Acorn Books

Acorn Books: I have written about this San Francisco store in the past . . . . They are going out of business and everything is now 70% off. I was there yesterday, and there are still a fair number of good books to be found - especially film books, and older film magazines including periodicals from the 1920's. What did I buy? I found a scarce copy of Screwball: The Life of Carole Lombard from 1975, the Intimate Journals of Rudolph Valentino from 1931; a nice hardback copy of Hot Toddy, a book on the murder of Thelma Todd; some vintage photoplay editions (I collect them); an autographed William K. Everson hardback book; a couple of other hardback Everson titles; a book on gangster movies, etc.... and all for cheap!

Nittany Lion perspective

Perspective on the times from the Nittany Lions.

My weekly research trips

My weekly research trips to the library continue. . . .  I uncovered Denishawn articles, ads and reviews from the Daily British Whig, the local newspaper from Kingston, Ontario. This material, dating from April 1924, included a review which mentioned Louise Brooks.  With just four  more inter-library  loan requests from Canada, I will have completed my Candadian-Denishawn research. By then, I will have obtained articles, advertisements and reviews from each of Louise Brooks' Canadian Denishawn performances. This week, I will also be looking for Denishawn material from the St. Paul Dispatch (from St. Paul, Minnesota.)

And lately, I have also been requesting and looking through other papers in search of yet more film reviews. These papers include the Hartford Courant, (from Connecticut), Queens County Evening News (from New York), Salem World (from Oregon), and the San Bernardino Evening Telegram & Evening Index (from California). I found a bit of material.

And the other night, I found online access to historic issues of the Penn State Collegian (the student newspaper at Penn State University). There, I found a few advertisements for Louise Brooks films. Here is one of them.



I would like to find more material from college newspapers. So far, as opportunity has arisen, I have scoured the papers at the University of Michigan, as well as Stanford University and the University of California, Berkeley. And in each, I found advertisements and some articles and even reviews. Imagine, college students writing about Brooks' films back in the 1920's! (In the past, I have also looked through the student newspapers from what are now Michigan State University and San Jose State University, but found nothing.) If anyone lives in a college town - the bigger the school the better - and would want to scroll through microfilm looking for Brooks material . . . . your help would be appreciated.

And for those keeping track, two of my ILL requests were rejected. Hoping to get small town reviews of Denishawn performances, I had requested the M'Alester News-Capital (from Mcalister, Oklahoma) and the Evening Chronicle (from Pottsville, Pennslyvannia). As it turns out, no state library seems to have these papers for the period requested.

Criterion DVD of Pandora's Box

The Criterion Collection website has announced the following information regarding their forthcoming release of Pandora's Box. This version - the first ever on DVD in the United States - will run 133 minutes. Expectations are high. And I think this forthcoming release should satisfy. We shall see. Among the bonus material is the first ever DVD release of now hard-to-find documentary, Lulu in Berlin. (No release date is given. The suggested retail price is $39.95)



SPECIAL FEATURES

-- New, restored high-definition digital transfer of the definitive Munich Film Museum restoration
-- Four different musical scores, each with its own unique stylistic interpretation of the film
-- Audio commentary by film scholars Thomas Elsaesser and Mary Ann Doane
-- Louise Brooks: Looking for Lulu, a 1998 documentary
-- Lulu in Berlin (48 minutes), a rare 1971 interview with Brooks by verite documentarian Richard Leacock
-- A new video interview with Leacock
-- A new interview with G. W. Pabst's son, Michael
-- New and improved English subtitle translation
-- PLUS: A book including Kenneth Tynan's famous essay "The Girl in the Black Helmet," a chapter from Louise Brooks's evocative memoir discussing her relationship with Pabst, and a new essay by film critic J. Hoberman

ABOUT THIS TRANSFER
-- Pandora's Box is presented in its original aspect ratio of 1.33:1. On widescreen televisions, black bars will appear on the left and right of the image to maintain the proper screen format. This new high-definition digital transfer was created from a 35mm composite print provided by the Munich Film Museum. Thousands of instances of dirt, debris, and scratches were removed using the MTI Digital Restoration System. To maintain optimal image quality through the compression process, the picture on this dual-layer DVD-9 was encoded at the highest-possible bit rate for the quantity of material included. The Gillian Anderson score is presented in both Dolby 5.1 surround and stereo mixes. The three other scores are presented in Dolby 2.0 stereo.

Alfred Cheney Johnston

An interesting website to check out is Alfred Cheney Johnston: Ziegfeld Follies Lost Photographer. This site is dedicated to the life & times of renown Jazz Age photographer Alfred Cheney Johnston (1884 - 1971). Besides taking scores of lovely photographs of showgirls, actors and other stage personalities, Johnston also photographed Louise Brooks. This website is put together by Robert Hudovernik, author of the forthcoming book Jazz Age Beauties.

Stolen Moments

Stolen Moments is a swell silent film / Rudolph Valentino themed podcast available on the internet. I've just finished listening to the newest installment, which features a chat with Kevin Brownlow. (I've listened to each of the podcasts, and each is good.) Stolen Moments is put together and hosted by Donna Hill (aka Rudyfan), who runs an excellent website devoted to Valentino. Check it out.

William K. Everson Archive

Well worth checking out is the William K. Everson Collection, a website which archives publicity material, photographs and most importantly the film notes (short essays) of the film historian, author, critic, teacher, archivist, and collector. [ Everson knew Louise Brooks, and wrote highly of her in his terrific 1978 book, American Silent Film. And some years ago before his death, I had the pleasure of seeing Everson's 16 mm print of Beggars of Life. ] Film buffs will enjoy exploring this site.