Silent

  • Germaine Dulac – Gossette (1923)

    1921-1930DramaFranceGermaine DulacSilent

    Synopsis
    In Gossette (1923), Dulac experimented with and designed a number of special lenses and prisms to produce a variety of effects and multiply the expressive means which translate the characters’ visions and mental states. She also reversed class and gender roles, as she made the female character Gossette come to the aid of Phillipe de Savières, falsely accused of murder, in order to save his name.Read More »

  • Marie Harder – Der Weg einer Proletarierin AKA A Proletarian’s Way (1929)

    Germany1921-1930Marie HarderPoliticsSilentWeimar Republic cinema

    Quote:
    Martha, a peasant woman expecting a child, experiences the fears typical of a woman in her condition. Encouraged by a neighbor, she decides to venture out into the world and join the working class fighting for a better future.Read More »

  • Robert Wiene – Unfug der Liebe AKA The Folly of Love (1928)

    1921-1930ComedyGermanyRobert WieneSilentWeimar Republic cinema

    Wikipedia wrote:
    Folly of Love (German: Unfug der Liebe) is a 1928 German silent comedy film directed by Robert Wiene and starring Maria Jacobini, Jack Trevor and Betty Astor. While several of Wiene’s previous films had met with mixed responses, Folly of Love was universally praised by critics. The film was made at the Marienfelde Studios of Terra Film. It was Wiene’s last silent film.Read More »

  • Richard Oswald – Anders als die Andern AKA Different from the Others (1919)

    Drama1911-1920GermanyQueer Cinema(s)Richard OswaldSilent

    Paul Korner is a homosexual musician who falls in love with his protégé Kurt. Unfortunately, the two are seen walking hand in hand by the blackmailer Franz. Though Paul agrees to Franz’s demands at first, it gets out of hand and he ends up refusing to pay which has dire consequences for the lovers.Read More »

  • René Clair – La tour (1928)

    Silent1921-1930ArchitectureExperimentalFranceRené ClairUncategorized

    The great French filmmaker René Clair crafted this elegant sepia-toned profile of Paris’s iconic landmark almost forty years after the Eiffel Tower took its first bow (at the 1889 Exposition Universelle). It clearly still fascinates and awes in this loving and playful tribute. LA TOUR takes the viewer first up and then down the mighty structure while also acting as a tribute to its eponymous designer, Gustave Eiffel. The film initially burrows into blueprints and photographs of the earliest stages of its construction ahead of the opening of the World’s Fair but Clair’s film revels in the completed structure itself, reverently scaling its heights and accompanying tourists on up through the various levels toward the topmost landing. Read More »

  • Victor Sjöström – Berg-Ejvind och hans hustru (1918)

    1911-1920DramaScandinavian Silent CinemaSilentSwedenVictor Sjöström

    A stranger comes to work at widow Halla’s farm. Halla and the stranger fall in love, but when he is revealed as Eyvind, an escaped thief forced into crime by his family’s starvation, they flee and become two of the many outlaws of Iceland’s mountains.Read More »

  • Ernst Lubitsch – So This Is Paris (1926)

    Silent1921-1930ComedyErnst LubitschUSA

    Ernst Lubitsch’s So This is Paris stars Monte Blue and Patsy Ruth Miller as a doctor and his wife. The couple is as faithful as the day is long–but when a dance team comprised of Lilyan Tashman and Andre Beranger make the scene, the days grow mighty short. Blue, Miller, Tashman and Berander spend the lion’s share of the film hiding their various peccadilloes from each other. The beauty of the Lubitsch touch is that, while So This is Paris suggests much, there isn’t a single censurable image throughout. Based on a play by Henry Meillac and Ludovic Halevy, this was a favorite of audiences and critics alike.Read More »

  • Marcel L’Herbier – El Dorado (1921)

    1921-1930DramaFranceMarcel L'HerbierSilent

    El Dorado is the fifth film directed by Marcel L’Herbier for Gaumont’s prestige collection ‘Pax’ which was characterised by high production quality. Its most striking aspect is the invention of new elements of the cinematographic language. L’Herbier uses distortions of the images to convey different messages or impressions: the faces of drinkers become distorted as they become drunk, Sibilla’s face becomes blurred as she thinks about her sick child, or photographs of the Alhambra are distorted to express the artistic vision of the painter intending to represent them.Read More »

  • Fritz Lang – Harakiri (1919)

    Drama1911-1920Fritz LangGermanySilentWeimar Republic cinema

    The Buddhist priest wants the Daughter of the Daimyo to become a priestess at the Forbidden Garden. The Daimyo thinks if he were in Europe that his daughter should decide on her own, but he is denounced and has to commit harakiri. She meets Olaf, a European officer, falls in love and marries him, but after a few months he has to return to Europe. She gives birth to a child and is waiting for him, while he marries in Europe. When he comes back to Japan four years later, he is accompanied by his European wife…Read More »

Back to top button