Courtesy of Eureka Entertainment
by James Cameron-wilson
Eureka Classics have done it again and have now released the first 4K restoration copy of the original 1927 The Cat and the Canary, available for the first time on blu-ray. Considering how many prestigious silent classics have been lost forever, it is quite a treat to sit through the full 86 minutes that have been meticulous preserved of what really is a prototype of its kind. One might consider the dark house comedy-thriller a rare beast, but it was extremely popular in its day, kicked off by this hugely popular silent, made just nine months before the release of the very first feature-length talking picture, The Jazz Singer.
Looking at The Cat and the Canary today, it is emblematic of everything we know about silent cinema, with its comic intertitles, wide-eyed acting and stereotypes, but viewed more seriously it was a hugely influential title.
by James Cameron-wilson
Eureka Classics have done it again and have now released the first 4K restoration copy of the original 1927 The Cat and the Canary, available for the first time on blu-ray. Considering how many prestigious silent classics have been lost forever, it is quite a treat to sit through the full 86 minutes that have been meticulous preserved of what really is a prototype of its kind. One might consider the dark house comedy-thriller a rare beast, but it was extremely popular in its day, kicked off by this hugely popular silent, made just nine months before the release of the very first feature-length talking picture, The Jazz Singer.
Looking at The Cat and the Canary today, it is emblematic of everything we know about silent cinema, with its comic intertitles, wide-eyed acting and stereotypes, but viewed more seriously it was a hugely influential title.
- 5/9/2024
- by James Cameron-Wilson
- Film Review Daily
The gothic mode in Italian horror was effectively launched, and reached its early apotheosis, with the release of Mario Bava’s Black Sunday in 1960. An ensuing tidal wave of likeminded films flooded the market throughout the ’60s, before starting to dry up in the early ’70s, as the more modernist-inclined (and frequently more graphic) giallo came into prominence. Now Severin Films has gathered together four vintage examples of the Italian gothic trend in their new box set Danza Macabra Volume One. When it comes to sex and violence, those two requisite mainstays of the genre, the films run the gamut from almost timidly titillating to unabashedly lurid.
Renato Polselli’s The Monster of the Opera, from 1964, opens with arguably its strongest set piece, which is revealed to have been a dream sequence. This allows Polselli to openly embrace a surrealist aesthetic through oneiric slow motion, tilted cameras, disorienting high- and low-angle shots,...
Renato Polselli’s The Monster of the Opera, from 1964, opens with arguably its strongest set piece, which is revealed to have been a dream sequence. This allows Polselli to openly embrace a surrealist aesthetic through oneiric slow motion, tilted cameras, disorienting high- and low-angle shots,...
- 5/16/2023
- by Budd Wilkins
- Slant Magazine
Bram Stoker's 1897 novel "Dracula" is told in epistolary form, and begins with the character of Jonathan Harker trekking into the Carpathian Mountains to close a real estate deal with a mysterious, elusive Eastern European count. The Count, a small smiling bald man with a mustache, is none other than Dracula, an ancient vampire that feeds on human blood and is in league with Satan. Dracula signs the paperwork, locks Jonathan in his dilapidated castle with a trio of succubi, and takes a ship to England. Jonathan will eventually escape to Budapest, but Dracula is still at large, ready to infiltrate England.
Later in the novel, it will be revealed that Dracula has been psychically convening with a local mental patient named Renfield, currently locked up in a British asylum. Dracula will use Renfield to infiltrate homes and drink his victims' blood. Renfield's role in Stoker's novel is relatively small,...
Later in the novel, it will be revealed that Dracula has been psychically convening with a local mental patient named Renfield, currently locked up in a British asylum. Dracula will use Renfield to infiltrate homes and drink his victims' blood. Renfield's role in Stoker's novel is relatively small,...
- 4/13/2023
- by Witney Seibold
- Slash Film
There is a great deal of controversy surrounding the creation of Batman. For many years, sole creative credit for the character was given to artist Bob Kane, who often spoke eloquently about his character. It wasn't until years later that a co-creator, Bill Finger, entered the conversation. Kane and Finger's relationship with Batman and each other is detailed in a Hulu documentary film called "Batman and Bill," and a 2012 book called "Bill the Boy Wonder: The Secret Co-Creator of Batman." It seems that Finger had a lot more to do with how audiences know Batman than Kane ever did, and only ever operated as a ghostwriter for DC Comics. Finger died in poverty in 1974. It wouldn't be until the 1980s that Kane would admit, only passingly, that Finger contributed as much as he did to the character. Eventually, Finger would be given posthumous credit. Kane himself passed in 1998 as a celebrated millionaire.
- 4/2/2023
- by Witney Seibold
- Slash Film
To Save and Project: The 19th MoMA International Festival of Film Preservation – See Screening Dates
The Museum of Modern Art announced in early December the To Save and Project: The 19th MoMA International Festival of Film Preservation, the latest edition of the annual festival dedicated to celebrating newly preserved and restored films from archives, studios, distributors, foundations, and independent filmmakers from around the world. Running from January 12 to February 2, 2023, this year’s program will open and close with the restoration premieres of two major silent films from MoMA’s archive: Paul Leni’s horror comedy The Cat and the Canary (1927) and Ernst Lubitsch’s comedy The
Marriage Circle (1924), respectively. To Save and Project is organized by Dave Kehr, Curator, Department of Film, The Museum of Modern Art, and Cindi Rowell, independent curator, with special thanks to Olivia Priedite, Film Program Coordinator, and Steve Macfarlane, Department Assistant, Department of Film.
The 2023 program includes the highly anticipated new version of Tod Browning’s insidious silent horror film...
Marriage Circle (1924), respectively. To Save and Project is organized by Dave Kehr, Curator, Department of Film, The Museum of Modern Art, and Cindi Rowell, independent curator, with special thanks to Olivia Priedite, Film Program Coordinator, and Steve Macfarlane, Department Assistant, Department of Film.
The 2023 program includes the highly anticipated new version of Tod Browning’s insidious silent horror film...
- 12/27/2022
- by Movies Martin Cid Magazine
- Martin Cid Magazine - Movies
Based on Victor Hugo’s 19th century novel, Paul Leni’s The Man Who Laughs is one of the most influential achievements in film history, if for no other reason than as the inspiration for The Joker. A soulful Conrad Veidt stars as Gwynplaine, a circus clown whose permanent grimace is a mocking reminder of his miserable fate. Mary Philbin plays his beloved Dea, a blind girl with the ability to “see” the real Gwynplaine. Olga Baclanova, villainess of 1932’s Freaks, co-stars, and Jack Pierce, the make-up genius behind Frankenstein’s monster and The Mummy, created Veidt’s nightmare smile.
A high quality print of Leni’s film can be seen here: The Man Who Laughs.
The post The Man Who Laughs appeared first on Trailers From Hell.
A high quality print of Leni’s film can be seen here: The Man Who Laughs.
The post The Man Who Laughs appeared first on Trailers From Hell.
- 12/20/2022
- by Charlie Largent
- Trailers from Hell
Riddle me this: what do the Joker and "Casablanca" have in common? If you answered, "Conrad Veidt," then you've survived the first deathtrap, much like the Dynamic Duo coming out of a cliffhanger ending into the next episode of the 1966 "Batman" TV series.
80 years ago, Veidt received fifth billing in "Casablanca" after Humphrey Bogart, Ingrid Bergman, Paul Henreid, and Claude Rains. His movie career, however, dates back even further than that to the silent era. In "The Man Who Laughs," the 1928 silent film helmed by German Expressionist director Paul Leni, Veidt shared top billing with Mary Philbin, and the indelible image of his grinning face left a mark on both movie history and comic book history.
The creation of Batman's greatest nemesis, the Joker, is attributed to writer Bill Finger and artists Bob Kane and Jerry Robinson. Over the years, conflicting accounts arose over who really originated the first idea for the character.
80 years ago, Veidt received fifth billing in "Casablanca" after Humphrey Bogart, Ingrid Bergman, Paul Henreid, and Claude Rains. His movie career, however, dates back even further than that to the silent era. In "The Man Who Laughs," the 1928 silent film helmed by German Expressionist director Paul Leni, Veidt shared top billing with Mary Philbin, and the indelible image of his grinning face left a mark on both movie history and comic book history.
The creation of Batman's greatest nemesis, the Joker, is attributed to writer Bill Finger and artists Bob Kane and Jerry Robinson. Over the years, conflicting accounts arose over who really originated the first idea for the character.
- 10/15/2022
- by Joshua Meyer
- Slash Film
Click here to read the full article.
Paramount’s Smile, in theaters Sept. 30, is the latest fright flick to benefit from a sinister grin. But the granddaddy of all scary smile films dates back to 1928, when Universal Pictures released The Man Who Laughs, an adaptation of the 1869 Victor Hugo novel.
The studio had success with another Hugo novel, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, which it had adapted into a Lon Chaney showcase in 1923. Chaney would physically transform once again into a deformed gothic antihero — this time, Gwynplaine, a nobleman’s son who is hideously disfigured when the king orders a permanent smile carved into his face. But the project was sidelined because of a rights issue, and Chaney instead made 1925’s The Phantom of the Opera, based on the 1910 Gaston Leroux novel. That film was a hit, too, so Universal chief Carl Laemmle resurrected Laughs for its next “super-production.”
To direct,...
Paramount’s Smile, in theaters Sept. 30, is the latest fright flick to benefit from a sinister grin. But the granddaddy of all scary smile films dates back to 1928, when Universal Pictures released The Man Who Laughs, an adaptation of the 1869 Victor Hugo novel.
The studio had success with another Hugo novel, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, which it had adapted into a Lon Chaney showcase in 1923. Chaney would physically transform once again into a deformed gothic antihero — this time, Gwynplaine, a nobleman’s son who is hideously disfigured when the king orders a permanent smile carved into his face. But the project was sidelined because of a rights issue, and Chaney instead made 1925’s The Phantom of the Opera, based on the 1910 Gaston Leroux novel. That film was a hit, too, so Universal chief Carl Laemmle resurrected Laughs for its next “super-production.”
To direct,...
- 9/30/2022
- by Seth Abramovitch
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
“What a lucky clown you are! You don’t have to wipe off your laugh.”
The Arkadin Cinema, a local independent theater scheduled to open soon, is hosting an film series that takes place in the back lot at The Heavy Anchor (5226 Gravois Ave in St. Louis). Conrad Veidt in The Man Who Laughs (1928) screens Wednesday March 9th. Showtime is 8:00. The Man Who Laughs is presented by Silents, Please Stl, a local group that aims to promote and preserve the art of silent filmmaking from the early 20th Century through community programming and education. Enter through the front of The Heavy Anchor. Admission is $10 and can be purchased in advance Here. Bring your own chair. First come, first served. Seating is limited. Food and drinks and available there at The Heavy Anchor. This is a 21+ event, so leave the kids home. A Facebook invite for the event can be found Here.
The Arkadin Cinema, a local independent theater scheduled to open soon, is hosting an film series that takes place in the back lot at The Heavy Anchor (5226 Gravois Ave in St. Louis). Conrad Veidt in The Man Who Laughs (1928) screens Wednesday March 9th. Showtime is 8:00. The Man Who Laughs is presented by Silents, Please Stl, a local group that aims to promote and preserve the art of silent filmmaking from the early 20th Century through community programming and education. Enter through the front of The Heavy Anchor. Admission is $10 and can be purchased in advance Here. Bring your own chair. First come, first served. Seating is limited. Food and drinks and available there at The Heavy Anchor. This is a 21+ event, so leave the kids home. A Facebook invite for the event can be found Here.
- 3/3/2022
- by Tom Stockman
- WeAreMovieGeeks.com
The Cat and the Canary
& The Ghost Breakers
Blu ray
Kino Lorber
1939, 1940 / 72, 83 min.
Starring Bob Hope, Paulette Goddard
Cinematography by Charles B. Lang
Directed by Elliott Nugent, George Marshall
Bob Hope’s brand of comedy may have been extinct by the sixties but it was alive and kicking in the pages of God Save the Mark, Donald E. Westlake’s comic crime novel about a schnook on the run for a murder he didn’t commit. Published in 1967, Westlake’s farce resembles one of Hope’s own movies; the pace is frenetic and the patter is as snappy as the comedian’s in his prime—a golden age exemplified by his one-two punch from 1939 and 1940, The Cat and the Canary and The Ghost Breakers. Those films present Hope in excelsis but in the hands of directors Elliott Nugent and George Marshall they serve as master classes in the tricky art of the scare comedy.
& The Ghost Breakers
Blu ray
Kino Lorber
1939, 1940 / 72, 83 min.
Starring Bob Hope, Paulette Goddard
Cinematography by Charles B. Lang
Directed by Elliott Nugent, George Marshall
Bob Hope’s brand of comedy may have been extinct by the sixties but it was alive and kicking in the pages of God Save the Mark, Donald E. Westlake’s comic crime novel about a schnook on the run for a murder he didn’t commit. Published in 1967, Westlake’s farce resembles one of Hope’s own movies; the pace is frenetic and the patter is as snappy as the comedian’s in his prime—a golden age exemplified by his one-two punch from 1939 and 1940, The Cat and the Canary and The Ghost Breakers. Those films present Hope in excelsis but in the hands of directors Elliott Nugent and George Marshall they serve as master classes in the tricky art of the scare comedy.
- 9/19/2020
- by Charlie Largent
- Trailers from Hell
Berlinale Specials is the festival’s incorporates all out-of-competition titles.
The Berlin International Film Festival (Feb 20-Mar 1) has added two world premieres to its Berlinale Special strand.
The first is Anne Fontaine’s drama Police [original title Night Shift], which stars Omar Sy, Virginie Efira and Grégory Gadeboias a trio of Paris police officers forced to accept an unusual mission. Studiocanal is handling French distribution and international sales.
Veteran filmmaker Fontaine’s previous films include Venice best screenplay winner Dry Cleaning (1997) and Coco Before Channel (2009).
The second is Vadim Perelman’s Persian Lessons, which stars Bpm (Beats Per Minute) lead Nahuel Perez...
The Berlin International Film Festival (Feb 20-Mar 1) has added two world premieres to its Berlinale Special strand.
The first is Anne Fontaine’s drama Police [original title Night Shift], which stars Omar Sy, Virginie Efira and Grégory Gadeboias a trio of Paris police officers forced to accept an unusual mission. Studiocanal is handling French distribution and international sales.
Veteran filmmaker Fontaine’s previous films include Venice best screenplay winner Dry Cleaning (1997) and Coco Before Channel (2009).
The second is Vadim Perelman’s Persian Lessons, which stars Bpm (Beats Per Minute) lead Nahuel Perez...
- 1/23/2020
- by 1100453¦Michael Rosser¦9¦
- ScreenDaily
The experts were right when they said that silent filmmaking was developing something unique and beautiful, before talkies came along and spoiled the party with all that noise. This ‘handy three-pack’ of once-obscure Josef von Sternberg classics proves the theory 100% — his intense dramas excite audiences with something that’s gone missing from the movies, or the cinema or whatever you want to call it: the magic of visual stylization in the service of basic human emotions. Before Marlene there was Evelyn Brent and Betty Compson: Sternberg presents them as shimmering visions.
3 Silent Classics by Josef von Sternberg
Blu-ray
The Criterion Collection 529, 530, 531
1927-28 / B&w / 1:33 Silent Ap / 81, 88, 75 min. / available through The Criterion Collection / Street Date October 8, 2019 / 79.96
Starring: George Bancroft, Evelyn Brent, Clive Brook; Emil Jannings, Evelyn Brent, William Powell; George Bancroft, Betty Compson, Olga Baclanova.
Cinematography: Bert Glennon; Bert Glennon; Harold Rosson
Original Music: multiple scores by Robert Israel,...
3 Silent Classics by Josef von Sternberg
Blu-ray
The Criterion Collection 529, 530, 531
1927-28 / B&w / 1:33 Silent Ap / 81, 88, 75 min. / available through The Criterion Collection / Street Date October 8, 2019 / 79.96
Starring: George Bancroft, Evelyn Brent, Clive Brook; Emil Jannings, Evelyn Brent, William Powell; George Bancroft, Betty Compson, Olga Baclanova.
Cinematography: Bert Glennon; Bert Glennon; Harold Rosson
Original Music: multiple scores by Robert Israel,...
- 10/22/2019
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
“What a lucky clown you are! You don’t have to wipe off your laugh,” one clown says to a second. This second clown, Gwynplaine, bows his head into shadows, masking the permanent grin stretched across his face in a failed attempt to convey, if not sadness, then anything other than mirth, joy and laughter. Though often classified as a horror movie, The Man Who Laughs (1928) stretches wider than that. Paul Leni’s silent film, based on Victor Hugo’s novel of the same name, is a romantic melodrama steeped in German expressionism and body horror. Universal’s ...
- 10/3/2019
- The Hollywood Reporter - Film + TV
“What a lucky clown you are! You don’t have to wipe off your laugh,” one clown says to a second. This second clown, Gwynplaine, bows his head into shadows, masking the permanent grin stretched across his face in a failed attempt to convey, if not sadness, then anything other than mirth, joy and laughter. Though often classified as a horror movie, The Man Who Laughs (1928) stretches wider than that. Paul Leni’s silent film, based on Victor Hugo’s novel of the same name, is a romantic melodrama steeped in German expressionism and body horror. Universal’s ...
- 10/3/2019
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Sherlock Holmes fans have another good version of a favorite Holmes tale to savor, a late German silent film in full expressionist mode, set on an impressively moody English moor. One can see the influence of silent action serials and then-recent haunted house horror hits. And it is said that this is the first picture that presents Holmes and Watson as a fraternal ‘buddy’ team. A major reconstruction of a film once thought lost; presented with informative extras and (on the Blu-ray) a second encoding of a much earlier film version.
Der Hund von Baskerville
Blu-ray + DVD
Flicker Alley
1929 / B&W / 1:33 Silent Ap. / 66 min. (+ extra feature) / Street Date February 12, 2019 / 39.95
Starring: Carlyle Blackwell, Alexander Murski, Livio Pavanelli, Betty Bird, Fritz Rasp, George Seroff, Valy Arnheim, Alma Taylor, Carla Bartheel, Jaro Füruth.
Cinematography: Frederik Fugelsgang
Art Directors: Gustav A. Knauer, Willy Schiller
Original Music (new): Guenter Buchwald, Frank Bockus, Sacha Jacobsen
Written by Hervert Juttke,...
Der Hund von Baskerville
Blu-ray + DVD
Flicker Alley
1929 / B&W / 1:33 Silent Ap. / 66 min. (+ extra feature) / Street Date February 12, 2019 / 39.95
Starring: Carlyle Blackwell, Alexander Murski, Livio Pavanelli, Betty Bird, Fritz Rasp, George Seroff, Valy Arnheim, Alma Taylor, Carla Bartheel, Jaro Füruth.
Cinematography: Frederik Fugelsgang
Art Directors: Gustav A. Knauer, Willy Schiller
Original Music (new): Guenter Buchwald, Frank Bockus, Sacha Jacobsen
Written by Hervert Juttke,...
- 3/5/2019
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
Jim Knipfel Sep 18, 2017
One of the earliest scary clown movies, The Man Who Laughs was also an influence on the creation of Batman villain, The Joker...
Clowns, both creepy and, well, slightly less creepy, were lurking about in the shadows for thousands of years before Stephen King’s evil clown Pennywise shambled along with those sinister red balloons of his. The Egyptians had them, the Greeks had them, the Romans had them. But in the 17th and 18th centuries, an interesting and telling thing happened.
See related The Croods 2 has been cancelled
During the Middle Ages, the clown and the performing freak were essentially one and the same. The jesters and fools who entertained in the royal courts of Europe were usually attired in flamboyant and garish costumes and makeup, and were often physically deformed in some way. After that, however, the two began to tear themselves apart, with the...
One of the earliest scary clown movies, The Man Who Laughs was also an influence on the creation of Batman villain, The Joker...
Clowns, both creepy and, well, slightly less creepy, were lurking about in the shadows for thousands of years before Stephen King’s evil clown Pennywise shambled along with those sinister red balloons of his. The Egyptians had them, the Greeks had them, the Romans had them. But in the 17th and 18th centuries, an interesting and telling thing happened.
See related The Croods 2 has been cancelled
During the Middle Ages, the clown and the performing freak were essentially one and the same. The jesters and fools who entertained in the royal courts of Europe were usually attired in flamboyant and garish costumes and makeup, and were often physically deformed in some way. After that, however, the two began to tear themselves apart, with the...
- 9/13/2017
- Den of Geek
21st edition of the genre festival to feature special screening of Luc Besson’s Valerian.
Fantasia International Film Festival has unveiled its first wave of titles for its upcoming 21st edition, running July 13-August 2 in Montreal.
This year’s festival will open with the North American premiere of Jung Byung-gil’s Cannes title The Villainess, followed by the North American premiere of Takashi Miike’s manga adaptation JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure: Diamond Is Unbreakable.
Fantasia will screen more than 130 feature films in 2017, including the world premieres of Géla Babluani’s Money Money, Ryan Prows’ Lowlife, Ted Geoghegan’s Mohawk and Gabriela Amaral Almeida’s Friendly Beast.
There will also be a special screening of Luc Besson’s Valerian And The City Of A Thousand Planets and David Lowery’s A Ghost Story will open the festival’s Camera Lucida strand.
Other notable titles announced in the first wave include Cho Sun-ho’s A Day, Federico Cueva’s You Only...
Fantasia International Film Festival has unveiled its first wave of titles for its upcoming 21st edition, running July 13-August 2 in Montreal.
This year’s festival will open with the North American premiere of Jung Byung-gil’s Cannes title The Villainess, followed by the North American premiere of Takashi Miike’s manga adaptation JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure: Diamond Is Unbreakable.
Fantasia will screen more than 130 feature films in 2017, including the world premieres of Géla Babluani’s Money Money, Ryan Prows’ Lowlife, Ted Geoghegan’s Mohawk and Gabriela Amaral Almeida’s Friendly Beast.
There will also be a special screening of Luc Besson’s Valerian And The City Of A Thousand Planets and David Lowery’s A Ghost Story will open the festival’s Camera Lucida strand.
Other notable titles announced in the first wave include Cho Sun-ho’s A Day, Federico Cueva’s You Only...
- 6/13/2017
- by [email protected] (Ian Sandwell)
- ScreenDaily
Women suffrage movie 'Mothers of Men': Dorothy Davenport becomes a judge and later State Governor in socially conscious thriller about U.S. women's voting rights. Women suffrage movie 'Mothers of Men': Will women's right to vote lead to the destruction of The American Family? Directed by and featuring the now all but forgotten Willis Robards, Mothers of Men – about women suffrage and political power – was a fast-paced, 64-minute buried treasure screened at the 2016 San Francisco Silent Film Festival, held June 2–5. I thoroughly enjoyed being taken back in time by this 1917 socially conscious drama that dares to ask the question: “What will happen to the nation if all women have the right to vote?” One newspaper editor insists that women suffrage would mean the destruction of The Family. Women, after all, just did not have the capacity for making objective decisions due to their emotional composition. It...
- 7/1/2016
- by Danny Fortune
- Alt Film Guide
The latest release of Lon Chaney's most famous silent classic is a Blu-ray, which allows us to marvel at at the actor's artistry in a beautifully tinted HD image. Erik the Phantom is one of the two or three greatest fantasy makeup performances of all time. The release has three separate encodings, of different versions running at different film speeds. A 1929 recut has the best image, while the original 1925 version is uncut. The Phantom of the Opera Blu-ray Kino Classics / Blackhawk 1925/29 / B&W with tints and Technicolor sequences / 1:37 flat Silent Aperture / 78, 92 and 114 min. / Street Date October 13, 2015 / available through Kino Lorber / 29.95 Starring Lon Chaney, Mary Philbin, Norman Kerry, Arthur Edmund Carewe, Gibson Gowland, John St. Polis, Snitz Edwards. Cinematography Milton Bridenbecker, Virgil Miller, Charles Van Enger Consulting Artist Ben Carré Film Editors Maurice Pivar, Gilmore Walker Original Music Makeup Lon Chaney Written by Elliott J. Clawson from the novel...
- 9/29/2015
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
What good is a canon? It's a question that hovers in endless debate near cinephile culture. The idea of distilling cinema down to its "best" or "most essential" films is like a game or a thought experiment, and whether it be the AFI or Sight & Sound or a group of Young Turks looking to rattle conventional wisdom, canon-making demonstrates nothing so much as a desire to assemble an expansive, fragmented, and still-evolving sense of film history into some sort of definitive order. Canons, each with its own biases, are useful chiefly as a starting point or a basecamp. The best answer is to always be looking, always curious. And cinema has barely more than a century to keep up with. I wonder how bibliophiles cope.One of the virtues of the San Francisco Silent Film Festival, which begins on May 28th, is how it mixes classics and arcana on a level plane.
- 6/3/2015
- by Duncan Gray
- MUBI
Lon Chaney didn't speak during early childhood, as his parents were deaf and mute, and he communicated with them via sign language. When silent movies came along, he was a natural. And at the end of his life, stricken with throat cancer, he lost his voice and again relied on pantomime to make himself understood. He came from silence and went back to silence.
Chaney was a unique kind of movie star, in that his success rested more on variety than reliability: if his audiences had any expectations going into a Chaney film, surely they must have been expectations of surprise, perhaps of an encounter with the unfamiliar and bizarre.
Outside the Law (1920) was Chaney's second film for director Tod Browning, whose concerns seemed to merge with his own in a particularly conducive way: separately and apart, both men pursued stories of humiliation, disfigurement, and revenge, featuring bizarre, displaced menageries and elaborate and uncomfortable disguises.
Chaney was a unique kind of movie star, in that his success rested more on variety than reliability: if his audiences had any expectations going into a Chaney film, surely they must have been expectations of surprise, perhaps of an encounter with the unfamiliar and bizarre.
Outside the Law (1920) was Chaney's second film for director Tod Browning, whose concerns seemed to merge with his own in a particularly conducive way: separately and apart, both men pursued stories of humiliation, disfigurement, and revenge, featuring bizarre, displaced menageries and elaborate and uncomfortable disguises.
- 10/3/2013
- by David Cairns
- MUBI
‘The Cat and the Canary’ 1939: Paulette Goddard / Bob Hope haunted house comedy among Halloween 2013 movies at Packard Theater There’s much to recommend among the Library of Congress’ Packard Campus and State Theater screenings in Culpeper, Virginia, in October 2013, including the until recently super-rare Bob Hope / Paulette Goddard haunted house comedy The Cat and the Canary (1939). And that’s one more reason to hope that the Republican Party’s foaming-at-the-mouth extremists (and their voters and supporters), ever bent on destroying the economic and sociopolitical fabric of the United States (and of the rest of the world), will not succeed in shutting down the federal government and thus potentially wreak havoc throughout the U.S. and beyond. (Photo: Bob Hope and Paulette Goddard in The Cat and the Canary.) Screening on Thursday, October 31, at the Packard Theater, Elliott Nugent’s The Cat and the Canary is a remake of Paul Leni...
- 9/29/2013
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
The full Fantasia 2013 lineup has now been revealed, and we have here the third and final wave of titles to share. Prepare to drool!
From the Press Release:
The Fantasia International Film Festival is proud to announce the rest of our 120-feature lineup that comprises our 2013 event, along with a string of additional details that mark our 17th edition as a standout. Fantasia will engulf the city of Montreal from July 18-August 6, 2013. Be sure to visit the Fantasia Film Festival website for detailed essays on every title announced here, as well as all films previously disclosed over the last weeks.
Before we get started on titles... Meet Our 2013 Juries
Main Competition For The Cheval Noir Award For Best Film
Jury President: Laura Kern (Critic, Curator, managing editor, Film Comment)
Jean-Pierre Bergeron (Actor, Director, Screenwriter)
Samuel Jamier (Co-Director of the New York Asian Film Festival, Programmer at Japan Society)
Jarod Neece (Senior Programmer and Operations Manager,...
From the Press Release:
The Fantasia International Film Festival is proud to announce the rest of our 120-feature lineup that comprises our 2013 event, along with a string of additional details that mark our 17th edition as a standout. Fantasia will engulf the city of Montreal from July 18-August 6, 2013. Be sure to visit the Fantasia Film Festival website for detailed essays on every title announced here, as well as all films previously disclosed over the last weeks.
Before we get started on titles... Meet Our 2013 Juries
Main Competition For The Cheval Noir Award For Best Film
Jury President: Laura Kern (Critic, Curator, managing editor, Film Comment)
Jean-Pierre Bergeron (Actor, Director, Screenwriter)
Samuel Jamier (Co-Director of the New York Asian Film Festival, Programmer at Japan Society)
Jarod Neece (Senior Programmer and Operations Manager,...
- 7/9/2013
- by The Woman In Black
- DreadCentral.com
The Fantasia Film Festival is taking place from July 18th to August 6th in Montreal and will feature over 100 films from around the world. We gave you a look at the initial lineup last month and now have an additional list of Fantasia 2013 films that will be screening, including Curse of Chucky, You’re Next, and Frankenstein’s Army:
Horror Is Child’S Play – Don Mancini’S Curse Of Chucky (World Premiere)
A rarity among genre franchises, the Child’S Play series (begun in 1988) has retained the sure-handed guidance of original screenwriter/creator Don Mancini throughout killer doll Chucky’s decades’-long reign of horror. Mancini, who will be hosting our “scar-studded” world premiere, graduated to the director’s chair with 2004’s Seed Of Chucky, after having co-written or written every entry in the series. His longevity with the project is, of course, matched by the fiendish voiceover work by...
Horror Is Child’S Play – Don Mancini’S Curse Of Chucky (World Premiere)
A rarity among genre franchises, the Child’S Play series (begun in 1988) has retained the sure-handed guidance of original screenwriter/creator Don Mancini throughout killer doll Chucky’s decades’-long reign of horror. Mancini, who will be hosting our “scar-studded” world premiere, graduated to the director’s chair with 2004’s Seed Of Chucky, after having co-written or written every entry in the series. His longevity with the project is, of course, matched by the fiendish voiceover work by...
- 7/9/2013
- by Jonathan James
- DailyDead
The hit sound film The Jazz Singer (1927), starring Al Jolson and directed by Alan Crosland, fueled the mainstream appetite for newfangled "talkies"... and brought on the death throes of the ol' fashioned silent film. Over the next few years, silent motion picture production around the world slowed, withered, and died. Before this era came to a close, however, the horror genre took root, clawed its way into mainstream popularity, and spawned a wealth of atmospheric and unsettling thrillers. These films built the foundation upon which a century of horror movies would be constructed. The art of film was still in its infancy, and this silent era of experimentation gave rise to some of the most striking and fascinating horror movies ever made. While Germany would soon rise to dominate horror of the silent era, Italy helped get the ball rolling with their first feature length film, Dante's Inferno (1911), directed by Giuseppe de Liguoro.
- 7/4/2013
- by Eric Stanze
- FEARnet
Even casual horror fans are familiar with the silent Universal classics The Phantom of the Opera and The Hunchback of Notre Dame, which starred the legendary “Man of a Thousand Faces” Lon Chaney, Sr. in his two most iconic screen roles. The box-office success of those two films led the studio in 1928 to adapt The Man Who Laughs, a story by Hunchback author Victor Hugo, into one of their first sound productions, with music and sound effects (but no recorded dialog). While Chaney did not return for this one (he was under contract to MGM by that time), the lead role was taken on by another screen legend, Conrad Veidt – best remembered by horror fans as the creepy sleepwalker Cesare in The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari. Just as in Hunchback, the title character here is not technically a “monster,” but a sympathetic figure who happens to be horribly disfigured... but like the grotesque Quasimodo,...
- 5/21/2013
- by Gregory Burkart
- FEARnet
Unheimliche Geschichten (Uncanny Tales) is a remake... except it isn't. And it's an anthology film... except it isn't. Richard Oswald, Austrian movie master, made a film of that title in 1919, a horror film which blended stories by Poe, Stevenson and others into a single overarching narrative with Conrad Veidt as central character.
In 1932, four years before the Jewish Oswald was forced to flee the country, he made another Unheimliche Geschichten, a comic compendium that used some of the same source stories, including Poe's The Black Cat and Stevenson's The Suicide Club, but added a new one and used a different overall story to tie it all together. The film was intended as a parody of the whole German expressionist horror school, and if it lacks somewhat in the laughter department, it is nonetheless a fascinating summation of German silent cinema in the early sound era.
Oswald alternated between comedy and sometimes horror-tinged melodrama,...
In 1932, four years before the Jewish Oswald was forced to flee the country, he made another Unheimliche Geschichten, a comic compendium that used some of the same source stories, including Poe's The Black Cat and Stevenson's The Suicide Club, but added a new one and used a different overall story to tie it all together. The film was intended as a parody of the whole German expressionist horror school, and if it lacks somewhat in the laughter department, it is nonetheless a fascinating summation of German silent cinema in the early sound era.
Oswald alternated between comedy and sometimes horror-tinged melodrama,...
- 11/2/2012
- by David Cairns
- MUBI
Georges Méliès' A Trip to the Moon Melancholia, A Separation Screenplay, Runner-Up Jeannie Berlin: National Society of Film Critics' Surprises Two interesting omissions from the Nsfc roster: critics' fave Michelle Williams (for portraying Marilyn Monroe in Simon Curtis' My Week with Marilyn) and George Clooney (for his stressed out father in Alexander Payne's The Descendants) weren't among the critics' top three actresses/actors. Dunst and Yun were followed by New York Film Critics winner Meryl Streep for her Margaret Thatcher in Phyllida Lloyd's The Iron Lady; Brad Pitt was followed by Gary Oldman in Tomas Alfredson's Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy and Jean Dujardin in Michel Hazanavicius' The Artist. Dujardin, in fact, was The Artist's sole representative in the Nsfc 2011 roster. For the record the other runners-up were Christopher Plummer (Mike Mills' Beginners) and Patton Oswalt (Jason Reitman's Young Adult...
- 1/8/2012
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
In the 1920s those seeds planted the decade before took hold, and there are notable examples of early horror on both sides of the Atlantic. The most significant of these, and perhaps the most famous, is F.W. Murnau’s masterpiece, Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horror. It is the first of countless adaptations of Bram Stoker’s Dracula, though famously made without the permission of the Bram Stoker estate. Although included amongst the Expressionist movement, what’s startling today is the movie’s lyrical use of natural light and exterior shots (of running water, animals etc.); visually it is in stark contrast to Caligari’s jagged mindscapes. They both create otherworldliness in different ways, one by giving us distorted images we can relate to, and the other by alienating us with carefully employed images of nature.
The best vampire movies from this to Let the Right One In (2008) take the myth seriously,...
The best vampire movies from this to Let the Right One In (2008) take the myth seriously,...
- 10/16/2011
- by Adam Whyte
- Obsessed with Film
Conrad Veidt is Turner Classic Movies' "Summer Under the Stars" performer of the day. An international star since the 1920s, Veidt worked in Germany, the United Kingdom, and Hollywood — twice. [Conrad Veidt Movie Schedule.] In the late '20s, Veidt was the star of unusual Hollywood fare such as Paul Leni's The Man Who Laughs (1928), in the title role as a man with a grin-like scar where his mouth should be, and Paul Fejos' The Last Performance (1929), as a magician in love with pretty Mary Philbin — a Universal star who also happened to be Veidt's leading lady in The Man Who Laughs. With the arrival of talking pictures, Veidt returned to Germany, but with the ascent of the Nazis he fled first to England and later to the United States. In the Hollywood of the early '40s, Veidt became everybody's favorite Nazi in movies such as Nazi Agent, Escape, and Casablanca.
- 8/24/2011
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
Paul Leni's The Man Who Laughs, starring Conrad Veidt, Mary Philbin (top); Andrew Simpson at the Wurlitzer (bottom) Cary Grant, Irene Dunne, Alida Valli, Pierre Brasseur, Angela Lansbury, Conrad Veidt, Sean Connery, John Wayne, Gene Wilder, silent-film stars Mary Philbin and Buster Keaton, and lots of zombies (it's Halloween, after all) are some of the performers featured in the Library of Congress Packard Campus for Audio Visual Conservation’s free film series in Culpeper, Va., in October. [Packard Campus Oct. 2010 Schedule.] Among the screening movies are Leo McCarey's comedy My Favorite Wife (1940), Mel Brooks' spoof Young Frankenstein (1974), Raoul Walsh's early epic Western The Big Trail (1930), and George A. Romero's zombie-packed Night of the Living Dead (1968). My two chief recommendations are: Georges Franju's eerie Les yeux sans visage / Eyes Without a Face (1960), which long predates The Silence of the Lambs in its tale about young women's skins [...]...
- 10/8/2010
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
Eighty-three years after its premiere, Fritz Lang's masterpiece, now restored with 25 minutes of lost footage, is sure to blow all those 3D vehicles and Hollywood franchises out of the water
So the sun is out, and already a long summer at the multiplex is yawning ahead, bringing with it the promise of all manner of last-legs franchises, cod-ironic homages to 80s TV and late-stage-career Tom Cruise vehicles. For me, however, the real treat will come as the last weeks of the season ebb into autumn, at which point the most spectacular ride of the lot is due in cinemas, a movie with more visual wonder and dazzlement in its first five minutes than a weekend's worth of 3D extravaganzas. That film is Metropolis, now scheduled for a September British re-release.
But it won't quite be the Metropolis you may remember. Rather, it is now (more or less) the film...
So the sun is out, and already a long summer at the multiplex is yawning ahead, bringing with it the promise of all manner of last-legs franchises, cod-ironic homages to 80s TV and late-stage-career Tom Cruise vehicles. For me, however, the real treat will come as the last weeks of the season ebb into autumn, at which point the most spectacular ride of the lot is due in cinemas, a movie with more visual wonder and dazzlement in its first five minutes than a weekend's worth of 3D extravaganzas. That film is Metropolis, now scheduled for a September British re-release.
But it won't quite be the Metropolis you may remember. Rather, it is now (more or less) the film...
- 5/4/2010
- by Danny Leigh
- The Guardian - Film News
How best to profess your love to your significant other on Valentines Day than to give the gift of silence? In their fourth annual mid-Winter edition, the San Francisco Silent Film Festival (Sfsff) returns with four classics: Buster Keaton’s Our Hospitality (1923) with live piano accompaniment by Philip Carli of the Flower City Society Orchestra; Sergei Komarov’s A Kiss From Mary Pickford (1927) co-presented by the Mary Pickford Foundation and the San Francisco Film Society (with Sffs’s own Steve Jenkins reading a live translation of Ukranian intertitles and Carli once more gracing the ivories); F.W. Murnau’s Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans (1927), co-presented by The Film Noir Foundation and accompanied by Dennis James on the Mighty Wurlitzer (with an on-screen slide-show and program notes by Hell on Frisco Bay‘s Brian Darr); and—last but not least—Paul Leni’s The Cat and the Canary (1927), co-presented by Jesse...
- 2/4/2009
- by Michael Guillen
- Screen Anarchy
By Matt Singer
We're getting into the Halloween spirit at IFC.com this week by taking a look back at some famous movie makeup jobs (that are, at minimum, 25 years old) that have maintained their power to scare the bejeezus out of viewers. These kids today with their computer generated imagery and their Blu-rays and their "Saw V"s! Back in our day, we didn't have computers to do our imagination's dirty work for us. Visionary artists had only prosthetics, wire, plaster, rubber and a whole lot of Karo syrup to bring their creations to life! Back in our day, these were the movies you rented on Halloween! At the video store! As far as we're concerned, they still should be. And don't you dare teepee our Web site or we're calling the cops. [Part two of our list can be found here.]
10. The Man Who Laughs (1928)
Directed by Paul Leni
Makeup by Jack Pierce
To get a sense...
We're getting into the Halloween spirit at IFC.com this week by taking a look back at some famous movie makeup jobs (that are, at minimum, 25 years old) that have maintained their power to scare the bejeezus out of viewers. These kids today with their computer generated imagery and their Blu-rays and their "Saw V"s! Back in our day, we didn't have computers to do our imagination's dirty work for us. Visionary artists had only prosthetics, wire, plaster, rubber and a whole lot of Karo syrup to bring their creations to life! Back in our day, these were the movies you rented on Halloween! At the video store! As far as we're concerned, they still should be. And don't you dare teepee our Web site or we're calling the cops. [Part two of our list can be found here.]
10. The Man Who Laughs (1928)
Directed by Paul Leni
Makeup by Jack Pierce
To get a sense...
- 10/30/2008
- by Matt Singer
- ifc.com
Along with the lineage that can be traced from Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight (2008) back to Paul Leni’s The Man Who Laughs (1928) is the latter’s indelible imprint upon Brian DePalma’s 2006 neo-noir The Black Dahlia, based on James Ellroy’s novel, where mutilation reclaims its destructive thrust as an expressive mask of life’s inequitable if not inevitable horrors.
To synopsize briefly, in The Man Who Laughs—the filmic adaptation of Victor Hugo’s 1869 novel—Gwynplaine (Conrad Veidt), the son of a noble father who has displeased King James II, is turned over to a surgeon, Dr. Hardquannone (George Siegman), associated with a band of ostracized and feared gypsies, the Comprachicos (literally “child-buyers"), for proper punishment: a facial mutilation which leaves him with a permanent and ghastly rictus grin. As a title card states, the King condemns him “to laugh forever at his fool of a father.
To synopsize briefly, in The Man Who Laughs—the filmic adaptation of Victor Hugo’s 1869 novel—Gwynplaine (Conrad Veidt), the son of a noble father who has displeased King James II, is turned over to a surgeon, Dr. Hardquannone (George Siegman), associated with a band of ostracized and feared gypsies, the Comprachicos (literally “child-buyers"), for proper punishment: a facial mutilation which leaves him with a permanent and ghastly rictus grin. As a title card states, the King condemns him “to laugh forever at his fool of a father.
- 7/20/2008
- by Michael Guillen
- Screen Anarchy
In an assured and brilliant stroke of timely programming, the San Francisco Silent Film Festival ("Sfsff") included Paul Leni‘s 1928 “silent” classic The Man Who Laughs as their Centerpiece presentation, acknowledging the direct influence the film’s protagonist Gwynplaine (Conrad Veidt) had upon the creation and development of Bob Kane‘s Batman archnemesis The Joker (masterfully appropriated by Heath Ledger in a consummate swan song performance for Chris Nolan’s The Dark Knight).
Television producer and director Frank Buxton, a member of the Sfsff Board of Directors for the last 12-13 years, emceed The Man Who Laughs. He recalled back to the festival’s first year when “about four people” were in the audience, whereas now he enthused proudly that the festival was “packed to the rafters.” He introduced Mike Mashon from the Library of Congress who detailed the preservation of the print of The Man Who Laughs provided the festival.
Television producer and director Frank Buxton, a member of the Sfsff Board of Directors for the last 12-13 years, emceed The Man Who Laughs. He recalled back to the festival’s first year when “about four people” were in the audience, whereas now he enthused proudly that the festival was “packed to the rafters.” He introduced Mike Mashon from the Library of Congress who detailed the preservation of the print of The Man Who Laughs provided the festival.
- 7/18/2008
- by Michael Guillen
- Screen Anarchy
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