Monday, April 16, 2007

Screenings in Toronto

Two films featuring Louise Brooks will be shown in Toronto at the Goethe-Institut. Pandora's Box will be shown on Thursday, April 19th and Diary of a Lost Girl will be shown on May 24th. Both screenings are set for 7 pm.  Further information here.

FILMS AT THE GOETHE-INSTITUT TORONTO  Kinowelt Hall
163 King St. W. (St. Andrew subway), 416/593-5257
-admission $5., reservations possible, 18 yrs. +
Silent Films with live accompaniment by some of Toronto’s most innovative contemporary musicians!

Thu, Apr 19, 7pm
Pandora’s Box (“Die Büchse der Pandora”),1929, large screen projection, 131 min, by Georg Wilhelm Pabst, with Louise Brooks, Fritz Kortner - Five Stars/Now Magazine      With live music accompaniment by Marilyn Lerner (piano) and Mark Duggan (marimba/percussion).

Pandora’s Box is the story of Lulu, a femme fatale, whose innocent sexuality destroys the men around her. The best known of G.W. Pabst’s works, and the most famous masterwork of eroticism and desire in German silent film!

Thu, May 10, 7pm
Madame Dubarry,1919, 16mm, 92 min,
by Ernst Lubitsch, with Pola Negri, Emil Jannings.     With live music accompaniment by Susanna Hood (voice) and Debashi Sinha (percussion).

Lubitsch’s first historical film and the best of his early silent films, Madame Dubarry is the story of a poor French seamstress who sleeps her way to the top in the court of King Louis XV and ultimately suffers the consequences. Legendary screen actress Pola Negri plays the courtesan, and the inimitable Emil Jannings plays the king. This film was a big audience success at its time! Rare screening!

Thu, May 24, 7pm
Diary of a Lost Girl (“Tagebuch einer Verlorenen”), 1929, 16mm, 100 min, by Wilhelm Pabst, with Siegfried Arno, Louise Brooks.     With live music accompaniment by Kathleen Kajioka (violin) and Rich Brown (electric bass).

As in Pandora's Box, Brooks plays an outcast, but when the film begins, Thymiane is a world away from Pandora's Lulu. Whereas Lulu had men eating out of her hand, Thymiane is an innocent cast adrift in a hostile world. Thymiane is less in control of the men around her and much more dependent on them than they are on her. After enduring many hardships in the first half of the film, the second half sees Thymiane gain the strength to reassert herself and take back control of her life. 

Sunday, April 15, 2007

Greta Garbo

Greta Garbo died 7 years ago on April 15, 2000. The long obituary which appeared in the New York Times the following day can be found online. The article is titled "Greta Garbo, 84, Screen Icon Who Fled Her Stardom, Dies."

There is also a rather interesting article in the Sunday New York Times about the influence of the cinema on the art of Picasso and Braque. The article by Randy Kennedy, "When Picasso and Braque Went to the Movies," appears in the art section. It disccusses an exhibition which seeks cinematic clues to the roots of Cubism.

Thursday, April 12, 2007

In Memorium

And advertisement for the Vonnegut family store in Indianapolis found while researching Louise Brooks films in that Indiana town. God Bless you, Mr. Kurt Vonnegut.

Tuesday, April 10, 2007

Beggars of Life screening in 35mm !

Speaking of Beggars of Life, a newly struck 35mm print of the film will be shown this summer as part of the San Francisco Silent Film Festival. And what's more, actor William Wellman Jr., the son of the film's famous director, will be on hand to speak about the film. The press release announcing the festival was just released:


Special Programs and Classic Films Take To the Screen at 12th Annual San Francisco Silent Film Festival


    SAN FRANCISCO, April 9 /PRNewswire/ -- The art of silent film will be 
restored to its original brilliance when The 12th Annual San Francisco
Silent Film Festival brings a classic love story, a dramatic portrayal of
hobo life, a British suspense-thriller and other great silent films back to
the big screen, all with live musical accompaniment, on July 13-15.
    "The majestic Castro Theatre in San Francisco will once again be the
site for a weekend-long celebration of silent film, so we can continue to
raise awareness of the need to protect, preserve and restore these precious
movies," said Artistic Director Stephen Salmons.
    "The movies that Hollywood produces today owe their inspiration and
their soul to the pioneering geniuses of the silent era, many of whom we
will salute at this year's festival," Salmons said.
    Among the special programs that will highlight the 2007 festival is an
Opening Night Presentation of Ernst Lubitsch's THE STUDENT PRINCE IN OLD
HEIDELBERG (1927), starring Norma Shearer and Ramon Novarro. "This is one
of the all-time great love stories, full of wit, zest and heart," Salmons
said. The festival also will screen William A. Wellman's BEGGARS OF LIFE
(1928), a gritty, unsentimental portrait of hobo life starring Richard
Arlen, Louise Brooks and Wallace Beery.
    "BEGGARS OF LIFE is a film we have hoped to show for years," Salmons
said. "It depicts homelessness in the pre-crash 1920s - something rarely
seen in mainstream cinema. Thanks to George Eastman House, the sole
surviving 16mm print has now been returned to 35mm, so we can finally show
the film again in its original format." Live musical accompaniment will be
provided by The Mont Alto Motion Picture Orchestra, a chamber ensemble that
performs period- authentic photoplay music.
    The festival will highlight the work of an early master of British
cinema "- and no, it isn't Alfred Hitchcock," Salmons said, "even though
the film we are showing is a real nail-biter, every bit as suspenseful and
surprising as anything Hitchcock dreamt up." A COTTAGE ON DARTMOOR (1929),
directed by Anthony Asquith, is a psychological thriller which relates the
story of a love triangle between a barber's assistant, a manicurist, and
one of their clients. The musical accompaniment also will be "the work of a
British master," Salmons noted. "We are importing pianist Stephen Horne
from London to perform his acclaimed solo score for this film."
    The festival's tribute to Turner Classic Movies will feature a rare
screening of the infamous 1921 version of CAMILLE, starring Rudolph
Valentino and Alla Nazimova.
    "It holds a unique position in film history as one of the most
flamboyant art films ever to come out of a Hollywood studio, "Salmons said.
"The costumes, the sets, and above all the extraordinary stylized acting of
Nazimova, a notorious figure of the silent era, make it a
once-in-a-lifetime experience. It will absolutely light up the big screen."
    The 12th Annual San Francisco Silent Film Festival opens on Friday,
July 13 and runs through Sunday, July 15, at the Castro Theatre, 429 Castro
Street in San Francisco. Complete program details and information on how to
purchase tickets will be announced in May at http://www.silentfilm.org. The San
Francisco Silent Film Festival is a nonprofit organization dedicated to
promoting silent film as an art form and as a cultural and historical
record.

Monday, April 9, 2007

Scrappy Lambert

A new-to-me vintage version of "Beggars of Life" has turned up on youtube.com (Thanx to Belgian LBS member Patrick Mathay for pointing this out.) This newly discovered recording of the Beggars of Life theme song is by Scrappy Lambert, and was released as a 78 rpm on the Bruswick label. Check it out at www.youtube.com/watch?v=FciasJD8C_8

Does anyone know anything about this recording, or anything about Scrappy Lambert ?

Saturday, April 7, 2007

Two announcements: Jack Garner & Kevin Brownlow

The Rochester Democrat & Chronicle has announced that long-time film critic Jack Garner will retire. The nationally syndicated journalist was a friend to all those interested in Louise Brooks. Not only had Garner known the actress in Rochester (where he had worked since the early 1970's), he had also interviewed her and her fellow silent film star, Lillian Gish. Garner had also introduced a recent centennial celebration screening of Pandora's Box, and contributed the forward to the recent book by Peter Cowie, Louise Brooks: Lulu Forever. And, way back in 2000, Garner praised the Louise Brooks Society website in the pages of the Rochester Democrat & Chronicle. According to the article announcing his retirement, Garner will continue to contribute occassional articles and columns. Good luck Jack !

----------

I am very excited to learn that Kevin Brownlow - film historian extraordinaire and friend of Louise Brooks - will be coming to San Francisco at the end of the month. Brownlow will be given the Mel Novikoff Award from the San Francisco Film Society. Brownlow will also be participating in two programs as part of the San Francisco International Film Festival. I am excitied because Kevin Brownlow - the author of The Parade's Gone By - is a legend among those who love silent film. (I had the pleasure of seeing Brownlow once before - at Cinecon in Los Angeles - and even got him to sign a few books for me then.)

Here is San Francisco Film Society press release:
Kevin Brownlow To Receive Mel Novikoff Award At 50th San Francisco International Film Festival
Archivist, Historian, Author, Documentarian and Director Honored for His Extensive and Peerless Body of Work
April 3, 2007
San Francisco, CA – Kevin Brownlow will receive the Mel Novikoff Award at the 50th San Francisco International Film Festival (April 26–May 10). Named for the pioneering San Francisco art and repertory film exhibitor Mel Novikoff (1922–1987), the Award acknowledges an individual or institution whose work has enhanced the filmgoing public’s knowledge and appreciation of world cinema. The Novikoff Award will be presented at An Afternoon with Kevin Brownlow on Saturday, April 28 at 2:00 pm at the Castro Theatre, preceding an onstage interview with film scholar Russell Merritt. Afterwards Brownlow will introduce the screening of his selection, The Iron Mask (1929). The gallant Douglas Fairbanks must save the French crown from black-hearted schemers in Alan Dwan’s lavish version of The Three Musketeers, filled with chivalry, derring-do and impressive pre–special effects stuntwork. Mask was made at the end of the silent era and is considered the summation of the swashbuckling genre.
As it is impossible to do justice to Brownlow’s body of work in just one afternoon or even one day, Cecil B. De Mille – An American Epic (2004), directed by Brownlow and produced by his colleague Patrick Stanbury, will play at 9:15 pm on Saturday, April 28 at the Sundance Cinemas Kabuki. Narrated by Kenneth Branagh and featuring music by Elmer Bernstein, Cecil B. De Mille follows the career of one of Hollywood’s original pioneers. Martin Scorsese, Steven Spielberg, Charlton Heston and Angela Lansbury are some of the many well-known names that appear, while De Mille’s surviving kin also lend insight into his personal and family life. His (and by extension, Hollywood’s) greatest hits are covered in detail, including later historical and Biblical epics like Cleopatra (1934), Samson and Delilah (1949) and The Ten Commandments (1956). The documentary includes never-before-seen footage of the parting of the Red Sea, which Spielberg declares “the best special-effects sequence of all time.”
Finally Brownlow will present the lecture Kevin Brownlow: Introduction to Silents on the pre-talkie era and screen excerpts from silent gems including Bronco Billy’s Adventure (1911),Scaramouche (1924), The Chess Player (1926) and Fire Brigade (1926) at the Pacific Film Archive in Berkeley on Sunday, April 29, at 5:30 pm. PFA pianist Judith F. Rosenberg will provide accompaniment. This program is presented in association with the San Francisco Silent Film Festival.
Born in Sussex, England in 1938, Kevin Brownlow is the godfather of modern film archiving practices. He is the preeminent film historian and documentarian of the silent era. He is also one of the most accomplished British directors of his era, having made the masterpieces It Happened Here (1966) and Winstanley (1975).
How It Happened Here, a warts-and-all account of the making of his first feature, is an important book on the difficulties and triumphs of making an indie film. Brownlow’s collection of interviews with silent-film stars, The Parade’s Gone By (1968), and his ensuing 12-part television documentary Hollywood (made with David Gill) have inspired numerous film archivists, critics and professors.
Brownlow’s magnificent restoration of Abel Gance’s 1927 classic Napoleon wasn’t just the film preservation event of the decade when it was rereleased in a gloriously restored version in 1981, but a cultural phenomenon. For nearly 40 years, he assembled every scrap of celluloid he could find, searching flea markets and the world’s archives. He championed the film and Gance at every opportunity. And he is still restoring the film. Like the Flying Dutchman, the film is his curse—and the world’s blessing.
Most of all, there are the films he has salvaged and dusted off for Photoplay Productions, the company he founded to focus on important restorations like The EagleThe Phantom of the OperaThe Thief of Bagdad and The Gold Rush to name just a few. To see a film bearing the Brownlow touch is to go back to a magical time when the silent movies glowed on the silver screen and cinema was a physical experience.
Brownlow’s intense passion is something to emulate. His utter tenacity to present the best restorations and orchestral scores has always been about the value of the film itself. And his writings make the reader want to see every movie he mentions because he loves them so much. 
Previous recipients of the Mel Novikoff Award are Anita Monga (2005), Paolo Cherchi Usai (2004), Manny Farber (2003), David Francis (2002), Cahiers du Cinéma (2001), San Francisco Cinematheque (2001), Donald Krim (2000), David Shepard (2000), Enno Patalas (1999), Adrienne Mancia (1998), Judy Stone (1997), Film Arts Foundation (1997), David Robinson (1996), Institut Lumière (1995), Naum Kleiman (1994), Andrew Sarris (1993), Jonas Mekas (1992), Pauline Kael (1991), Donald Richie (1990), USSR Filmmakers Association (1989) and Dan Talbot (1988). The Mel Novikoff Award Committee members are Francis J. Rigney (chairman), Linda Blackaby (ex officio), Helena R. Foster, George Gund III, Maurice Kanbar, Philip Kaufman, Edith Kramer, Tom Luddy, Gary Meyer, Anita Monga, Janis Plotkin and Peter Scarlet.
Here is a link to the Iron Mask screening, which I believe Brownlow will be attending. And here is a link to the screening of the new Brownlow documentary on Cecil B. DeMille at the Kabuki. And here is a link to the Kevin Brownlow: Introduction to Silents program at the PFA.

Friday, April 6, 2007

Out

I just came across this piece on Peter Cowie's Louise Brooks: Lulu Forever. It appeared in the September 2006 issue of Out, a gay men's magazine.



In case you haven't already gotten a copy of Peter Cowie's book, now is the time to do so! It contains a thoughtful text on Brooks (who Cowie knew), as well as dozens and dozens of lovely and rare images of the actress.

If you can't afford a copy, perhaps you local library  has one on the shelves. If they don't, suggest they purchase a copy for their collection. Many local library websites have a  "make a suggestion" page where patrons can suggest  new books.

Tuesday, April 3, 2007

William Wellman Jr

Today, I had a very pleasant telephone chat with William Wellman Jr. We spoke about many things, including an upcoming screening of Beggars of Life. (More on that at a later date.) 

Along with Beggars of Life - the excellent 1928 film starring Louise Brooks, Wellman Sr directed many other notable films, including WingsPublic EnemyCall of the WildBeau Geste, the original A Star Is Born, and The Ox-Bow Incident. He is certainly one of the great directors of his time. His son, with whom I spoke, has recently authored a book.



I haven't yet seen the book, but Wellman Jr told me the book does discuss Louise Brooks. I am looking forward to getting a copy, and all interested should check it out. More about the book and its subject and the author at www.williamwellmanjr.com

Sunday, April 1, 2007

Lulu in KC today

From today's Kansas City Star newspaper


Who knows what will come out of “Pandora’s Box” when the classic silent film is accompanied by a live score performed by the Gillham Park Orchtet at 2 p.m. today at the Kansas City Central Library, 1410 10th St.

My guess: A mesmerizing experience.

German director G.W. Pabst’s ahead-of-its-time psycho-sexual melodrama from 1928 stars bangs-wearing beauty Louise Brooks (a Kansas native), whose party-girl character Lulu expects a bang out of life — until her luck runs out.

“She looks modern,” wrote film guru Roger Ebert about Brooks as Lulu. “She doesn’t have the dated makeup of many silent stars. … She wants to party, she wants to make love, she wants to drink, she wants to tell men what she wants and she wants to get it.”

Orchtet leader Jeffery Ruckman wrote the all-acoustic score for “Pandora’s Box.” The group’s inventive soundscapes have also been featured on National Public Radio’s “All Things Considered.”

Consider this: Brooks’ career faded with the advent of talkies, but her legacy is right up there with Greta Garbo and Marlena Dietrich. Be seduced by it in this free screening.
I would love to hear from anyone who attends this screening, and know their impressions of the soundtrack.
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