Hipp at last! Master of the House (1925)/What Happened to Jones (1926), Hippfest 2023 Day 3

Perhaps the contortionist was the main surprise, even more so than the magician with his cup and ball, but they were entirely in keeping with the spirit of the evening and the connection between variety/vaudeville theatre and early film as projected in Bo’ness’ Hippodrome, Scotland’s oldest purpose-built cinema dating from 1910 and the glorious hub of this fascinating festival, this jewel of the Forth.

Out of the mists of the Firth, it came, a mixture of Brigadoon and Eldorado, I place I have been waiting to get to for years (Covid Interruptus); McPordenone, the friendliest silent film festival in Britain and beyond, a place you have to work a little to get to, cars, trains, taxi drivers that mysteriously arrive just when you need them at Linlithgow Station, and a robust landscape - that’s just between my hotel and the town centre – but which richly rewards the effort. Immediately you know it’s been worth the wait, friendly staff who clearly love what they do, a whole community willing to help you and an invading community of passionately informed and engaged silent cineastes from the World over.

It's like the World Cup being played in Tobermory. The best films, the best players, the best audience. and the best atmosphere. And, I do love a bit of atmosphere! Friday on the Firth showcased everything I’d hoped to find with two cracking films, superb accompaniment and brilliant company.

Johannes Meyer and Astrid Holm

Master of the House (1925), with John Sweeney

Du skal ære din hustru translates as Thou Shalt Honour Thy Wife and shows Carl Theodor Dreyer at his most observational and heart-warmingly comic. It’s the story of an abusive relationship told with context and compassion; the ironic tone set from the first title card which tells us that this is a story of husbands no longer found in Denmark but still persisting elsewhere. Clearly this subject matter was just as loaded in 1925 as it is now and, if Dreyer handles the subject with such a light touch it’s only to underline the misery often experienced; he knew his audience well enough to know the prod of recognition was all they needed.

As Pamela Hutchinson’s eloquently informed introduction pointed out, Dreyer builds his characters up with forensic control and he’s careful to fill out each one, even the villain of the piece, especially him for love is not merely about taking sides nor winning the debate it is about support and understanding, family and, ultimately, going at each other’s pace.

Viktor Frandsen (played by Johannes Meyer, such a striking performer) is disappointed in his life, his business failed he is unhappy at the work he can get and makes his whole family miserable with his diktats and heart-hardened daily cruelties. His wife Ida (Astrid Holm of The Phantom Carriage, Häxan and more) is the centre of his ire and the film starts as she enters their living room, opens the curtains, empties the bird cage and starts the boiler as her day of relentless chores begins.

Karin Nellemose and Mathilde Nielsen

As Pamela suggested, this film changes our view of bread and butter for good as Viktor annoyed by what he sees as a few scrapes of butter on his breakfast forces Ida into scrapping butter from her own food to give to him and his gratefulness is strictly limited to “So, you’re not short of butter?”. He’s not able to bring enough money into the house and blames her for poorly managing the domestic budget, holes in his shoes as his other pair remain in the cobblers, Ida unable to divert funds from her already restricted budget.

 

The children fare little better Karen (Karin Nellemose in her debut) the oldest taking the brunt and also her brother Dreng (Aage Hoffman), forced to stand facing the corner, hands behind his back after a snowball fight, all of this to come for the youngest Barnet (Byril Harvig). All of this is watched over by Mads (Mathilde Nielsen) an older woman who once looked after Viktor when he was young and who know only feels anger at what she sees that he’s become. She helps with the family chores and is urged by Ida to keep her counsel knowing Viktor’s retaliation will only be in one direction. But everything must come to ahead, Ida’s health is failing and as Mads brings in her mother (Clara Schønfeld) to look after her, she devises a plan to bring her former charge back to sanity.

 

The bare bones of the plot don’t credit the skill with which Dreyer and his players make this drama work. Mads is rescuing both parts of the couple and is a very modern hero in this sense in a morality tale not just with shades of grey but tints of compassion and understanding. Dreyer’s humanity goes the distance as always.

 

Accompanying with wonderful grace and invention of his own was John Sweeney who recognised the soulful humour in this patient work and responded as he always does, a part of and in tune with the emotional narrative.

What Happened to Jones (1926) with Neil Brand and Frank Bockius

A complete change of pace for the evening’s Gala which was unlike anything you’ll find in Bologna, Pordenone or London, a champagne reception, canapes and fancy dress, evening gowns for the women and more bishops than you’d find in the Vatican even at the weekend! Travelling light the best I could muster was looking like a cast member of The Archers according to one well-known composer, writer and TV presenter, and he wasn’t wrong.

Hippfest Supremo Alison Straus adds so much personality to the festival and leads the team effort from the front with enthusiasm and invention. This much I would have confessed to her husband The Bishop, but you know how taciturn we Methodists are.

Between the fore and after-party was one of the funniest of Hollywood comedies with the irresistible Reginald Denny playing the titular Jones, a man more sinned against than sinning… just about. He’s Tom Jones, a smart “out of towner” who’s about to be married the next day to Lucille Bigbee (Nixon) one of the local favourites and whom even her parents (Melbourne MacDowell and the fearsome Frances Raymond) would prefer to wed scion of respectability, Henry Fuller (William Austin, always so wide-eyed and fretful in these roles).

The night before the wedding and all is well… what could possibly go wrong? Friend of the family Ebenezer Goodly (Otis Harlan) suggests a quick game of poker, Tom get’s lucky with his first hand and decides to cash in but before he can, the police raid, chaos breaks out and Tom and Ebeneezer just about escape into a women’s Turkish bath… what could possibly go wrong? The next day Tom wakes up in the Goodly’s house and has to dress up as a Bishop, Ebenezer’s brother, the man who is dues to officiate at the wedding which now looks to be between horrible Henry and Lucille… what, indeed, could possibly go wrong?

 

Reginald Denning and Otis Harlan try to explain.

This is a farce and it is indeed like Brian Rix on speed, especially with the sprightly accompaniment of Brand and Bockius accelerating the action and fuelling the fun. There was almost telepathically intricate interplay between the two with percussion leading in some parts and the piano delivering sexy speakeasy jazz in others; also, some excellently timed swanee whistling!

ZaSu Pitts also features as a biddable housemaid, she steals every scene!

As a programming finishing touch, the film was proceeded by a short involving the smashing of cases of whiskey in the cause of Prohibition in 1922 and then a film advertising a DIY home sauna kit which, in addition to looking unworkable and dangerous, foreshadowed Jones perfectly. Then we had the magic and the contortion… 112 years or so since these arts would have been commonplace on this stage and others. It’s these flourishes that finesse the fuller programme, surprises and a commitment to not only the business of silent film but also its enduring celebration and, had the coaches not arrived well before midnight, that process would have continued well into the morning.

Still, it’s now only Saturday… More anon, as I have Charlie to Chase along with some dogs this morning plus a stand-up quiz involving the use of body parts in a live setting that might be best kept secret in the interests of the participants…

You don’t have to be mad to be at Hippfest but you do have to be happy and ready for anything.

If you're in the area, or even if you're not, there's a wealth of informtion on the Hippfest site including Pamela Hutchinson's programme notes.

Fishy kettle tale… Der var engang (1922), with Neil Brand, Danish Film Institute streaming

Back to the endless database of digitalised Danish film for this comic fairy tale from Carl Theodor Dreyer which owes a little to early Lubitsch perhaps but is no surprise after the Dane’s earlier film, the magically real Parsons Widow (1920). If Der var engang (Once Upon a Time) does not match up to the almost perfectly executed Prästänkan, that’s partly because it is a more overt fantasy and because significant sections are still missing even from this 2002 restoration.

 

Around half of the film is lost but here the title cards have been restored and sense is made using stills from the film and additional intertitles. The main source for the intertitles was a title list from the archives of the Swedish film censorship office and the whole piece is now sequenced well enough to still enchant especially with the aid of Neil Brand’s expert score which smooths over the missing segments and the odd uncompleted or fully rehearsed moment.

 

Based on Holger Drachmann's 1883 play, itself drawing from Hans Christian Andersen's Svinedrengen (The Swineherd) and William Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew, it’s a fable about a Prince and a Princess who need to find the level of their love, one too much a stranger to her real self, confounded by the comforts of her position and lost in her privilege. Yes, indeed, this is very much another Play for Today…

The King of Illyria (Peter Jerndorff)

The story revolves around the Prince of Denmark – no, not that one – and his attempts to woo the especially obstinate Princess of Illyria. Unlike his distant relative, he’s a decisive man of action who, rather more quickly than in three acts and two scenes of dithering, decides that a play’s the thing wherein to prick the conscience of the King’s daughter.  And what a “conscience” it is, certainly more absent than present.

 

I would rather marry a beggar… Be happy I am not having you hanged!

 

As the film starts, we see a succession of hopefuls competing for the hand of the Princess, played by Clara Pontoppidan, here as Clara Wieth, who enjoyed over sixty years in cinema from 1910 to 1972 and featured in Dreyer’s Leaves from the Book of Satan (1920). All of them fail miserably as, bored to tears she dismisses their attempts to entertain and attract; even the rather camp chap who dances. Then it’s the Prince of Denmark’s turn and with handsome Svend Methling in the role surely, she’s going to be impressed but far from it, he only angers his would-be fiancé and the look on the long face of his loyal retainer, Kasper Smokehat (Røghat in Danish, played by Hakon Ahnfelt-Rønne) says it all…

Smokehat and the Prince

The Princess is not for turning and so it’s time for Denmark to go sulk in the woods with his horse. He is greeted by a mystical peddler – or some-such – who offers him a copper kettle that will show him how to “capture happiness” … With magic on his side our brave hero returns with well-trimmed facial hair to try and capture the hardest heart in all of Illyria.

 

The film looks delicious throughout and no more so than the scenes that follow with the Princess and her ladies in waiting frolicking around the well-topiarised royal gardens. They’re a vision of coordinated fashion and expression setting the Princess in a completely different light; warm and summer freed as compared with glacial palatial. She’s intrigued by the handsome new woodsman with his distracting rattle… and then must have his special kettle even if it means exchanging a kiss…

 

Oh well, it is my duty as Princess to support art…

The Princess is on the right (Clara Pontoppidan)

The Princess decides that the rattle is irresistible as indeed maybe the woodsman and make the exchange… but, as Lady Booby said to Joseph Andrews, “kissing is as a prologue to a play” and before long the kettle is irresistible too even as the second kiss is only rewarded with an image of the Princess’ “true love”, the Prince of Denmark she currently loathes. No such disdain for the woodsman though and, away from prying eyes, he is allowed into the royal rooms… as the dealing moves from hearth to heart.

 

But this Prince has a bigger plan - an elaborate "play" - and sailing through the mists comes a boat carrying his emissaries, a knight who asks if the Princess has reconsidered Denmark’s offer. She has not… but meanwhile the noble Smokehat comes to the King disguised as a knight and not only reveals the Princess’ embarrassment but threatens to order Denmark’s gathering soldiers to attack unless “…the Princess be exiled along with the rogue she prefers!”

 

The Prince in disguise with a magic rattle...

Now, it’s all a bit of a long game, but the King feels he has no option and the Princess is sent to live with the woodsman in a humble cottage whilst he maintains the deception of not being a royal. No interviews with Oprah though, just pot making and the attempt to bring his love down to ground. She’s not the only one who needs lessons in humility as they see the Prince’s own men abusing the poor folk, hanging poachers and other wrong doers.

 

It’s a fairy tale and so you may decide that you know what’s going to happen, it could be Grimm or it could be Disney but either way it’s a trajectory that doesn’t disappoint. This is not the best of Dreyer – it’s hard to tell given the missing footage – but it has its moments and is wonderfully bought to life by the restoration and Neil Brand’s playing which leads our emotional imagination through the stills and title cards that complete the picture.

 

The film can be viewed on the Danish Film Institute site and with those engaging leads, stunning cinematography, Neil’s score and the humorous balance of Smokehat, it is yet another Danish delight.

Yes, your majesty. Two kisses...

The music of chance… Le Giornate del Cinema Muto, Pordenone, Day Five

 

It can be no co-incidence that the occurrence of co-incidence in the films of John M. Stahl is surprisingly regular: I mean, what are the odds? Yesterday's film, Suspicious Wives, relied on multiple instances of happenstance and today’s The Song of Life (1922) did too and in a much more satisfying and purposeful way.

Anyone familiar with the novels of Paul Auster will appreciate the role of chance in driving narrative and changing lives and Stahl’s deployment of sheer luck in this film was a question of stylistic impact and not, as Deadpool might say, “lazy writing” …

Co-incidence number one, a woman leaves her husband and child on the same day as he dies in a bizarre and frighteningly realistic railway accident. The film cuts forward thirty years to show that the move from dustbowl city just did not work out for the woman, Mary Tilden (Georgia Woodthorpe in a meaty role for a 62-year old), who is now struggling to make ends meet and not string enough to work even cleaning dishes.

Gaston Glass, Georgia Woodthorpe and Grace Darmond

Co-incidence number two; Mary decides to kill herself by drinking poison, but her cat knocks the drink from her hand and it drips through to the apartment below where a struggling writer, David (Gaston Glass) sees it drip onto his paper. He rushes up stairs and seeing that she has tried to kill herself invites her downstairs for breakfast and support. His wife Aline (Grace Darmond) returns and seeing the alacrity with which the older woman cleans up decides it’s a good idea if she moves in with them whilst she goes back to work.

Co-incidence number three: David’s book is about a baby abandoned by his mother on the day his father died… yes, Mary is his mother. This may seem all too convenient, but it sets up a rich melodrama that allows for much exposition on the nature of maternal love, abandoned children – why is David a writer? – and, ultimately retribution.

It’s the best Stahl so far and features some memorable moments in the happy-ish but poor lower East-side streets: two adorable children playing tricks on their dad, a cheeky monkey and a roof-top street party in the heat wave. There are some super exteriors of New York too.

Gabriel Thibaudeau accompanied on the piano with sympathy and taking each shock turn in his stride.

Hildur Carlberg

The film is an unusual love triangle – OK, quadrangle – but the programmers were smart lining it up after Dreyer’s The Parson's Widow (1920) which also features the (non-romantic) love between a mother—figure and two younger lovers.

This film, Swedish title Prästänkan, is much more defined and so remarkably controlled from the high-quality cinematography to the casting of so many memorable fizzogs: no Hollywood glamour here just real people with all their quirks!

It’s as madcap as Lubitsch and Pola but gradually evolves into a touching story of love, loss and community. Einar Rød – who looks like he’s on his way to playing an in-store acoustic set at Rough Trade East – is Söfren an unlikely aspiring pastor who is motivated by the “living” and not the calling as he applies for the vacant position. His sweetheart is Mari (Greta Almroth) and the two are banking on his winning the position.

Einar gets the gig but on one condition, the local law has it that the previous pastor’s widow can marry the successful candidate… This is when Hildur Carlberg makes her entrance as Margarete Pedersdotter and it is the most fascinating of castings, as with Stahl, another rich role for an older actor. Hildur is superb, scowling one minute and sardonic the next, making short work of Söfren’s blatant ambition and seemingly casting him under a spell. The two are wed and Mari comes to work at the parsonage as Söfren’s sister… Margarete sees this coming and blocks the two at every turn with her two faithful old retainers. It’s a good film for the older actors in general!

There were three people in the marriage...

It’s slapstick and subtle especially when Söfren dresses up as a demon to scare his wife to death… she wipes the floor with him as he raises his arms to show his slippers under the white sheet.

One of the very best films of the week and all the more so for John Sweeney’s continued revelries on the Teatro Verdi’s Fazioli piano.

Onto the afternoon and another film from a Balzac novel, the German Liebe (Histoire des treize) (1927), directed by Paul Czinner and starring his partner Elisabeth Bergner as the beguiling Antoinette de Langeais, a role previously played by Lyda Borelli and Norma Talmadge (The Eternal Flame (1922)) but here recreated more in line with the original story arc. Antoinette is unhappily married but will not allow any of her flirtations to develop, much to the frustration of the Marquis de Montriveau (Hans Rehmann) and, some of the watching audience…

Elisabeth Bergner and Hans Rehmann

Bergner is highly impressive in a series of sumptuous gowns and is a very nuanced performer on a par with the afore-mentioned on this evidence. The Marquis hatches a plan to teach her a lesson and you can understand why…

Günter Buchwald accompanied with grace and piano-patience.

The evening saw another orchestral treat with a screening of Mario Bonnard’s The Sposi Promises (1922) with the New Chamber Orchestra Ferruccio Busoni with Naonis Orchestra, conducted by Massimo Belli, performing Valter Sivilotti score.

I knew nothing about this film, which is always the delight of this silent shindig and it was… spettacolare! At first it looked like it was going to be a quirky rural comedy but by the end we had witnessed revolution, bread riots, invasion, massed battles, plague and some wild headgear.

Bonnard handles the epic and the intimate with equal skill and his quick cuts, tracking shots and framing is so consistent and compelling for a story that packs so much in. Sleep-deprived and a little bit groggy on Day Five, I was entertained enough to mouth “shhhh” in Italian to some chattering young Italians beside me (like they cared). When in Pordenone…

One Wedding and a Thousand Funerals

The restoration is sparkling and Valter Sivilotti’s score spirited and sympathetic: the best accompaniments always follow the film’s lead and have the confidence to run alongside with their own expression of the narrative. This was a huge deal for the Italians and Valter took his chance with the élan of Francesco Totti!

Bonnard adapted the classic novel by Alessandro Manzoni (1827) which is set in northern Italy in 1628, during the oppressive years of direct Spanish rule and the Milan plague of 1630, wikiparently the most widely read book in Italian history?

It’s an assault of characters and events but you soon get with the rhythm of a story based around the two lovers Lucia (Emilia Vidali) and Renzo (Domenico Serra – possibly a distant relative of Mike Myers?) who are forced apart by cruel nobility and feckless priests. It’s a lot of plot but in summary: One Wedding and a Thousand Funerals.

The cinematography of Giuseppe-Paolo Vitrotti is worthy of mention especially the aerial tracking on the baddy Don Rodrigo’s opulent dining table – I’ve seen this shot before but later (Dwan, Lubitsch?) and it sets the scene beautifully as the Spaniards revel in their ill-gotten opulence!

At the end you want to watch it all again which is handy as upstairs at the Teatro they’re selling the DVD edition published by the Fondazione Cineteca Italiana! There are mugs and t-shirts, but this will be my most Italian souvenir of Le Giornate 37!

A river runs through it… The Bride of Glomdal (1926), John Sweeney, Kennington Bioscope

For a good portion of this film the narrative ebbs and flows in pleasing ways without really hitting you hard. The scenery is, of course, stunning as photographed by Einar Olsen and the cast, especially willowy, steel-blue-eyed Tove Tellback, are superb making a believably real rustic romance with stubbornness, jealousy, a fight and an injury… but suddenly, just when you think the narrative is ready to wind down, events take a dangerous turn and in a closing sequence of jeopardy, thrilling stunt work and fast-paced, anxious direction you find yourself thinking once again that no one can quite “play” fast moving water like John Sweeney!

Mr Sweeney was on excellent form throughout, pastoral accompaniment holding the story easily within his hands and a pitch-perfect flavouring for the romance and the resentment on route to the rapids that engulf the finale. These are moments to cherish when player and projection are completely in sync each adding to the other’s efforts and taking away nothing at all.

Harald Stormoen and Alfhild Stormoen look on...

Lillian Henley was in similar flow at the start of the evening as she accompanied newsreel of actual Pankhursts in startlingly clear action from 1913 and earlier as a Bioscope tribute to a century of suffrage (at least for those women of standing who got the vote in 1918). Lillian has form her of course having scored the BFI’s excellent Make More Noise compilation and her sympathy for the period and the cause was in evidence again as we saw the, so called, Trafalgar Square “riot” and 66,000 marching through London in a suffragette “pageant”. There were banners celebrating Sylvia and declaring that Fortune Favours the Brave. Odd that, in 2018 you could almost be certain that it’s favouring the deceitful and the salesman…

In 1913 people believed in democracy and, of course died for it. Two films showing the 1913 Derby were screened and there was a collective gasp when Emily Davison collides with the King’s horse – whatever her motivations, her death still carries meaning. There was footage of her funeral and a poignant sight it was too; we can each take our own meaning, but this isn’t just history but an ongoing process, just like Ireland, the Union and Parliamentary democracy itself.

Good on you Widnes!! My Granddad Bill no doubt was one of them.

A little light relief followed in which a confused fellow becomes A Suffragette in Spite of Himself (1911) after schoolboys tack a “votes for women” sign on his back. He gets into a fight with some chaps at an anti-suffrage meeting and is saved by the suffragettes before being enlisted to walk, shoulder to shoulder. There are some wonderful backdrops of Trafalgar Square and Bloomsbury and the gent is played by Marc McDermott who went on to feature in Hollywood, in Laugh, Clown, Laugh, Blind Wives, Flesh and the Devil and many more.

We even had time for Charley Smiler Takes Up Ju-Jitsu (1911) and early and very brief comedy from Fred “Pimple” Evans which featured some sisterly slams from a suffragette trained in the martial art in question.

George Lewis faces off against Rex Lease both in the race and for Mildred Harris...

Finally, we saw one of the US Collegians series, this one a racing tale called The Last Lap (1928) in which our hero Benson (George Lewis) must overcome the college bully to win the freshers vs sophomores cross-country race and the heart of Mildred Harris. It’s predictable and slightly infuriating but has its moments… maybe if we saw more of the series? This was episode 37!

It wasn’t in the same league as the main feature but then Dreyer is one of the most accomplished film makers of the era, and well beyond. Whilst I’ve seen some of his early films, The President, Leaves from Satan's Book, Michael as well as Joan and Vampyr, he was so productive between the first of those films and the last producing about one feature a year. This film came after Master of the House and before Joan and stylistically it’s quite different.

As John Sweeney said in his introduction though, it is interesting to see yet another strong female lead, in this case, Berit Glomgaarden (Tove Tellback) whose insistence on making her own choices drives the story.

Berit chooses her man

Based on the novel by Jacob Breda Bull, John said that the photo play was partly improvised – led by Dreyer - which might explain part of the differences from the film around it. Filmed in the Norwegian countryside, this is also a canvas wide enough to make the dedicated fan of Joan’s compact, claustrophobia, more than usually agoraphobic. It almost feels like a Victor Sjöström film so glorious is the backdrop. Also, what we now see is some 75 minutes long and just over half the original length although this doesn’t impact the story too much apart from rendering the jealous lover/would be murderer, Gjermund Haugsett (Einar Tveito) a little under-developed.

Gjermund’s father, Berger Haugsett (Oscar Larsen) agrees with Berit’s father, Ola (a moody Stub Wiberg) that she should marry his boy but, rather crucially, the bride-to-be has not signed off on the deal. Indeed, Berit has a different romantic course in mind, she is in love with Tore Braaten (Einar Sissener) the son of a small farm holder, Jakob (Harald Stormoen), who has big plans to expand operations and works feverously laying out new fields.

Einar Tveito

Once this preference is known tension bubbles across the village… Gjermund fights with Tore and the two have to be pulled apart. But Haugsett has made his choice and refuses to budge. Berit runs away as her father takes around wedding invitations and falling off her horse is rescued by Tore who takes her home for recuperation. Time for a reconciliation you’d think but there’s no chance as Haugsett hardens his heart, confounding expectations of a simple resolution – these farmers are so stubborn!

But there’s more to come as we head for the final nerve shredding conclusion!

Well played Bioscope, Mr Sweeney and Ms Henley, another memorable night at the Cinema Museum and this time I was early enough to grab a slice of the KB’s excellent home-made quiche!

Everywhere you look in Kennington, there are treasures…