Monday, June 4, 2018

Louise Brooks at the 2018 San Francisco Silent Film Festival

I'm back from the recently concluded San Francisco Silent Film Festival. (Read my PopMatters preview of the event on HERE.) I saw some good films, signed copies of my books, and chatted with friends both old and new. I had a good time, despite the fact that no Louise Brooks films were shown this year. However, to the discerning film buff, the actress did have a certain "presence" at the event.

In fact, Brooks was pictured on page eleven of the Festival program, amidst an essay by Nina Fiore titled "Silent but not Silenced: Outsiders Outcasts of Silent Cinema." The image of Brooks is a still from Diary of a Lost Girl, the sensational 1929 German film directed by G.W. Pabst. But what's more, two of the stars of that film were starred in two of the other films shown at this year's event.


One of those stars is Fritz Rasp, who played the ever so creepy pharmacist Meinart in Diary of a Lost Girl. He was featured as the just-as-creepy butterfly collector Stapleton in Der Hund von Baskerville (1929). Based on the famous Sherlock Holmes story by Arthur Conan Doyle, this was the last silent Holmes story filmed in Europe. It was also the film Rasp made before Diary. Rasp as Stapleton is pictured left - Rasp as Meinart is pictured right.


The other Diary cast member featured in a film at the Festival is Andrews Engelmann, who played the also creepy director of the reform school for girls. His large bald head defined him in that film. At the Festival, he was seen as André von Engelman, a German U-boat commander in Mare Nostrum (1926). And again, his large bald head defined him.


Both of these actors were recognizable to me (and how interesting it was to see them in something else besides Diary), as well as to Ira Resnick, a fellow Louise Brooks devotee and collector and the author of the must have coffee table book, Starstruck. I have known Ira for a few years now, since 2010, when he first came to the Festival. Here is a snapshot of Ira and I, who stopped by to chat during my book signing.


During my book signing, I had the distinct privilege of signing alongside Academy Award honoree Kevin Brownlow, the author of The Parade's Gone By and the film historian who knew Brooks as well as anyone in her later years. Brownlow is legend to those who love silent film, and not surprisingly, he outsold me ten to one. Nevertheless, it was a pleasure to see Kevin again. He has been helpful to me, and generous in sharing his material and memories of Brooks.



And that's not all. I spotted Louise Brooks fan art for sale at the merchandise table, and spoke with musician Stephen Horne about Prix de Beaute. We have a mutual desire to see the silent version of that film released, and we chatted about the prospects. Stephen has accompanied the silent version a number of times, and he told me about an usual UK screening where the theater brought in a female vocalist to sing the film's lyrical theme song. Perhaps one day....


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