penfold

You probably know how I go rattling on about how great British Silent Cinema was at its best, well, there's a good opportunity coming up on the last weekend in September to see what I mean.
Three days highlighting the eleven-years work of the wonderful British Silent Film Weekends, ex Nottingham, at the NFT. Films to expect include the fabulous The First Born, The Lure of Crooning Water, The Battle of The Somme(1916), The Ware Case and many more; firmer details when the booklet is published. This is a terrific pick of films, goodness knows when the next chance to see them will be. I urge you to try and make at least some of them....but I should warn you, it's addictive stuff....and the bad news is that I will be there, but don't let that put you off...

Bit of a Bay Window, what??

TimR

That really does sound like a wonderful opportunity.

The Battle of the Somme - and on the large screen, with an audience.

*sigh*.......frustrating that it doesn't happen here! There are silent film festivals, certainly, and have been for many decades: but not British silent films. American, German, Russian, Swedish, Italian, French...but not British....

"Home was never like this"

"Mine was"

penfold

Do you live near the coast?? If you started rowing this weekend....
I'll be thinking of you.

Bit of a Bay Window, what??

TimR

British Silent Film Festival - here I come! Don't start without me.....

"Home was never like this"

"Mine was"

penfold

See you there, but don't forget the lifejacket...

Bit of a Bay Window, what??

penfold

More extensive details now available.....if you can make these screenings, please do; these are terrific films and presentations, great fun, and rare as hens teeth....your support could make them less rare.



The Bioscope


And if you are interested in silent film and film pre-history, this is the blog...

Bit of a Bay Window, what??

Gary D.

None of the above are familiar to me, although some sound interesting. I

like silents, particularly the latter ones--Greta Garbo's The Kiss is one of the best. It easily could have sound put in--but why?

I didn't know this, but at least during the 1920s, the actors learned the lines. I always thought they were just mouthing them.

A fellow dog-walker whom I occasionally encounter with her pet lost her hearing completely when she was 58, and you'd never know she can't hear a word. I could never learn a new language, or worse, learn to read lips--and she was reading my lips under the light of a street lamp after dark.

Anyway, I asked her about silent films, and she confirmed that the actors did, indeed, speak their lines.

As an aside, I am wondering--in 'talkies'--when the main characters are sipping champagne in a night club and all the expensively clad extras are jabbering away--what are they saying? It would be interesting to read lips.

Someone once said, they are just saying, 'Bwana, bwana--bwana? Bwana' over and over.

penfold

They did indeed speak their lines; it's odd, but I have picked up a little lip-reading as a result of watching silents. Quite often, particularly in earlier silents, you can tell the actors are referring to other characters by their real names; but then again, it was not uncommon for cast lists to have unnamed characters; The Boy, The Girl, The Mother, The Artist, whatever.
The most famous example is a US film called What Price Glory?, set in France during WW1. Edmund Lowe and Victor McLagen, Tunbridge Wells' contribution to film history, play US soldiers competing over a mademoiselle, Dolores Del Rio. While the intertitles are proclaiming such as 'But surely Captain, you're not pulling rank on a matter such as this?' any lipreader can tell you the on set dialogue contains quite a few references to unlikely descendence from female canines, questioning of parents marital status, and so on.

Allegedly, back in the days of silents the complaints of the filthy language in cinemas from deaf patrons was a regular thing...

Bit of a Bay Window, what??

batman

It often depends on how experienced and/or professional they are. There is a lot of 'rhubarbing' but some background artists create little scenarios for themselves and act those out.

On some productions I was involved with the background artists often used to slag off the stars! Eg - 'that ------ ----- is a right tosser isn't he?' 'yes, but not as bad as ----- ----------' ........ on one such occasion this woman was overheard by the actor in question and left the production shortly afterwards.

CaptainWaggett

According to Richard Griffiths' huge book on The Movies (the one Martin Scorsese claimed in his autobiographical film history to have stolen from the New York Public Library ), lipreaders at the time observed that in one film Aileen Pringle could be 'heard' saying to Conrad Nagel ' If you drop me, you bastard. I'll break your neck' rather that 'I will love you, my angel, until the stars fall from the heavens' or whatever was on the intertitles.

Gary D.

Well, this confirms some of my suspicions. Maybe my deaf-lady friend didn't see the same film.

It's not silent, of course, but I read on the set of East of Eden, when that great Canadian actor Raymond Massey was playing opposite James Dean as his father, they couldn't get Mr. Massey to respond angrily enough--someone else probably knows the details much better than I.

Mr. Massey had complete contempt for Dean and he exploded when Dean leaned over and whispered something foul in his ear. Can't remember what part of the film that is, since Dean was not a favorite, although Mr. Massey was. Maybe it was when the boy was trying to make a profit on the war. Anyway, when you come across this part, Mr. Massey's rage was real!

TimR

Hello Penfold. How was the event?

"Home was never like this"

"Mine was"

Steve Crook

Ray Massey was just too nice

He could act angry - but that wasn't enough for Jimmy Dean & Elia Kazan. So they, especially Dean, provoked him off-camera to get him really angry. "The Method" has a lot to answer for.

Steve