Tweet MESSALINA (1922) Enrico Gauzzoni Italian Epic

Maybe I am mistaken, but whenever you see a list of the most highly sought after lost films of the Silent Era, I don't recall ever having read this one being on it? Why? Distributed by FBO in the States during 1924, obviously the movie was pretty big here the year before BEN HUR, and featured a spectacular Chariot Race. Was Fred Niblo trying to top the Chariot Race in the 2 Million Dollar Italian production? Does anyone know? Are there any previous discussions about this at all? What exactly was this picture about? Roman decadence? The insanity of Caligula? Claudius Bride, the Mad Empress? Something else? Who were the Stars? The actress who played Messalina? Can't seem to find out much of anything.

Haven't been able to come up with any posters or lobby-cards for this picture? Anyone have some stills maybe? There is zero information about this picture on the TCM Movie Data Base.

Don't know why it sunk without a ripple, but Messalina was the wife of Derick Jacobi...I mean, Claudius.

MESSALINA has survived both in a tinted silent version running 2860m (the film was originally 3373m), as well as in the form of a 1935 sound reissue. The latter can currently be watched at YouTube, with the chariot race sequence beginning around 32m50s into this version (which eliminates most of the intertitles and is clearly projected a bit fast):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hdhWXnj8sko

The movie is a rather episodic, diva-esque account of Messalina's marital infidelities and other highly melodramatic affairs in which she becomes embroiled. There's a fairly striking whipping scene along the way, as well as a sequence in which a woman is chained up and almost fed to the lions. Definitely a case of the spectacle being stronger than the narrative, and of the parts being greater than the whole... but that's probably a remark that could be made about most 'epic' movies of this type.

Are you kidding me? It's listed on Silent Era.com as Status Unknown. Last updated in 2008. Could it actually have been found since that time? Is it complete? Do you know? Thanks for the link and the starling information!

The tinted silent version (which I haven't seen) at the Cineteca di Milano is about 85% complete, if one goes purely on the length of the surviving footage. It's referenced at least as early as 1996 in Gian Luca Farinelli and Vittorio Martinelli's list of silent holdings at European archives, so isn't a new discovery. Silent Era attempts to cover a huge amount of terrain in its database, and it's inevitable that it can't be completely comprehensive.

The sound version has never been considered lost at all, but probably eluded works such as Magliozzi's Treasures from the Film Archives due to the fact it was catalogued as a 1935 sound feature by the National Cinema Archive in Rome. Although the length of this version is just 1724 metres, this may not be so incomplete as it sounds, due to the vast majority of the intertitles having been removed and replaced by overdubbed dialogue.

UHG! The 1935 sound re-issue is virtually unwatchable, unless I mute the audio. Didn't expect a bunch of voices to be dubbed in, and it just doesn't mesh. Good to know that most fo the original Silent still survives.

They did the same to Larry Semon comedies.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bUBt9C5c ... re=related

GR,

Yikes! HORRIBLE!!!! These outrageously Bastardized versions are the Pitts!