Tuesday, November 6, 2012

Louise Brooks on the cover of Doom Patrol

From Show Girl in the 1920s to Valentina in more recent decades, Louise Brooks likeness has long served as an inspiration to cartoonists and comic book artists. This tradition of inspiration continues. A couple of images of Louise Brooks appear on the cover of an issue (number 13) of Doom Patrol (Vertigo), from October, 2010. The story is by Keith Giffen, and the art is by Matthew Clark, Ron Randall, and John Livesay. More information about this particular issue of Doom Patrol can be found at www.comicbookresources.com/?page=user_review&id=2540


Monday, November 5, 2012

Video: The Raconteurs, Steady As She Goes - Louise Brooks


A Louise Brooks tribute video, featuring "Steady As She Goes" by The Raconteurs (Jack White's group).

Sunday, November 4, 2012

Louise Brooks and Pandora's Box on TCM tonight!

Tonight, the cable station Turner Classic Movies (TCM) is scheduled to air the 1929 Louise Brooks' film, Pandora's Box, in the United States. Directed by G.W. Pabst, it's considered one of the great films of the silent era. Check your local listings to find when this airs in your area. For more information, check this TCM webpage devoted to the film.


Saturday, November 3, 2012

The Great Nickelodeon Show

Louise Brooks fan Russell Merritt, who has introduced her films here in San Francisco,
 is behind this cinematic extravaganza

Friday, November 2, 2012

Louise Brooks film screens at Andy Warhol Museum

There are few pop culture icons like Louise Brooks . . . and Andy Warhol. Each is legendary. Each, in ways, symbolize their time.

The silent film star and the pop artist come together on November 2 when the Andy Warhol Museum in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania screens the gender-bending 1928 Louise Brooks' film, Beggars of Life. Live musical accompaniment will be provided by Pittsburgh's Daryl Fleming and friends.

Pop art colors define this vintage lobby card
Brooks’ singular beauty, charisma and naturalness helped make her a popular star in the 1920s. The bobbed hair actress was best known for her roles in light romantic comedies like Love Em and Leave Em (1926) and A Girl in Every Port (1928). Her dramatic role in Beggars of Life proved to be something different.

Directed by William Wellman the year after he made Wings (the first film to win an Academy Award), Beggars of Life is a gripping drama about a girl (played by Brooks) dressed as a boy who flees the law after killing her abusive stepfather. On the run, she rides the rails through a male dominated hobo underworld in which danger is always close at hand. Wallace Berry and Richard Arlen also star.

In its review, the New York Morning Telegraph wrote, "Louise Brooks, in a complete departure from the pert flapper that it has been her wont to portray, here definitely places herself on the map as a fine actress. Her characterizations, drawn with the utmost simplicity, is genuinely affecting."

Quinn Martin of the New York World added, "Here we have Louise Brooks, that handsome brunette, playing the part of a fugitive from justice, and playing as if she meant it, and with a certain impressive authority and manner. This is the best acting this remarkable young woman has done."

Beggars of Life features Brooks' best acting and proved to be her best film prior to heading off to Germany to star in Pandora's Box and Diary of a Lost Girl (both 1929). It is on those two films, each directed by G.W. Pabst, that Brooks' iconic reputation rests.

For this special screening, the Warhol Museum continues its partnership with the George Eastman House, the world-renowned photograph and motion picture archive in Rochester, New York. The screening is part of a series of seldom shown classic films, "Unseen Treasures from The George Eastman House."

The Beggars of Life screening marks the second time the Warhol Museum has partnered with the Eastman House to show a Brooks' film in Pittsburgh. Back in December of 2008, the Warhol Museum screened the 1930 Brooks' film, Prix de Beauté.

Pop art colors define this vintage lobby card
 For more info: Beggars of Life (b/w, 81 minutes) will be shown on Friday, November 2 at 8:00 p.m at The Warhol Theater in The Andy Warhol Museum in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The Museum will screen a recently restored, 35mm archival print, with live musical accompaniment. Additional details and ticket availability can be found at http://www.warhol.org/webcalendar/event.aspx?id=7162

Thursday, November 1, 2012

New score for Pandora's Box playing in the UK

A new score for Pandora's Box (1929), starring Louise Brooks, has been written by composer Jóhann Jóhannsson and cellist and composer Hildur Gudnadóttir (from the Icelandic band Múm). They will stage their score live during screenings in the UK, together with clarinettist and graduate of the Royal Northern College of Music Dov Goldberg, and experimental turntable artist Philip Jeck, whose distinctive sound is created by mixing, looping and layering extracts from old vinyl records.


Pandora's Box will be performed in Manchester, Leeds, Coventry and London through November 3. The screenings and newly commissioned score is part of an Opera North Projects, an element of Opera North which brings classical and contemporary arts together in a year-round program of performance.

More on the new score and screenings can be found at www.guardian.co.uk/uk/the-northerner/2012/oct/30/opera-opera-north
Powered By Blogger