October 15, 1960, at the age of 70."

I also learned from the IMDb that Henny was married to Curt Stark when she made this film with him (DER SCHATTEN DES MEERES). They do have noticeable on-screen chemistry together! Sadly, Curt Stark was killed in action in 1916 during WWI. How fortunate we are to have the medium of film, that seemingly can bring the dead back to life!