Georges Méliès: First Wizard of Cinema (1896-1913)

The outstanding Flicker Alley 5-disc set Georges Méliès: First Wizard of Cinema (1896-1913) is now published, and I have my copy. Naturally, it’s a sensational package. Put together by Eric Lange (Lobster Films) and David Shepard (Blackhawk Films) from the archival holdings from seventeen collections across eight countries, the elegantly-presented DVDs comprises 173 titles (including one unidentified fragment) - almost (though not quite) every extant Georges Méliès film, plus the Georges Franju 1953 film, Le Grand Méliès. The DVDs are region 0, NTSC format.

The set comes with a well-illustrated booklet, which has essays by Norman McLaren (something of a surprise - it’s a transcript of an audio recording he made for a conference he couldn’t attend) and a long piece by John Frazer on Méliès’ life and work, adapted by Shepard from a text first written by Frazer in 1979. The full list of titles is now available on the Flicker Alley site, but here’s The Bioscope’s version, with the titles in the chronological order in which they appear on the DVDs, with Star-Film catalogue number, original French title and English title.

1896
1 - Partie de cartes, une/Playing Cards
26 - Nuit terrible, une/Terrible Night, a
70 - Escamotage d’une dame chez Robert-Houdin/Vanishing Lady, the
82 - Cauchemar, le/Nightmare, A

1897
96 - Château hanté, le/Haunted Castle, The
106 - Prise de Tournavos, la/Surrender of Tournavos, The
112 - Entre Calais et Douvres/Between Calais and Dover
122-123 - Auberge ensorcelée, l’/Bewitched Inn, the
128 - Après le bal (le tub)/After the Ball

1898
147 - Visite sous-marine du Maine/Divers at Work on the Wreck of the “Maine”
151 - Panorama pris d’un train en marche/Panorama from Top of a Moving Train
153 - Magicien, le/Magician, The
155 - Illusions fantasmagoriques/Famous Box Trick, The
159 - Guillaume Tell et le clown/Adventures of William Tell, The
160-162 - Lune à un mètre, la/Astronomer’s Dream, The
167 - Homme de têtes, un/Four Troublesome Heads, The
169 - Tentation de Saint Antoine/Temptation of St Anthony, the

Entrevue de Dreyfus et de sa femme à Rennes

1899
183 - Impressionniste fin de siècle, l’/Conjurer, The
185-187 - Diable au couvent, le/Devil in a Convent, The
188 - Danse du feu/Pillar of Fire, The
196 - Portrait mystérieux, le/Mysterious Portrait, The
206 - Affaire Dreyfus, la dictée du bordereau/Dreyfus Court Martial - Arrest of Dreyfus
207 - Ile du diable, l’/Dreyfus: Devil’s Island - Within the Palisade
208 - Mise aux fers de Dreyfus/Dreyfus Put in Irons
209 - Suicide du Colonel Henry/Dreyfus: Suicide of Colonel Henry
210 - Débarquement à Quiberon/Landing of Dreyfus at Quiberon
211 - Entrevue de Dreyfus et de sa femme à Rennes/Dreyfus Meets His Wife at Rennes
212 - Attentat contre Me Labori/Dreyfus: The Attempt Against the Life of Maître Labori
213 - Bagarre entre journalistes/Dreyfus: The Fight of Reporters
214-215 - Conseil de guerre en séance à Rennes, le/Dreyfus: The Court Martial at Rennes
219-224 - Cendrillon/Cinderella
226-227 - Chevalier mystère, le/Mysterious Knight, The
234 - Tom Whisky ou l’illusionniste truqué/Addition and Subtraction

L’Homme-orchestre

1900
243 - Vengeance du gâte-sauce, la/Cook’s Revenge, The
244 - Infortunes d’un explorateur, les/Misfortunes of an Explorer, The
262-263 - Homme-orchestre, l’/One-Man Band, The
264-275 - Jeanne d’Arc/Joan of Arc
281-282 - Rêve du Radjah ou la forêt enchantée, le/Rajah’s Dream, The
285-286 - Sorcier, le prince et le bon génie, le/Wizard, the Prince and the Good Fairy, The 289-291 - Livre magique/Magic Book, The
293 - Spiristisme abracadabrant/Up-to-date Spiritualism
294 - Illusioniste double et la tête vivante, l’/Triple Conjurer and the Living Head, The
298-305 - Rêve de Noël/Christmas Dream, The
309-310 - Nouvelles luttes extravagantes/Fat and Lean Wrestling Match
311 - Repas fantastique, le/Fantastical Meal, A
312-313 - Déshabillage impossible, le/Going to Bed under Difficulties
314 - Tonneau des Danaïdes, le/Eight Girls in a Barrel
317 - Savant et le chimpanzé, le/Doctor and the Monkey, The
322 - Réveil d’un homme pressé, le/How He Missed His Train

L’Homme à la tête en caoutchouc

1901
325-326 - Maison tranquille, la/What is Home Without the Boarder?
332-333 - Chrysalide et le papillon, la/Brahmin and the Butterfly, The
335-336 - Dislocation mystérieuse/Extraordinary Illusions
345-347 - Antre des esprits, le/Magician’s Cavern, The
350-351 - Chez la sorcière/Bachelor’s Paradise, The
357-358 - Excelsior!/Excelsior! - Prince of Magicians
361-370 - Barbe-Bleue/Blue Beard
371-372 - Chapeau à surprises, le/Hat With Many Surprises, The
382-383 - Homme à la tête en caoutchouc, l’/Man With the Rubber Head, The
384-385 - Diable géant ou le miracle de la madone, le/Devil and the Statue, The
386 - Nain et géant/Dwarf and the Giant, The

Voyage dans la lune

1902
391 - Douche du colonel/Colonel’s Shower Bath, The
394-396 - La danseuse microscopique, la/Dancing Midget, The
399-411 - Voyage dans la lune/Trip to the Moon, A
412 - Clownesse fantôme, la/Shadow-Girl, The
413-414 - Trésors de Satan, les/Treasures of Satan, The
415-416 - Homme-mouche, l’/Human Fly, The
419 - Équilibre impossible, l’/Impossible Balancing Feat, An
426-429 - Voyage de Gulliver à Lilliput et chez les géants, le/Gulliver’s Travels Among the Lilliputians and the Giants
No number - Sacre d’Edouard VII, le/Coronation of Edward VII, The
445-448 - Guirlande merveilleuse, la/Marvellous Wreath, The

1903
451-452 - Malheur n’arrive jamais seul, un/Misfortune Never Comes Alone
453-457 - Cake-walk infernal, le/Infernal Cake-Walk, The
458-459 - Boîte à malice, la/Mysterious Box, The
462-464 - Puits fantastique, le/Enchanted Well, The
465-469 - Auberge du bon repos, l’/Inn Where No Man Rests, The
470-471 - Statue animée, la/Drawing Lesson, The
473-475 - Sorcier, le/Witch’s Revenge, The
476 - Oracle de Delphes, l’/Oracle of Delphi, The
447-478 - Portrait spirite, le/Spiritualistic Photographer
479-480 - Mélomane, le/Melomaniac, The
481-482 - Monstre, le/Monster, The
483-498 - Royaume des fées, le/Kingdom of the Fairies, The
499-500 - Chaudron infernal, le/Infernal Cauldron, The
501-502 - Revenant, le/Apparitions
503-505 - Tonnerre de Jupiter, le/Jupiter’s Thunderbolts
506-507 - Parapluie fantastique, le/Ten Ladies in an Umbrella
508-509 - Tom Tight et Dum Dum/Jack Jaggs and Dum Dum
510-511 - Bob Kick, l’enfant terrible/Bob Kick the Mischievous Kid
512-513 - Illusions funambulesques/Extraordinary Illusions
514-516 - Enchanteur Alcofribas, l’/Alcofribas, the Master Magician
517-519 - Jack et Jim/Comical Conjuring
520-524 - Lanterne magique, la/Magic Lantern, The
525-526 - Rêve du maître de ballet, le/Ballet Master’s Dream, The
527-533 - Faust aux enfers/Damnation of Faust, The
534-535 - Bourreau turc, le/Terrible Turkish Executioner, The
538-539 - Au clair de la lune ou Pierrot malheureux/Moonlight Serenade, A
540-541 - Prêté pour un rendu, un/Tit for Tat

Voyage à travers l’impossible

1904
547-549 - Coffre enchanté, le/Bewitched Trunk, The
552-553 - Roi du maquillage, le/Untamable Whiskers
554-555 - Rêve de l’horloger, le/Clockmaker’s Revenge, The
556-557 - Transmutations imperceptibles, les/Imperceptible Transmutations, The
558-559 - Miracle sous l’Inquisition, un/Miracle Under the Inquisition, A
562-574 - Damnation du Docteur Faust/Faust and Marguerite
578-580 - Thaumaturge chinois, le/Tchin-Chao, the Chinese Conjurer
581-584 - Merveilleux éventail vivant, le/Wonderful Living Fan, The
585-588 - Sorcellerie culinaire/Cook in Trouble, The
589-590 - Planche du diable, la/Devilish Prank, The
593-595 - Sirène, la/Mermaid, The
641-659 - Voyage à travers l’impossible/Impossible Voyage, The
665-667 - Cascade de feu, la/Firefall, The
678-679 - Cartes vivantes, les/Living Playing Cards, The

1905
683-685 - Diable noir, le/Black Imp, The
686-689 - Phénix ou le coffret de cristal, le/Magic Dice, The
690-692 - Menuet lilliputien, le/Lilliputian Minuet, The
705-726 - Palais des mille et une nuits, le/Palace of the Arabian Nights, The
727-731 - Compositeur toqué, le/Crazy Composer, A
738-739 - Chaise à porteurs enchantée, la/Enchanted Sedan Chair, The
740-749 - Raid Paris - Monte-Carlo en deux heures, le/Adventurous Automobile Trip, An
756-775 - Légende de Rip Van Vinckle, la/Rip’s Dream
784-785 - Tripot clandestin, le/Scheming Gamblers’ Paradise, The
789-790 - Chute de cinq étages, une/Mix-up in the Gallery, A
791-806 - Jack le ramoneur/Chimney Sweep, The
807-809 - Maestro Do-Mi-Sol-Do, le/Luny Musician, The

1906
818-820 - Cardeuse de matelas, la/Tramp and the Mattress Makers, The
821-823 - Affiches en goguette, les/Hilarious Posters, The
824-837 - Incendiaires, les/Desperate Crime, A
838-839 - “Anarchie chez Guignol, l’”/Punch and Judy
843-845 - Hôtel des voyageurs de commerce ou les suites d’une bonne cuite, l’/Roadside Inn, A
846-848 - Bulles de savon animées, les/Soap Bubbles
849-870 - Quatre cents farces du diable, les/Merry Frolics of Satan, The
874-876 - Alchimiste Parafaragaramus ou la cornue infernale, l’/Mysterious Retort, The
877-887 - Fée Carabosse ou le poignard fatal, la/Witch, The

L’Tunnel sous la Manche ou le cauchemar anglo-français

1907
909-911 - Douche d’eau bouillante, la/Rogues’ Tricks
925-928 - Fromages automobiles, les/Skipping Cheeses, The
936-950 - Tunnel sous la Manche ou le cauchemar anglo-français, le/Tunnelling the English Channel
961-968 - Eclipse de soleil en pleine lune/Eclipse, or the Courtship of the Sun and Moon, The
1000-1004 - Pauvre John ou les aventures d’un buveur de whisky/Sightseeing through Whisky
1005-1009 - Colle universelle, la/Good Glue Sticks
1014-1017 - Ali Barbouyou et Ali Bouf à l’huile/Delirium in a Studio
1030-1034 - Tambourin fantastique, le/Knight of Black Art, The
1035-1039 - Cuisine de l’ogre, la/In the Bogie Man’s Cave
1044-1049 - Il y a un dieu pour les ivrognes/Good Luck of a Souse, The
1066-1068 - Torches humaines/Justinian’s Human Toches 548 A.D.

1908
1069-1072 - Génie du feu, le/Genii of the Fire, The
1073-1080 - Why that actor was late
1081-1085 - Rêve d’un fumeur d’opium, le/Dream of an Opium Fiend, The
1091-1095 - Photographie électrique à distance, la/Long Distance Wireless Photography
1096-1101 - Prophétesse de Thèbes, la/Prophetess of Thebes, The
1102-1103 - Salon de coiffure/In the Barber Shop
1132-1145 - Nouveau seigneur du village, le/New Lord of the Village, The
1146-1158 - Avare, l’/Miser, The
1159-1165 - Conseil du Pipelet ou un tour à la foire, le/Side Show Wrestlers
1176-1185 - Lully ou le violon brisé/Broken Violin, The
1227-1232 - The Woes of Roller Skates
1246-1249 - Amour et mélasse/His First Job
1250-1252 - Mésaventures d’un photographe, les/The Mischances of a Photographer
1253-1257 - Fakir de Singapour, le/Indian Sorcerer, An
1266-1268 - Tricky painter’s fate, a
1288-1293 - French interpreter policeman/French Cops Learning English
1301-1309 - Anaïc ou le balafré/Not Guilty
1310-1313 - Pour l’étoile S.V.P./Buncoed Stage Johnnie
1314-1325 - Conte de la grand-mère et rêve de l’enfant/Grandmother’s Story, A
1416-1428 - Hallucinations pharmaceutiques ou le truc du potard/Pharmaceutical Hallucinations
1429-1441 - Bonne bergère et la mauvaise princesse, la/Good Shepherdess and the Evil Princess
No number - unidentified film

1909
1495-1501 - Locataire diabolique, le/Diabolic Tenant, The
1508-1512 - Illusions fantaisistes, les/Whimsical Illusions

1911
1536-1547 - Hallucinations du Baron de Münchausen, les /Baron Munchausen’s Dream

1912
Pathé - A la conquète du pôle/Conquest of the Pole, The
Pathé - Cendrillon ou la pantoufle merveilleuse/Cinderella
Pathé - Chevalier des neiges, le/Knight of the Snow, The

1913
Pathé - Voyage de la famille Bourrichon, le/Voyage of the Bourichon Family, The

Almost needless to say, the quality of the digital transfers is excellent, sometimes startlingly so. There are fifteen examples of beautiful hand-colouring. Many musicians have provided scores, making the DVD a fascinating demonstration in itself of different approaches to the task of accompanying Georges Méliès (even if, for myself I find the American taste for organ accompaniment baffling). They are Eric Beheim, Brian Benison, Frederick Hodges, Robert Israel, Neal Kurz, the Mont Alto Motion Picture Orchestra, Alexander Rannie, Joseph Rinaudo, Rodney Sauer and Donald Sosin. Some of the films come with Georges Méliès’ original English narrations, designed to be spoken alongside the films, and here are spoken by Serge Bromberg and Fabrice Zagury (with some rather quaint mangling of the English language in places).

Georges Méliès is confirmed here as among the pre-eminent artists of the cinema, perhaps the most exuberant of all filmmakers. The films display imagination, wit, ingenuity, grace, style, fun, invention, mischief, intelligence, anarchy, innocence, vision, satire, panache, beauty and longing, the poetry of the absurd. Starting out as extensions of the tricks that made up Méliès’ magic shows, to view them in chronological order as they are here is to see the cinema itself bursting out of its stage origins into a theatre of the mind, where anything becomes possible - a true voyage à travers l’impossible, to take the title of one of his best-known films. The best of them have not really dated at all, in that they have become timeless, and presumably (hopefully) always will be so. Méliès in his lifetime suffered the agony of seeing his style of filmming turn archaic as narrative style in the Griffith manner became dominant, but we can see now that is his work that has truly lasted. The films will always stand out as showing how motion pictures, when they first did appeared, in a profound sense captured the imagination. And there is that consistency of vision that confirms Méliès as a true artist with a body of work that belongs in a gallery - or in this case a boxed set of DVDs - for everyone to appreciate.

What a great publication this is. Every good home should have one.

The sound of silent film

Sound of Silent Film, from www.acmusic.org

Further evidence of the rude health of the modern silent film. The third annual Sound of Silent Film Festival, an evening of modern silent films with music scores performed live, takes place at the Chopin Theatre, 1543 W. Division, Chicago on 26 March. The five films on the bill are Native New Yorker by Steve Bilich, Elastic Stronghold by Justin Heim, Birdcatcher by Chris Hefner, The Purse Belongs to Her by B.J. Moore, and Bajalica by Hurt McDermott. The composers are Natasha Bogojevich, Demetrius Spaneas and William Susman.

There’s a trailer for the festival (QuickTime), or find out more from the Academy of Accessible Music website.

Charleston Symphony Orchestra Silent Film Contest

This is novel. The third annual Charleston Symphony Orchestra Silent Film Contest has just been announced. The concept for this project is to have amateur and professional filmmakers choose a piece from the set repertoire, and make a film based on his/her interpretation of the piece. The completed films are then sent to the Symphony where they will be judged by an independent panel. The selected films will be projected onto a movie screen above the orchestra as the soundtracks are performed live. The winner receives a $1,000 grand prize and may have his/her film presented at a future CSO event.

The concert will be held on Thursday, April 10 at the Charleston Music Hall, Charleston, SC, starting at 9PM. This year the selections are “The Last Spring” from Two Elegaic Melodies by Edvard Grieg, “March of the Sardar” from Caucasian Sketches: Suite by Mikhail Ippolitov-Ivanov, “The Alcotts” from Concert Sonata by Charles Ives, Symphony No. 25 Movement 1 by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, the Magic Flute Overture by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, The Barber of Seville: Overture by Gioacchino Rossini, and Messages, an original composition by local composer and professor at the College of Charleston, Trevor Weston. All are in the public domain and freely available (”i.e. iTunes”) except for the Weston piece, for which you have to request a Midi file from the organisers.

All entires must be on DVD, must not infringe copyrights, must be world premieres, and must “be intended for a family audience, be non-commercial in nature (e.g., no infomercials or commercials), fall within the equivalent of a G, PG or PG-13 rating as such ratings are determined for theatrical films by the Motion Picture Association of America, and not contain any sexually explicit, disparaging, libelous or other inappropriate content or any nudity”. What fun. Further details are available from the competition site.

Joan in Sheffield

The Passion of Joan of Arc, from www.sensoria.org.uk

In the Nursery, the esteemed music duo (twins Klive and Nigel Humberstone) who have produced several scores of silent films, will be premiering their latest score, for Carl Dreyer’s The Passion of Joan of Arc (1928) at the Sensoria festival in Sheffield on 16 April. This is a new festival of film and music, running 12-18 April 2008, though a full programme has not been publishd is yet, so I don’t know if there will be further silent film/music combinations. The venue for The Passion of Joan of Arc will be Sheffield cathedral, and the box office is now open.

The Passion of Joan of Arc is of course one of the landmark films of silent era, indeed of cinema history as a whole. It is one of those superhuman works where you cannot imagine that the mundanities of filmmaking - camera set-ups, lighting, pauses, retakes, breaks for meals - ever took place. Using extensive use of probing, intense close-ups (no make-up was used), the film is like the history of a soul, quite unlike any other movie (what a vulgar term that is) that you will have come across. Information on the film is extensive, but check out Carl Dreyer’s illuminating thoughts on the production process, with its emphasis on staying true to the documents of the period, on the Criterion site. Dreyer, so it is said, wanted the film to be seen in silence.

In the Nursery’s website has information on their previous silent film scores. These have included Electric Edwardians (the Mitchell and Kenyon DVD collection of early actualities), Hindle Wakes, A Page of Madness, Man with a Movie Camera, Asphalt and The Cabinet of Dr Caligari. Sound extracts are available as mp3 files. The Passion of Joan of Arc will subsequently screen at Wave Gotik Treffen in Liepzig somewhere between 9-12 May, and at the Barbican in London on 1 June.

When the Barbican put on Molly

Molly Picon in East and West (Ost und west), from Barbican Film

The home for silent film in London is now the Barbican centre, whose Silent Film and Live Music continues to demonstrate imaginative programming in the titles selected and the music chosen to accompany them.

Apart from highlighting the current series, I wanted to draw particular attention to the film showing on Sunday February 17, Ost und West (East and West) (Austria 1923). This features Molly Picon, the great star of Yiddish stage and screen, and gives me the opportunity of reproducing the splendid still above. The diminutive, round-eyed Molly Picon (1898-1992) was a New York Yiddish theatre star, on the stage from the age of six, and massively popular among Jewish and on-Jewish audiences in the 1920s. She made made a handful of films in the 1920s and 30s, before returning to the screen more regularly in the 1970s (she’s most familiar to general audiences for playing the matchmaker in Fiddler on the Roof). Ost und West is the earliest of her films that survives. I’ve not see the film (yet), so here’s the Barbican’s blurb for it:

Featuring Molly Picon, one of the great stars of Yiddish cinema, it tells the story of streetwise New York flapper Mollie, who travels to her cousin’s wedding in a traditional Polish shtetl. Contrasting sophisticated city values against those of simple village life, the film contains classic scenes of the irrepressible Picon lifting weights, boxing and teaching young villagers to shimmy, and eventually meeting her match in a young yeshiva scholar.

The music comes from Lemez Lovas of Oi Va Voi and guest musicians Moshikop and Rohan Kriwaczek, taking in “traditional klezmer to contemporary electronica, from liturgical melancholy to party pop kitsch and from vaudeville to breakbeat.” Directed by Sidney M. Goldin and Ivan Abramson, the film is screening at 16.00 and runs for 85mins.

www.amazon.co.uk

For anyone interested in the history of Yiddish film, the essential source is J. Hoberman’s Bridge of Light: Yiddish Film Between Two Wars (1991), which apart from its commendable written content, is just one of the most beautifully-produced books on film history that I know. Check out also Sylvia Plaskin, When Joseph Met Molly: A Reader on Yiddish Film (1999) (Joseph being the Polish director Joseph Green), Judith N. Goldberg, Laughter Through Tears: The Yiddish Cinema (1983), or Eric A. Goldman, Visions, Images and Dreams: Yiddish Film Past and Present (1984).

Other titles being screened in the Barbican series are:

9 March - On Our Selection (Australia 1920) - homely, landmark Australian comedy-drama about the pioneering Rudd family. With piano accompaniment by Neil Brand.

3 April - Chang: A Drama of the Wilderness (USA 1927) - King Kong creators Merian C. Cooper and Ernest B Shoedsack’s classic dramatised documentary set in the jungles of Thailand (and producing background footage that went on to pad out a number of Tarzan movies). With live accompaniment by Italian group Yo Yo Mundi.

20 April - The St Kilda Tapes - a collection of silent films from the Scottish Screen Archive, including the topical St. Kilda – Britain’s Loneliest Isle (1923-28), Da Makkin O’ A Keshie (1932), and A New Way to a New World (1936), all set to music by acoustic guitarist David Allison.

4 May - Nanook of the North (USA 1922) - the so-called first documentary film (if you’ve got a couple of hours I’ll give you chapter and verse on how wrong all the text books are), directed by poet of cinema Robert Flaherty. Music from the Shrine Synchrosystem, featuring Max Reinhardt, DJ Rita Ray, world music kora master Tunde Jegede and Ben Mandelson on guitars, which ought to steer us away from the siren temptations of too much authenticity (like Flaherty?).

17 May - The Wind (USA 1928) - one of the cast-iron classics of silent cinema, Victor Sjöström’s visual masterpiece stars Lillian Gish living a hard life in dust-bowl Texas, and is guaranteed to convert even the stoniest-hearted sceptic into acclaming silent cinema. With the Carl Davis symphonic score (sadly, not with actual orchestra).

1 June - The Passion of Joan of Arc (Denmark 1928) - somehow not convinced even by The Wind? Carl Theodore Dreyer’s astonishing, overpowering work, with Falconetti as Joan, will do the trick. With music by In the Nursery.

15 June - Stella Dallas (USA 1925) - classic weepie from Henry King, starring Ronald Colman, Douglas Fairbanks Jr. and Belle Bennett. Remade with Barbara Stanwyck in 1937, but this is the version to see. With piano accompaniment by Stephen Horne.

Far, far away

Further information has been made about about Stummfilmmusiktage, the German festival of silent film and music, which takes place in the Markgrafentheater, Erlangen, 24-27 January. This email has just been sent out by the festival:

Dear friends of the silent screen,

It’s been a while since you heard from us, but the 2008 programme of StummFilmMusikTage Erlangen is finally rock solid and pre-sale tickets are available (please note: If you are considering acquiring tickets from outside Germany, please write to asynchron@stummfilmmusiktage.de and we will help you reserve the tickets you want). Our main theme for the 2008 festival will be Far, Far Away with films focussing on the rich silent film heritage of Asia, but also on Western conceptions of Asia and the exotic.

Please note that there have been a few changes in our programme since we first published it in October. This year’s films will take you to the South Seas, Japan, Mongolia, Siam, India, Chinatown L.A., the Limehouse district in London, and… to the moon.

The programme now goes like this:

Thursday, January 24, 2008

7 p.m.
Vernissage
Japanese Film Actresses in Silent Era

in cooperation with The National Film Center, Tokyo

Introduction: Mariann Lewinsky
Autor of the book Die verrückte Seite

Venue: SiemensForum Erlangen
Werner-von-Siemens-Str. 50

20:30 p.m.
What Made Her Do It? (Nani ga kanojo o sô saseta ka)
Japan 1930, 83 min
directed by: Shigeyoshi Suzuki
score: Günter Buchwald
performed by: Erlanger Musikinstitut

Venue: Vortragssaal der Siemens AG
Werner-von-Siemens-Str. 50

Friday, January 25, 2008

6 p.m.
Introduction: Storm Over Asia
with Nina Goslar (ZDF/ARTE), Bernd Schultheis (composer), Vera Zvetajeva (Cine-Club, Vladimir)

7 p.m.
Storm Over Asia (Potomok Chengiskhan)
Soviet Union 1925, 130 min
directed by: Wsewolod Pudowkin
score (world premiere): Bernd Schultheis
performed by: Ensemble Kontraste
conductor: Frank Strobel

coporoduction with
ZDF/ARTE and Ensemble Kontraste

9 p.m.
Introduction: Silent Film in Japan
Günter Buchwald

10 p.m.
Express 300 Miles (Tokkyu Sanbyaku Ri)
Japan 1929, 84 min
directed by: Genjiro Saegusa
score and performance: Günter Buchwald

Saturday, January 26, 2008

4 p.m.
Georges Méliès Short Film Programme
France 1896-1911, 60 min
directed by: Georges Méliès
score and performance:
Yogo Pausch

6 p.m.
Introduction Tabu: film and score
Violeta Dinescu (composer)

7 p.m.
Tabu
USA 1925, 84 min
directed by: F.W. Murnau
score: Violeta Dinescu
performed by: Ensemble Kontraste
conductor: Frank Strobel

9 p.m.
Merian C. Cooper - Life as Adventure
A conversation with Kevin Brownlow

10 p.m.
Chang
USA 1927, 69 min
directed by: Merian C. Cooper
score and performance:
Hildegard Pohl (piano), Yogo Pausch (percussion)

Sunday, January 27, 2008

11 p.m.
The Light of Asia
India/D 1925, 97 min
directed by: Franz Osten
score and performance: Om Prakash Pandey (Tabla), Henning Kirmse (Sitar)

13 p.m.
Slapstick-Lunch
Enjoy a delicious three-course Asian lunch. We’ll serve slapstick highlights on the side.
A reduced combi ticket for the screening of The Light of Asia and the three-course lunch is available.

4 p.m.
The Cameraman
USA 1925, 75 min
directed by: Buster Keaton
score and performance: Helmut Nieberle Quartet

6 p.m.
Anna May Wong
A reading by actors Heike Thiem-Schneider and Thomas Lang

7 p.m.
Piccadilly
GB 1928, 110 min
directed by: E.A. Dupont
Score: Frieder Egri, Roman Rothen
performed by: Frieder Egri & Ensemble

I like the idea of a slapstick lunch. Presumably custard pies for dessert. Further details as always from the festival web site.

The silent pianist speaks again

Neil Brand

Neil Brand is taking his show The Silent Pianist Speaks - first shown at the Edinburgh Festival - to London. He is appearing for two nights at the Pleasance Theatre, Islington, 22-23 December. What better way to welcome in Christmas. Here’s the press release:

“ASSISTED BY THE TRILLING WIT AND POLISH OF BRAND’S LIGHTNING-FINGERED ACCOMPANIMENT, THE SHEER FINESSE OF EACH SUCCESSIVE SLAPSTICK SELECTION WORKS ITS MAGIC ON THE AUDIENCE AND THE LAUGHTER FLOWS MORE AND MORE FREELY” Telegraph 2007

Fresh from co-starring with Paul Merton in the UK tour of Paul Merton’s Silent Clowns, Neil Brand, one of the world’s foremost silent movie accompanists is proud to present his own critically acclaimed show at The Pleasance Theatre, London for two nights only. The Silent Pianist Speaks is one of most unique and memorable shows you will see. It left both audiences and critics at this year’s Edinburgh Festival Fringe in far from silent awe of the great filmmakers of the Silent Era and the magic of the accompanists who breathed life and sound into their work.

Neil uses clips from some of the greatest moments in silent cinema to illustrate his 25 year career and the special place of music with silent film.

“A RICHLY DIVERTING HOUR OF ENTERTAINMENT - BRAND SHOULD BREAK HIS SILENCE MORE OFTEN” Metro 2007

From the earliest, earthiest comedies and thrillers, through a silent cine-verité classic shot by a young Billy Wilder, which the audience gets to score, to the glories of Hollywood glamour and the sublime Laurel and Hardy, Neil provides improv accompaniment and laconic commentary on everything from deep focus to his own live cinema disasters.

The show culminates in a performance of a film he hasn’t seen, talking through the scoring process as he plays and struggles to make some sense of the film.

“BRAND’S IMPROVISED PIANO PLAYING ELEVATES SILENT MOVIES FROM CRUDE SLAPSTICK TO SUBTLE BALLET” Guardian 2007

Having trained originally as an actor, Neil has been accompanying silent films for over 25 years performing regularly at the NFT on London’s south bank and film festivals and special events throughout the UK and the world. He is considered one of the finest exponents of improvised silent film accompaniment in the world.

He has written the title music and scores for many TV documentaries including Paul Merton’s Silent Clowns, Silent Britain and Great Britons and scores for over 50 Radio 4 dramas including War and Peace, The Box of Delights, several of the BBC audio Shakespeare Collection plays and Sony award winner A Town Like Alice. Neil is also highly regarded as a writer of radio plays including the Sony-nominated Stan, which he adapted last year to great acclaim for BBC4 TV.

He has appeared with Paul Merton across the UK in Paul’s show, Paul Merton’s Silent Clowns and also across the UK and US with his first show, Where Does the Music Come From? This year he has appeared at Finland’s ‘Midnight Sun’ Festival, Padua Opera House and Kilkenny Comedy Festival.

More details and online booking from the Pleasance website.

Retour de flamme

This short piece on the remarkable Lobster Films of Paris is doing the rounds. Here it is (taken from www.france24.com):

Frenchman Serge Bromberg, saviour of more than 100,000 reels of old films, this week marked the 15th anniversary of a world-touring show with a difference - where he accompanies rescued silent movies on the piano.

A twice yearly Paris event, Retour de Flamme (Return of the Flame) has played New York’s MoMA and travels to India next February before going to Italy and the US for shows in San Francisco and New York.

“I like to say I ‘restore’ the spectator,” he said in an interview. “I bring old movies up-to-date with a presentation and a specially-written musical score, to bring the films alive.

Bromberg’s company Lobster Films, set up two decades ago with fellow film addict Eric Lange, has saved from destruction movies dating as far back as 1895, including film’s first movie with sound - Charlie Chaplin’s first 1914 movie “Twenty Minutes of Love” - and the first movies shot in Palestine (1897) as well as the only Marx Brothers shot in colour.

In the first 50 years of cinema, films were recorded on nitrate stocks, which is inflammable and decays. As no-one had thought at the time of preserving film, much of movie history was lost.

“I pick up films all year, with 99 percent unviewable but there’s always one which is extraordinary and which I want to share,” said the 46-year-old film buff.

On DVD now is 1912 footage of the Titanic before it went down, and a 1931 burlesque titled Stolen Jools, featuring Laurel and Hardy, Buster Keaton, Joan Crawford, Gary Cooper and Douglas Fairbanks Jr.

“Fifty percent of the films shot before World War II have been lost,” he added.

Among recently saved treasures are 15 hours of rushes from a 1964 drama featuring the late Romy Schneider and directed by Henri-George Clouzot. The film was never completed and the rushes had been kept at home by Clouzot’s widow Ines.

Another of his 2007 finds is “Bardelys the magnificent” (1926) by King Vidor, starring John Gilbert.

So it’s true, Bardelys the Magnificent has been found, and of course it would be Lobster who found it. All power to them, and three cheers to all film archivists able to accompany their restorations of silent films on the piano. It ought to be a compulsory part of the job.

Pop and propaganda

Another day, another silent adopted by a modern pop group. This time it’s the Pet Shop Boys, who will be playing their score to Battleship Potemkin at the Barbican in London on 11 January 2008. The duo will be joined by the BBC Concert Orchestra, conducted by the suite’s arranger, Jonathan Stockhammer. In the breathless words of the Daily Telegraph, the ’suite’ is “an immaculate match for this extraordinary, groundbreaking piece of Bolshevik propaganda”. Hmm. The Barbican site has three short sound clips (QuickTime files), so you can be the judges.

Mary Pickford used to eat roses

Of all the subjects that might have been chosen as the theme for a contemporary popular song, the formation of the United Artists film company must come as one of the least expected. But such is the theme of ‘Mary Pickford’, the new single by Katie Melua. I shall not pass judgement on its musical or lyrical merits - simply to say that it is written by Mike Batt, and tell us in simple words that Mary Pickford, her husband Douglas Fairbanks, Charlie Chaplin and D.W. Griffith got together to form the United Artists Corporation, which indeed they did in 1919. It was the first film company to be formed by film artists, rather than businessmen, and was of course intended to produce and distribute the films of the quartet (as well as others) and retain power and profits for themselves. Famously, Richard A. Rowland of Metro Pictures Corporation, on hearing the news, pronounced that “the lunatics have taken over the asylum”.

The video is constructed as a silent film, and features numerous clips, including newsreel footage of the four founders, The Gaucho, The Black Pirate, The Taming of the Shrew, and even Rescued from an Eagle’s Nest, Griffith’s undistinguished 1907 film acting debut. Chaplin film clips are noticeable by their absence. The video features faux silent titles, including (a nice touch) “Guitar solo”.

Cue an upsurge of interest in Mary Pickford, no doubt. Apparently Pickford did indeed use to eat roses (presumably just the petals) to make herself look more beautiful, as the song tells us. Cue an upsurge in visits to garden centres…