Musings on silent films

[Moor Larkin]

Just watched Buster Keaton's "The Navigator" for the first time ever. Pure joy!

...and interestingly, co-directed by Donald Crisp....

who directed Charles Hawtrey in his first movie appearance. Now there's a Kevin Bacon moment....

[will.15]

Keaton said he hired Crisp, who had directed previous features, to handle the straight scenes, but he was trying to gag it up and was of no use. Keaton was never generous talking about his co-directors. Most of his silents had them. He wasn't as self effacing as his general demeanor would suggest.

[didi-5]

I only really knew Donald Crisp from National Velvet when I saw him in the 1919 silent feature Broken Blossoms, with Lillian Gish. What a shock and surprise to see him in such a different role.

[penfold]

Your average silent movie, not the classics, are hard to sit through when viewed today.

How many have you sat through ?? And where ???

[penfold]

I still think it is colour that did for the Silents on TV, rather than their silence, just as it did for old Talkies too. That and the fact that Nitrate film has suicidal tendencies.

Well, we have a fair few B&W films still shown on such as Film Four, dammit, some even have subtitles...but very, very rarely silents. As for Nitrate, all films made prior to around the mid-50's were made on nitrate, so that isn't an issue....what tends to inhibit silents on TV is how few silents have suitable musical scores ready-to-roll....and if they aren't there, they have to be commissioned, composed, rehearsed, recorded.....it's an expensive business, and it also inhibits DVD releasesd as restorations can attract funds, live performance can attract funding from arts bodies, but recording for releases has, by and large, to be done on a commercial basis.

[penfold]

Keaton said he hired Crisp, who had directed previous features, to handle the straight scenes, but he was trying to gag it up and was of no use. Keaton was never generous talking about his co-directors. Most of his silents had them. He wasn't as self effacing as his general demeanor would suggest.

One way of looking at it....the other way would be to take on board that the creative force behind Keaton's films was Keaton; that his co-directors......... Bruckman, Sedgwick, Crisp....would have been called Assistant Directors or uncredited by some Directors at that time. He was generous enough to give them full on-screen credit......did Chaplin , for instance, often credit Henry Bergman who worked with him as AD/Co-D for decades ??????

[CaptainWaggett]

One way of looking at it....the other way would be to take on board that the creative force behind Keaton's films was Keaton; that his co-directors......... Bruckman, Sedgwick, Crisp....would have been called Assistant Directors or uncredited by some Directors at that time. He was generous enough to give them full on-screen credit......did Chaplin , for instance, often credit Henry Bergman who worked with him as AD/Co-D for decades ??????

Interesting point. Hitchcock, for example, was not noticeably generous in giving credit to anyone else.

[Steve Crook]

How many have you sat through ?? And where ???

Or even tried to sit through

Steve

[will.15]

One way of looking at it....the other way would be to take on board that the creative force behind Keaton's films was Keaton; that his co-directors......... Bruckman, Sedgwick, Crisp....would have been called Assistant Directors or uncredited by some Directors at that time. He was generous enough to give them full on-screen credit......did Chaplin , for instance, often credit Henry Bergman who worked with him as AD/Co-D for decades ??????

Except Keaton's co-directors were usually established directors (Clyde Bruckman was an exception, one of his writers who Keaton gave the co-chair to because he came up with the idea for The General. Bruckman later did some directing, but his alcoholism probably later limited him to mostly writing shorts). But Chaplin's assistant directors were sometimes established directors as well. Most assistant directors are complete unknowns.

[penfold]

Except Keaton's co-directors were usually established directors (Clyde Bruckman was an exception, one of his writers who Keaton gave the co-chair to because he came up with the idea for The General. Bruckman later did some directing, but his alcoholism probably later limited him to mostly writing shorts). But Chaplin's assistant directors were sometimes established directors as well. Most assistant directors are complete unknowns.

Quite; both star directors used experienced personnel to help them out; Keaton credited them onscreen, Chaplin didn't. Some AD's may be unknown to us, but those were not....and certainly weren't at the time. On the whole, Chaplin did treat his team better because he was independent, and had the financial muscle to keep paying them.....Rollie Totheroh, Henry Bergman, Edna Purviance, they stayed on the team, and the payroll, until they died....