Nitrateville Interviews David Shepard About the Albatros Films on DVD From Flicker Alley
About 30 years ago I read an article by Michael Powell in Film Comment in which he told how, during the 1920s when he was in Nice working at Rex Ingram's studio, there were two occasions when the audience was so excited by what it had just seen that they held up their chairs to block the film being shown until the projectionist rewound the scene and showed it again. One was Chaplin's pantomime of the dancing dinner rolls in The Gold Rush; the other was a bravura sequence of kinetic editing in Alexander Volkoff's Kean, with Ivan Mosjoukine.
Who what? you ask. Exactly. It was my introduction to one of the facts of film history, which is that there are terrific films and important people who get written out of film history because they don't fit the narrative. In the case of Mosjoukine, Volkoff and the other White Russians working in France in the 1920s, doubly so; once because they were some of the most important figures of pre-Revolutionary Russian cinema, and therefore to be downplayed in favor of Soviet cinema, and secondly, because ostensibly commercial French cinema was largely dismissed. Mosjoukine was remembered mainly for being the face in the stock footage used in the Kuleshov Experiment, which is like remembering Marilyn Monroe for being in Bruce Conner's Marilyn Times 5.
But if you can manage to live long enough and the films can too, everything comes around again. As David Shepard explains in our interview, a group of White Russian films made at the Films Albatros studio in the Paris suburb of Montreuil were shown at Pordenone, reviving interest in them, and now he's released a five-film set of some of their best work, French Masterworks: Russian Emigres in Paris 1923-1928 - 5 Iconic Films Albatros Productions. Which, to use an overworked phrase, is a revelation— in three cases, commercial star vehicles built around a charismatic personality, but filled with a jolting, modernist visual inventiveness which demonstrates how the silent cinema continues to surprise. The remaining two bring to five the number of Jacques Feyder's silent works on DVD and make the case for him as one of the most sensitive and insightful directors of the time.
I spoke with David Shepard by email about how this set came to be and why we should know about it.
Mosjoukine as Edmund Kean.
NITRATEVILLE: So Albatros Films is not a name that would be well known to even fairly serious film fans, to whom UFA and Gaumont would be familiar enough, say. What was this studio, and how did you get interested in their output?
DAVID SHEPARD: The major Albatros films were distributed here when they were new, although like most foreign films, they were radically abridged; Gribiche, for example, was cut from 107 to 60 minutes and called Mother O'Mine, which makes it sound like a sentimental Irish song. The Rene Clair Albatros films The Italian Straw Hat and Two Timid People enjoyed a certain renown, having remained in circulation through MoMA and nontheatrical distributors such as Brandon Films and Contemporary Films. Vintage 16mm prints of Kean and The Burning Crucible found their way into the collector market (I had both). They are also discussed in Bardeche and Brasillach's History of Motion Pictures that was published in English translation in 1938.
So Films Albatros was not entirely unknown. Some years ago I saw both Albatros and Mosjoukine retrospectives at the Pordenone Silent Film Festival, and reminded how wonderful these films really are, I set my sights on them for DVD.
The early productions seem to be very much centered around Ivan Mosjoukine's star power. Who was he and why did he captivate audiences so?
Ivan Mosjoukine, or Mozzuhkin, was one of the great stars of pre-revolutionary Russian cinema, and two of those films, Queen of Spades and especially the great Father Sergius preserved his talent and reputation in the West. He would be better remembered today had he not declined the part of Napoleon for Abel Gance, choosing instead to do Michel Strogoff for Tourjansky! He truly illuminates every film he's in.
Mosjoukine was Albatros' best asset not only as star but also as writer and director, until he succumbed to an offer from Universal where he was thought to be a possible successor to Valentino. He spoke no English, and after he got here he was given second billing to Mary Philbin and an uninspired director who spoke no Russian, French or German, Edward L. Sloman, for the unfortunate Surrender. Then the studio decided his acquiline profile made him resemble Larry Semon and Mosjoukine foolishly agreed to surgery on his nose! After that no further Hollywood films materialized and he went back to France.
Mosjoukine in Le Brasier Ardent/The Burning Crucible.
By that time sound had arrived, but he was very limited by his heavy Russian accent. ("The French don't care what you do, actually, as long as you pronounce it properly" —G.B. Shaw.) When I was a student in France, my best friend's father was a dentist who fixed Mosjoukine's teeth for free because by then he could no longer afford to pay. He died in 1938 of tuberculosis at the age of only 49 or 50.
When I was first reading about film as a precocious movie kid, French silent cinema, except for the avant-garde and maybe Rene Clair, was usually dismissed as commercial rather than artistic and thus of no particular interest. And it's taken decades, perhaps, to overcome that. There's clearly commercial calculation in the way some of these films are constructed around Mosjoukine's romantic persona, but there's also a sense of avant-garde experimentation in them, which makes them much more startling than, say, the same kind of forbidden love story being done in Hollywood around that time. Why haven't we seen these movies until now?
For decades, what little interest remained in silent cinema after the advent of sound was perpetuated by The Museum of Modern Art or small specialzed distributors. Dr. Goebbels presented MoMA in 1936 with a collection of landmark German silents and the right to circulate copies; the Russian films were kept alive here by Soviet-sponsored distributors such as Amkino, later Artkino and its 16mm licensees Garrison Pictures and Brandon Films.
French productions, with much less centralized ownership, more or less disappeared for a decade. However, in the years just preceding World War II, there was quite a renaissance of French cinema here with the '30's films of Carne, Clair, Prevert, Renoir, Feyder, Duvivier, Musso and others. Many of those artists also made English-language films, that helped increase awareness of their work. Also, many of the best French films not protected by U.S. copyright circulated in (often deplorable) P.D. copies prior to 1996 when they were protected by the Uruguay Round Agreements Act.
The Albatros films were acquired (with rights) in 1958 by the Cinematheque Francaise that (very) gradually exhibited, restored and circulated many of them, and has licensed some of them to us.
Let's go through the films in the set and tell us why you chose that title and what condition it survived in and you were able to use for the DVD set.
I remember a story, perhaps legend, that when Sergei Eisenstein was in Hollywood, Samuiel Goldwyn asked whether he would remake Potemkin with Ronald Colman, but a little bit cheaper. Eisenstein is said to have declined, explaining that while Mr. Goldwyn was interested only in art, he was interested only in money. Anyway, Alexandre Kamenka and his colleagues at Films Albatros clearly believed that they could draw audiences combining big productions with sincere film art, and for a few years they did; which is why I think their work remains so attractive today.
I chose for the DVD box set the films that most appealed to me after seeing most of the Albatros silents at two retrospectives curated by Lenny Borger and put on by the Giornate del Cinema Muto in Pordenone, Italy. Lenny wrote notes for the films and a long article on the Russian film expats, "From Moscow to Montreuil," that are included as a booklet with the DVDs.
The Late Mathias Pascal.
To take the films in chronological order, Le Brasier Ardent/The Burning Crucible is an amazing showcase for the protean talent of Ivan Mosjoukine who wrote, directed and plays multiple parts in a work that for me precisely captures the exhilaration of the European avant-garde after the devastation of World War I. It's a unique and stunningly courageous production that's mind-bending to view. It's almost impossible to imagine something as offbeat as this from a commercial motion picture company. The restoration from the original negative and the print's tinted images don't hurt a bit! Neil Brand rose to the challenge with effective music.
Kean, one of the high water marks for Albatros, recreates the theatre of a century earlier as a biopic of Edmund Kean, regarded as the greatest Shakespearean of his time and a prototypical self-destructive actor (think John Barrymore). When Kean is on stage, Ivan Mosjoukine plays him in early 19th century theatrical style; off-stage, he gives a really subtle interpretation of his character including an understated death scene two reels in length. It's a huge production (Albatros had to rent a second studio for its replica of London's Drury Lane theatre), notable not only for its wonderful art direction but also for a rapid-cut sequence inspired by Gance's La Roue. (Alexandre Volkoff, the director, was largely responsible for the Brienne sequence in Gance's "Napoleon" that features similar editorial fireworks). Such an outstanding film deserves outstanding music and thanks to the support of Turner Classic Movies, we were able to commission a beautiful score by Robert Israel, recorded with a 32-piece orchestra in the Czech Republic.
The Late Mathias Pascal is a super-production of three hours. Mosjoukine's last Albatros film, it is scripted, co-produced and directed by Marcel L'Herbier, whose great reputation rests upon it as well as on three other silent features, L'Argent, El Dorado and L'Inhumaine. Based upon a novel by Luigi Pirandello (who admired the finished film), it's about a character in a dead-end job with a nagging wife and a mother-in-law from hell. When his death is falsely reported, he starts a new life that, in its own way, proves as confining as the old one. With beautiful location photography in Italy, the film is also famous for its unusual and effective stylized sets by Cavalcanti. Among the supporting actors are the American Lois Moran (remembered as an imamorata of F. Scott Fitzgerald) and the great French actors Michel Simon and Pierre Batcheff at the beginning of their careers. It's a great yarn and a visual treat: a beautiful tinted and toned print with a large-orchestra score composed and conducted by Timothy Brock, recorded in live performance before 5,000 people in the Piazza Maggiore of Bologna, Italy.
I was eager to watch Gribiche after I saw the deeply affecting child actor Jean Forest in two earlier films also directed by Jacques Feyder that we issued on DVD, Crainquebille and Faces of Children. Forest is totally ingratiating and completely natural as a working-class youth who allows himself to be adopted by a rich American widow (Francoise Rosay) so that his mother, a war widow, can marry a man who doesn't want a stepson. It's less ambitious than the earlier Albatros super-productions,although there is great production design by Lazare Meerson in his first of eight films with Feyder (the dresses, furniture and plumbing fixtures get screen credit)! Gribiche is such a charming, engaging film that it's my favorite of the set. In a lovely tinted and toned print, it has a score by Rodney Sauer and the Mont Alto Motion Picture Orchestra; they will be playing it live for the 35mm screening at this year's San Francisco Silent Film Festival.
The New Gentlemen.
The New Gentlemen (1928, released 1929) is a sharp political comedy about a so-so dancer, mistress to a wealthy member of the French Chamber of Deputies who advances her career; she's also in love with a left-wing union organizer. Directed and written by Jacques Feyder in collaboration with Charles Spaak (Grand Illusion), the film was banned and only released after excision of some of the more stinging scenes. (These are restored in this edition except for one that couldn't be found). The music is by Antonio Coppola and the Octuor de France. After this film, Feyder decamped for MGM where he directed, among other films, Garbo in The Kiss and the German version of Anna Christie. Returning to France, he then directed Carnival in Flanders, for which Meerson built a whole 17th century Flemish village; it's among the best pre-war French films.
I have been chastised for investing heavily in these "obscure" films instead of wrapping new ribbons around yet another release of familiar tried-and-true classics, but I hope many of you will take a chance on these wonderful films. If you think they're terrible I will personally refund your purchase price!
Order the Albatros set at (as of publication) a 25% discount here.
