Upcoming silent films at the San Francisco Silent Film Festival December event

The San Francisco Silent Film Festival has announced the schedule of films for it's upcoming December event, which is set to take place on Saturday, December 7th. Among the films is one which every Louise Brooks will want to see. It is a film that Louise Brooks quite nearly appeared in. In fact, she went on location, was fit for a costume, and started work on the film, only to be pulled from the production in order to star in another film in which she wears feathers. Can you guess which film it is?

ANNOUNCING THE COMPLETE SCHEDULE

Here are all the details for our annual holiday show—A DAY OF SILENTS—at the beautiful Castro Theatre on Saturday, December 7. Five programs with musical accompaniment by the great Mont Alto Motion Picture Orchestra, Donald Sosin, and Berklee Silent Film Orchestra! TICKETS are now on sale. Don’t miss a thing and save money with the all-day PASS. More information HERE.

 

FATTY + BUSTER 11:00 am | $17 general / $15 member Music by Donald Sosin Roscoe “Fatty” Arbuckle discovered Buster Keaton and these three sparkling shorts demonstrate the striking chemistry between the two geniuses. The program includes THE COOK (1918), GOOD NIGHT, NURSE (1918), and THE GARAGE (1919).

REDSKIN 1:00 pm | $17 general / $15 member Music by Mont Alto Motion Picture Orchestra Navajo Wing Foot navigates between his western education and the traditions passed down by tribal elders. Shot in breathtaking two-color Technicolor at locations in New Mexico and Arizona (including Acoma Pueblo and Canyon de Chelly).

WOMAN WITH A MOVIE CAMERA 3:15 pm | $17 general / $15 member Music by Donald Sosin French filmmaker Alice Guy-Blaché got into the movie business at the very beginning—in 1894! One of the very first directors to make narrative films, her work is marked by innovation—she experimented with color-tinting, and special effects. The program includes six of her shorts.

THE MARRIAGE CIRCLE 5:00 pm | $17 general / $15 member Music by Mont Alto Motion Picture Orchestra Ernst Lubitsch works narrative magic with knowing looks and subtle gestures in this superb comedy centering around two couples—the sublimely-in-love Monte Blue and Florence Vidor, and the less-so Adolphe Menjou and Marie Prevost.

THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA 8:00 pm | $24 general / $22 member Music by Berklee Silent Film Orchestra The very first film version of Phantom stars Lon Chaney—the Man of a Thousand Faces—in his most celebrated role, the disfigured, cloaked “phantom” who haunts the Paris Opera House and will do anything for his beloved Christine. With original Technicolor and hand coloring!

Silent films at the Brooklyn Public Library, series turns 18

This year marks the 18th year in which the Brooklyn Public Library shows silent films for FREE. The series is curated and hosted by Ken Gordon, a big fan of Louise Brooks and a supporter and member of the Louise Brooks Society. Congratulations Ken and the BPL on turning 18! (They are a bit older than that, actually.) More information on the current series, which features live musical accompaniment by Bernie Anderson, can be found HERE.

Though there not showing a Brooks' film, this season looks appealing. The BPL will be showing The Phantom of the Opera (1925), starring Lon Chaney, The Extra Girl (1923), starring Mabel Normand, and The Informer (1929), a British silent directed by Arthur Robison.

Greetings from a Rochester Louise Brooks Fan

The other day, the Louise Brooks Society received an email from Tim Madigan, Professor and Chair of Philosophy at St. John Fisher College in Rochester, New York. Aside from his academic interests, Tim is also a self-professed major fan of Louise Brooks. On October 2, spoke about Louise Brooks at the Rochester Public Library (see previous post).

Tim wrote, "Many thanks for giving my October 2nd talk about Louise Brooks at the Rochester Public Library a shout-out on your website. I have long been an admirer of your work on Brooks and I had some fear and trembling giving a talk about her at the Rochester Public Library, knowing that at least some of the people attending would be far more learned about her life and career than I am. But it turned out to be a nice gathering and I actually reconnected with some folks I hadn’t seen in several years. I also met with Tim Moore, who filled me in on local Brooks activities I was unaware of."

Tim continued, "There was some method to my madness in giving the presentation. At its end I made a modest proposal that the Rochester Public Library have an annual Louise Brooks Event (or Happening), of which mine could be the first. I’d also like to see the library have a dedicated Louise Brooks Room, with photos and other memorabilia (perhaps including, in a case, some of the library books she annotated).... As I mentioned in my talk, like many others I’ve been obsessed with Brooks for decades and often teach about her in my Philosophy through Film courses at St. John Fisher College. I also held a 100^th birthday party for her in 2006, complete with a cake with her image on it. And as the attached photo demonstrates, her image can be found throughout my office, including a photo of me visiting her grave at Holy Sepulcher Cemetery."

"I think there were about 40 or so folks in attendance, some of whom remembered seeing Louise when she was still able to walk the streets of Rochester. At some point I hope to type up the remarks I made."

Reminder - Reluctant Icon Louise Brooks event set for Wednesday, October 2

A reminder that the upcoming Louise Brooks event at the Rochester, New York Public Library. The event, "Reluctant Icon: Louise Brooks (1906-1985)" is set to take place on Wednesday, October 2 in the Kate Gleason Auditorium in Rochester's Central Library. Start time is 6:00 pm, and the event is expected to run one hour.

Rochester resident Tim Moore took these pictures of the some of the library's in-house promotion for the event.

According to the library website: "2019 marks the 90^th anniversary of Louise Brooks’ most famous film, Pandora’s Box, a print of which has been newly restored. In this presentation, Tim Madigan will discuss how a young girl from Kansas came to Weimar, Germany to play the iconic role of Lulu in that movie, as well as how she later moved to Rochester, where she spent the rest of her life, becoming a noted chronicler of Hollywood and a figure of mystery. He’ll also discuss her depiction in the 2012 novel The Chaperone and its 2018 movie version, and why she lives on as a modern-day muse.

Tim Madigan is Professor and Chair of Philosophy at St. John Fisher College where he regularly discusses Pandora’s Box in his “Philosophy through Film” course." The event is free and open to the public. More information may be found HERE.

As many Louise Brooks fans should know, Louise herself visited this library on many occasions. She was a great reader of books, and at least a few of the books she checked out (and even annotated) still resides on the library shelves. The Central library also has a small collection of books and movies related to Brooks, including copies of some of the publications of the Louise Brooks Society.

Louise Brooks in second edition of Perfume Legends

Fragrance expert Michael Edwards has revised and updated his highly regarded reference work Perfume Legends. First published in 1996, Edwards' book is now considered one of the most significant books written on modern perfumery. His new book, Perfume Legends II, has recently been released, and includes a reference to Louise Brooks in describing Loulou, a Louise Brooks-inspired  scent created by Jean Guichard for Cacharel in 1987. (A container of this perfume, in its box, is in the collection of the Louise Brooks Society.) The Loulou perfume is also depicted on the cover of the book.

The following two paragraphs are excerpted from Perfume Legends II. "By the mid-eighties, competition in the French fragrance market had become brutal. In just one year, more fragrances were launched than in the entire 1960s. Loulou was a sequel to 1978’s Anaïs Anaïs and inspired by silent film star Louise Brooks. 'In France, people say that a young girl’s skin smells of caramel. That is the smell of toffee,' says Guichard. 'So we started working around the vanilla-toffee notes.'

In Tahiti he came across the beautiful tiare flower, which had a freshness he needed to balance the 'gourmand' flavours. 'We associate vanilla with something very agreeable, because, as children, we were spoiled by cakes and ice cream. More than that, it’s a scent that men find sexy'."

It is interesting to note that the script font used to spell out the word Loulou is the same used on the Dutch edition of Loulou in Hollywood.

Louise Brooks film Beggars of Life shows in England

The 1928 Louise Brooks film, Beggars of Life, will be shown on Sunday, October 6th in Dorset, England. More information can be found HERE.

According to the venue: The Dodge Brothers and Neil Brand play live to a screening of the classic 1928 silent film Beggars of Life. Renowned film critic Mark Kermode - who plays bass and harmonica - will be joining his bandmates and acclaimed composer Brand for a musical accompaniment to the seminal 1928 silent movie featuring Wallace Beery as a rail-riding hobo and Louise Brooks as a girl on the run. The Dodge Brothers (Mike Hammond, Mark Kermode, Aly Hirji and Alex Hammond) play an exuberant hybrid of country blues, rockabilly, jugband and skiffle. 

“Never has a film and a band been more perfectly matched than ‘Beggars of Life’ and the Dodge Brothers – deep dish Americana, rail-riding hoboes and Louise Brooks – they were made for each other.” – Bryony Dixon, curator of silent film, British Film Institute.

The performance has been met with glowing reviews following London shows, and the band became the first ever to accompany a silent film at Glastonbury Festival in 2014. Tickets: £17.50, Concessions £15.50 (including 50p Regent Centre Development Fee)

 

 Want to learn more about Louise Brooks and Beggars of Life? My book, Beggars of Life: A Companion to the 1928 Film, as well as the DVD / Blu-ray of the film from Kino Lorber, are the perfect compliment to one another. And what's more, the DVD, featuring the best copy of the film available anywhere, includes an informative commentary by yours truly!

My 106-page book on Beggars of Life looks at the film Oscar-winning director William Wellman thought his finest silent movie. Based on Jim Tully’s bestselling book of hobo life—and filmed by Wellman the year after he made Wings (the first film to win the Best Picture Oscar), Beggars of Life is a riveting drama about an orphan girl (played by Louise Brooks) who kills her abusive stepfather and flees the law. She meets a boy tramp (leading man Richard Arlen), and together they ride the rails through a dangerous hobo underground ruled over by Oklahoma Red (future Oscar winner Wallace Beery). Beggars of Life showcases Brooks in her best American silent—a film the Cleveland Plain Dealer described as “a raw, sometimes bleeding slice of life.” This first ever study of Beggars of Life includes more than 50 little seen images, a mention of the Dodge Brothers, and a foreword by actor and author William Wellman, Jr. (the director's son).

If you haven't secured a copy of either the book or the DVD / Blu-ray, why not do so today? Each is an essential addition to your Louise Brooks collection, and EACH IS AVAILABLE IN BOTH THE UK AND THE USA via amazon.com.