Diary of a Lost Girl - Croatia 1930

If you are a fan of Louise Brooks, of silent film, or of the movies from any era, the Heritage Auctions website is always well worth checking out. New on the site is this vintage movie poster from Croatia, The auction description is copied below: 

Diary of a Lost Girl (Pabst Film, 1930). Yugoslavian Poster (24.5" X 37.5").

Diary of a Lost Girl is the famous German film directed by G. W. Pabst and starring the inimitable Louise Brooks. Certainly the large 1929 Austrian poster, the only copy known, which is so beautifully featured in the book Starstruck by Ira Resnick, has remained to this day one of the most sought after images on this title. This amazing find is from the first showing in the newly formed Yugoslavia, in 1930. It is a redrawing of the Austrian artwork with even more force and suggestiveness than the source poster. With its image of a partially clad Louise Brooks, the poster is at once, eroticism in its true form, and a timeless theatrical image. This may be the only known copy of this poster. It has had restoration only in the foldlines for some fold separations and minor center-point and left foldline loss of paper. There was some edge wear on the right border. Fine/Very Fine on Linen. Estimate: $1,500 - $3,000.

Louise Brooks & Bruce Conner

Bruce Conner (1933 – 2008) was an American artist renowned for his work in assemblage, film, drawing, sculpture, painting, collage, and photography, among other disciplines. He was also a big fan of Louise Brooks. On more than one occasion, Conner told me of his lifelong interest in the actress. [Read more about Conner on his Wikipedia page.]

Conner was born on this day in 1933 in McPherson, Kansas, and was raised in Wichita, Kansas. Back in 1997, I mounted a small exhibit about Louise Brooks at a neighborhood cafe. Conner visited the exhibit, and wrote a note in guestbook.

Somewhere, there is a video of me introducing Bruce Conner at the Castro Theater in San Francisco before an audience of more than 1400 people. [The occasion was a screening of Pandora's Box at the 2006 San Francisco Silent Film Festival.] After my introduction, Conner talked of his interested in Brooks and related how he used to watch her come and go from her Wichita dance studio.

From Wikipedia: "Conner began making short movies in the late 1950s. Conner’s first and possibly most famous film was entitled A MOVIE (1958). A MOVIE (Conner explicitly titles his movies in all capital letters) was a poverty film in that instead of shooting his own footage Conner used compilations of old newsreels and other old films. He skillfully re-edited that footage, set the visuals to a recording of Ottorino Respighi's Pines of Rome, and created an entertaining and thought-provoking 12 minute film, that while non-narrative has things to say about the experience of watching a movie and the human condition. A MOVIE (in 1994) was selected for preservation by the United States National Film Registry at the Library of Congress. Conner subsequently made nearly two dozen mostly non-narrative experimental films."

Non of those films seem to be available on YouTube. So, instead, we offer these with best wishes to Bruce Conner on his birthday. (To watch the NSFW Bruce Conner film, Breakaway (1966), visit this page on vimeo. And yes, that is Toni Basil of Mickey fame as the dancer.)

Louise Brooks: As seen on Amazon

Seen on Amazon, two Louise Brooks related titles at ridiculous prices! Needless-to-say, each can be had for a lot less.

The first is a softcover copy of Louise Brooks, by Barry Paris. This 1990 edition is out-of-print, and second-hand copies can be found for only a few dollars. Nevertheless, this seller is asking $4,999.00 for a mint copy. Go figure. 

The second is a copy of the Louise Brooks edition of The Diary of a Lost Girl, which retails for $24.95. Here, this seller is asking $224.55. Wow!

Early 1930s Louise Brooks portrait

An early 1930's portrait of Louise Brooks, by Irving Lippman (of Columbia Studios).

Happy birthday Louise Brooks

Dancer, writer, and silent film star Louise Brooks was born on this day in 1906 in Cherryvale, Kansas. And, on that very day, the Cherryvale Daily News ran a small item on the front page of the newspaper. Happy Birthday, Louise !

To celebrate, why not watch a movie like Pandora's Box, or read a book, like the Louise Brooks edition of The Diary of a Lost Girl.

Compare and contrast: two pictures of Louise Brooks

Louise Brooks, circa 1925

Louise Brooks, circa 1927

Louise Brooks Society visits the William S. Paley Collection

The Louise Brooks Society visits the William S. Paley Collection at the De Young Museum in San Francisco. (Brooks and Paley had an affair in the 1920s, and later in life, Paley - the founder of CBS - secretly supported the destitute Brooks as she wrote "Lulu in Hollywood.")

Movies return to the Potrero Theater

According to its Cinema Treasures page, "The New Potrero opened as the Alta Theatre in 1913. The installation of sound equipment in 1930 also brought a new name: the New Potrero Theatre.... They ran no ad in the daily newspaper; a monthly calendar kept neighborhood patrons abreast of what was playing." Because they did not advertise, nor seemingly did they get their showings listed in the local San Francisco newspapers, I doubt that any Louise Brooks film ever screened there.