More on the Cinecon schedule

Yesterday's post sketched this year's schedule for the Cinecon Classic Film Festival. The annual event, which takes place in Hollywood, has moved online due to the ongoing pandemic. All films will be streamed live via the internet on the Cinecon main page Friday September 3rd through Monday September 6th. The show will start at 3:00 PM PT / 6:00 PM ET on Friday and run about 4 1/2 hours.

I am looking forward to a handful of programs, including a Colleen Moore film, a Clara Bow / Baby Peggy film, a Thomas Meighan film (Brooks' co-star in The City Gone Wild), and the Francis X Bushman documentary (Bushman was my grandmother's favorite actor), among others. Here is a little more detail on this year's event, which is coming up in just a few weeks over Labor Day weekend. Don't miss this special online event. 

This following information comes from THIS PAGE:

ELLA CINDERS (1926, First National Pictures)
A special screening of ELLA CINDERS staring the great Colleen Moore. This showing will feature a brand new score by Scott Lasky of the Famous Players Orchestra. There will also have bonus footage from other Moore films featuring fragments from FLAMING YOUTH and clips from the set of PAINTED PEOPLE. and if that wasn't exciting enough this special program will be introduced by Colleen Moore's niece Melinda Morrison-Cox.

The film was based on the comic strip of the same name, created by William Conselman and Charles Plumb, which was running in newspapers across the country at the time the film was made. In the story poor hard working Ella wins a contest to travel to Hollywood and make a movie. Unfortuatly when she gets there she finds out the contest was a scam and she needs to find a job. Colleen is Ella and Lloyd Hughes plays her love interest. Others in the cast include Vera Lewis, Doris Baker, Emily Gerdes and Mike Donlin.

HELEN'S BABIES (1924, Sol Lesser Prod.)
Cinecon decided to encore this film at Cineconline for two reasons, one, it's a nice little film that deserves to be screened again, and two, we wanted to give our online audience a feel for our in person show. This was our opening night film for Cinecon 54 in 2018. We had selected this film to pay tribute to our long time Cinecon friend, "Baby Peggy" herself, Diana Serra Cary in honor of her 100th birthday. It was also the premier of a new restoration of the film by the Library of Congress. It featured newly discovered footage unseen since the film was originally released. In addition it was accompanied live by the Famous Players Orchestra with a new original score compiled and lead by maestro Scott Lasky.

In this silent comedy Edward Everett Horton is a young bachelor, Uncle Harry, who suddenly finds himself saddled with raising two precocious little girls: Jeanne Carpenter and our star, Baby Peggy, who at the time this film was released was the second most popular child star (after Jackie Coogan of Chaplin’s THE KID) in all of moviedom. The girls' antics drive him crazy at first, but then he begins to warm to them. 19-year-old Clara Bow is the local girl who enters into Uncle Harry’s life.

THIS IS FRANCIS X. BUSHMAN
from the Niles Essanay Silent Film Museum and Flicker Alley this documentary film by Lon and Debra Davis is a natural follow up to their extensive and well researched book on Bushman, King of the Movies: Francis X. Bushman (published 2014 by BearManor Media).

This documentary covers Bushman's life from his early film success in silent films as a romantic idol at Essanay and Metro studios through his later life. Though he made the transition to talkies his career never regained the prominence of those early days. He eventually spent some time working outside of the film industry, only to return later to play smaller parts both in films and on television until his death in 1966 at the age of 83.

THE CONQUEST OF CANAAN (1921, Paramount Pictures)
Another rarity courtesy of The Library of Congress Staring Thomas Meighan. The cast also includes Doris Kenyon, Diana Allen and Louis Hendricks. From the novel by Booth Tarkington with a scenario by Frank Tuttle and directed by R. William Neill.

The town of Canaan, Indiana is the backdrop for of this tale of political corruption. Meighan plays Joe Louden who is the hero of the misfortunate, but spurned by the “respectable” members of the town led by the corrupt Judge Pike (Hendricks). Joe leaves town to go to law school and comes back to town to defend the less fortunate against the judge and gain the respect of everyone.

Cinecon schedule announced

For more than half a century, Cinephiles have gathered in over Labor Day Weekend to celebrate the movies at the annual Cinecon Classic Film Festival. As Hollywood's longest running classic film festival, Cinecon is where fans as well as archivists, authors, and collectors have come together to experience classic film screenings, special programs, celebrity guests, and the best movie memorabilia show in the nation.

I have attended Cinecon a few times in the past, most recently in 2016 to sign books in the memorabilia room. The first time I went, in the late 1990s, I had the chance to meet, ever so briefly, Francis Lederer, Louise Brooks' co-star in Pandora's Box. Lederer was on hand for a screening of The Wonderful Lie of Nina Petrovna (1929). Afterword, Lederer, though very old, took questions from the audience about his career - including a couple about Brooks. I got his autograph on my Cinecon program, and had a snapshot taken with the both of us in it. I hope to return to Cinecon sometime soon, perhaps next year, when it plans to resume its in-person festival.

Covid-19 has temporarily derailed the festival from taking place in Hollywood, and instead, it has moved online. Just recently, the Cineconline 2021 schedule of streaming events was announced. While there is no Louise Brooks related material this year, there is a program of rare Colleen Moore trailers as well as a streaming screening of Moore's Ella Cinders (1926). I can't wait.

 

CINECONLINE SCHEDULE

NOTE: Friday streaming begins at 3PM PDT

Saturday, Sunday and Monday streaming begins at 12:00PM PDT

This is the order of appearance.

Exact Start Times to come

Each day will begin with a Ten Minutes to Showtime Clock

There will be five minute intermissions between features.

In addition to the films shown below, Cineconline will feature celebrity guests, Cinecon Memories and more.

 

Friday September 3rd.

COLLEEN MOORE TRAILERS

DYNAMITE DAN - introduced by Sara Karloff

MAKE MINE MONICA - introduced by Ms. Lang's Son Rocky Lang

RENDEZVOUS WITH ANNIE

ELLA CINDERS - introduced by Ms. Moore's niece Melinda Morrison

End Of Day One Approx 4 ½ hours

 

Saturday September 4th.

SILENT TRAILERS

ICE COLD COCOS

BLUE BLAZES RAWDEN

Cinecon Memories

KINECON AT CINECON #5 – 2 hours

WHEELER & WOOLSEY NRA SHORT five minutes

THE MISFIT

BUSTER'S MIX-UP

CONQUEST OF CANAAN

End DAY 2 Approx 5 ½ hours

 

Sunday September 5th.

SILENT TRAILERS

A CLOSE SHAVE

THE DELICATESSEN SHOP

HOOFBEATS OF VENGEANCE

COWBOY CRAZY

SLEEPY TIME GAL introduced by Juli Canova

MAX STEINER: MAESTRO OF MOVIE MUSIC

HELEN'S BABIES

END OF DAY 3 Approx 6 hrs.

Monday September 6th.

SILENT TRAILERS – 5minutes

JANE WITHERS TRIBUTE

SWING FEVER - introduced by Mr. Gilbert's great nephew Bryan Cooper

THIS IS FRANCIS X BUSHMAN

Cinecon Memories

THUNDERBEAN ANIMATION PROGRAM

LOVE AT FIRST FLIGHT

COLLEGE QUEEN

KING OF THE KONGO - introduced by Sara Karloff

PENROD AND SAM

CLOSING REMARKS FOLLOWED BY POST FESTIVAL ZOOM PARTY

END OF DAY 4 Approx 5 1/2 hrs.

 

 

Mary Louise Brooks (November 14, 1906 – August 8, 1985)

Remembering  Mary Louise Brooks (November 14, 1906 – August 8, 1985),
known professionally as Louise Brooks.

 From my collection of fan art.

"The Magic of Lulu"

by Ana Rosa 

acrylic on 11" x 14" board, 2003

A Louise Brooks musical tribute from Rick Gallego & Cloud Eleven

Recently, I received a CD in the mail from independent recording artist Rick Gallego. His latest record is titled Pandora's Box (Kool Kat Musik). Rick enclosed a brief note that read, "Hi Thomas, thought you might find this interesting, since this was inspired by Louise!" Rick is right. I liked it a lot.

Pandora's Box is a melodic joy ride whose retro power pop influences include the Electric Light Orchestra (ELO), Todd Rundgren, Pet Sounds era Beach Boys, early solo Paul McCartney, and latter-day XTC. Rick has been putting out music since 1996. In short, he has a number of recordings to his credit, either as a solo artist or as part of Jiffipop and/or Cloud Eleven. He and his bands have received rave reviews, and had his music featured in TV shows on ABC, NBC and elsewhere. For more on the songwriter/multi-instrumentalist Rick Gallego and Cloud Eleven, be sure and visit his website and / or his Facebook page.

Some of the linear notes, which are printed over an image of Louise Brooks, explain how this, his latest effort, came about: "Pandora’s Box isn’t so much a ‘new’ album than a collection of previously unfinished song fragments that had been buried on old cassette tapes, plus some outtakes from other albums, and a few covers. During the lockdown of 2020, I would discover a stray chorus here, a verse there, and commence to completing the songs, then record them. In some ways, Pandora’s Box is Terrestrial Ballet part deux. Sometimes it just feels good to clean out that old junk drawer."

I emailed Rick about his new CD, and he wrote back, saying "I already had the song called "Pandora's Box" (dedicated to Lulu), so I decided to name the album that too." I asked Rick the question I ask everyone. How did you first hears about Louise Brooks? Rick answered, "In January 2020 I was doing a YouTube search for anything 1920's, as I have always been fascinated with that decade. I landed on a video (don't really remember who posted it) that reviewed various cultural attributes of the '20s, and it mentioned Louise Brooks as an icon of the period. I had never heard of her before and was really taken by her look, so did a Google search. It kind of snowballed from there into wanting to know everything about her. After seeing a couple of her movies (swoon!) and getting the Barry Paris book (the University of Minnesota Press 2000 paperback version - I ended up buying the first edition hard cover from you later on!), I was pretty much a big fan of hers by then. Since then, I joined your LBS page on Facebook, bought all of her movies on DVD/Blu-ray, and bought every book I could get my hands on, including of course, Lulu In Hollywood. There's a certain magical quality about Louise Brooks that just draws you in, kind of like the movie Close Encounters Of The Third Kind, where everyone is compelled with this 'thing' (Devil's Tower), but they don't know why. Louise Brooks is truly a fascinating person, not only beautiful, but intelligent and witty too. So very happy I found her!

The first track on Rick's new CD is titled "Pandora's Box (Schöne Lulu)." The linear notes for this track read, "This song began as a sort of Rundgren-esque synth jam and evolved into what we have here. Basic tracks were recorded in 2018 and completed in 2020. At the time of completion, I was absorbed into all things 1920s, including art deco, silent films, and specifically actress/writer/icon Louise Brooks. Her most memorable role was that of Lulu, in the classic 1929 German film Pandora's Box. This, my first ever instrumental (silent!) track, is dedicated to the lovely Lulu." Here is the video for that track. Just turn off your mind, relax, and float down stream.

And here is the video of the CD's second track, "Row Row Row," Cloud Eleven's version of the children's nursery rhyme. I really like this gorgeous recording. The song features a homage to the Beatles, while this video features a homage to a couple of Kansas icons. You can likely guess which ones.

And lastly, here is the video for one of my very favorite tracks on Pandora's Box, a mock garage rock cover titled "I Can Do Anything I Want!" I think Kansas-born artist Bruce Conner, a Louise Brooks devotee, would have liked this.

New release - Beggars of Life out on DVD and Blu-ray in Spain

I've just noticed that the 1928 film, Beggars of Life, has just been released on DVD and Blu-ray in Spain under the title Mendigos de Vida, which was the title the film was originally shown under in Spain and much of Latin America. 

I don't know much about this release except for what I can gather from the backs of the DVD and Blu-ray version. Though released as both a silent and sound film in the late 1920s, this new Spanish release is a silent film. It runs 81 minutes, and includes both Castilian and English subtitles. (The Kino Lorber version, the best there is, also runs 81 minutes, while the Grapevine DVD is said to run 83 minutes.) There is no indication that there is any kind of musical accompaniment, though Karl Hajos, the original composer for the film, is credited on the back of the release. (Should anyone get a hold of this version, I would be interested to know if there is any sort of musical soundtrack.)

Pictured below are the front the backs for both the DVD and Blu-ray releases. I show them both because they are slightly different in layout. Another curiosity is the fact that Wallace Beery, the star of the film, has been eliminated from the packaging imagery (though he is listed in the credits and given top billing).

Here is a newspaper advertisement for the film dating from 1930 when it showed at the Palacio de la Musica in Madrid, Spain. Louise Brooks is given second billing, with Wallace Beery listed third. Richard Arlen, who shares a significant amount of screen time with Brooks and was likely considered better looking than Beery by the senoritas, is given top billing

Beggars of Life is the subject of a chapter in my forthcoming two volume work, Around the World with Louise Brooks, which looks at the way this and other of the actress' films were received all over the world. The acclaimed William Wellman film was also the subject of my 2017 book, Beggars of Life: A Companion to the 1928 Film, which can be purchased on amazon all around the world.

Talking Louise Brooks and Diary of a Lost Girl on the Cinematary podcast

I was recently a guest on Cinematary, a podcast devoted to film history & film criticism. On episode #359, I spoke about Louise Brooks and her sensational 1929 film Diary of a Lost Girl. Check it out HERE or below.

 

Episode 359 - Diary of a Lost Girl (Young Critics Watch Old Movies v.7) 

 

July 09, 2021  /  Cinematary Writers

Part 1: Zach, Andrew and Jessica discuss movies they saw this week, including: Zola, No Sudden Move, Fear Street Part One: 1994 and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.

Part 2 (40:25): The group continues their Young Critics Watch Old Movies series with a look at 1929's Diary of a Lost Girl with guest Thomas Gladysz.

Learn more about the Louise Brooks Society here and buy Diary of a Lost Girl on Kino Lorber.

See movies discussed in this episode here.

Don't want to listen? Watch the podcast on our YouTube channel.