San Francisco Chronicle: Ask Mick LaSalle

[silentfilm]

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.c ... 13C9PE.DTL

Dear Mick: I recently watched "Passion of Joan of Arc," "The General" and Anthony Asquith's "Cottage on Dartmoor." These silent films are changing the way I look at movies. The cinematography, editing, expressionistic acting and music combine to create films of power and emotion. Could you recommend a few films?

Robert Holloway, Novato

Dear Robert: The foundation of everything I know about silent movies and a lot of what I subsequently learned about film history is the 13-part documentary "Hollywood" by Kevin Brownlow and David Gill. Made in the late '70s, it's the equivalent of a great college course in silent film. If you can somehow get a VHS copy of that, you'll learn a lot, including what you particularly want to see. I'd also make sure to go to the San Francisco Silent Film Festival's Winter Event (Feb. 14), because watching a silent film as it was intended to be seen, with music, a big screen and a huge audience, will increase your pleasure and enthusiasm. Also, check the listings of Turner Classic Movies, because it shows films - such as Monta Bell's 1925 masterpiece "Lady of the Night" - that you can't see anywhere else. Finally, in the meantime, you might want to take a look at Mauritz Stiller's "Erotikon," Chaplin's "The Gold Rush" and "City Lights," Lubitsch's "The Student Prince in Old Heidelberg," Greta Garbo's "The Mysterious Lady" and "A Woman of Affairs," Josef Von Sternberg's "The Docks of New York," King Vidor's "The Crowd," Joe May's "Asphalt," Georg Wilhelm Pabst's "Diary of a Lost Girl," anything with Buster Keaton and Tod Browning's "The Unknown." For starters.

[rudyfan]

Jeebus, Mick always gets in a reference to Norma Shearer. He's like Syndrome in The Incredibles, he IS her biggest fan!

[Richard P. May]

I first met Mick maybe 15 years ago, when he was helping one of the revival theaters in SF put together a Shearer festival, and I was handling the circulation of prints at Turner Entertainment Co.
He also had a radio program, and announced what was showing. The theater constantly sold out.

Shearer had an interesting body of movies, and I agree with his interest.

[Gagman 66]

Thames HOLLYWOOD is must viewing! Sadly this fabulous series has not been released on DVD. But it was on Laser-disc, which is much better quality than VHS.

LADY OF THE NIGHT a Masterpiece??? I thought it was good, but more of a programmer. A LADY OF CHANCE is a much better film. I haven't seen THE DEVIL'S CIRCUS, but I have a worn old copy. Does anyone know if this film has ever been shown on TCM?

Don't forget now. Lon Chaney's THE BLACK BIRD with Renee Adoree, Directed by Tod Browning, makes it's North American TCM Premier this Sunday! What ever you do don't miss this event! Personally, I like this movie much better than several of Chaney's more famous features.

What no article for this film among the Silent Sunday Nights profiles??? Maybe I should drag my review over into this thread and post it here?



Lon Chaney, Renee Adoree, And Owen Moore. From Tod Browning's THE BLACK BIRD (MGM, 1926).