Stars, volcanoes, crimpers and goats. Hippfest 23 Day Five

The lights go out one by one and as they do Stephen Horne synchronises a pure note as if the chimes of midnight are running us slowly towards tomorrow and Annette Benson, silently ignored by Brian Aherne in his director’s chair turns and walks shamefully across the massive studio floor, trudging through pools of light as Stephen’s flute, with regretful reverb, highlights her ultimate exit from the life she had and lost…

 

Ladies and gentlemen, it’s been quite a few days and, almost as soon as it began it ended, sweeping by in a rush of high-quality organisation, beautiful cinema and music and the warmest of welcomes on the East Scottish Riviera… But what a way to finish?! Farewell Annette, Brian and Mr Donald Calthrop, Falkirk and the Forth, see you next year!

 

Shooting Stars is some film and, as the BFI’s Bryony Dixon reminded us in her introduction, not only was this 25-year-old Anthony Asquith’s first film, but it was also one her scripted so tightly that the nominal director A.V. Bramble was more an administrator of his vision. Asquith made certain to hire the best cinematographers available in Henry Harris and Stanley Rodwell – the expertise he wanted to ensure the success of a production that in his script notes he explained “…will depend to a great extent upon the excellence of the photography… The most modern form of technique is involved.”

 

He also insisted on the film being shot at Cricklewood so the enormity of his vision could be fully realised as we’re treated to incredibly complex shots as the cameras fly down and across the action on the floor and on different sets high and low in this magnificently textured space. This is top-end, late-silent sophistication and not without intrinsic purpose for a plot absolutely reliant on this sense of space; the proximities of heartbreak in the Middlesex dream factory.

Donald Calthrop and Dorothy "Chili" Bouchier

This film gives a lie to the myth of British cinematic incompetence, perpetuated by our own snobbery as well as the crushing competitiveness of Hollywood and, yes, he’s on a level with Hitchcock for much of this film, A Cottage on Dartmoor and Underground. Here Asquith – already seeped in film culture – takes aim at the darker and dafter side of the business and creates one of the first domestic films about film: a narrative that manages to be both effective as satire and affecting as a story of love gone awry.

 

This film opens with an outrageous overhead tracking sequence that you could have easily belonged in a German studio rather than one in Cricklewood. The stars of the film are the stars in a film – Prairie Love - a western, the least likely genre you’d expect from the hapless English to make a success of; a cliched clunker. We find star on the rise, Mae Feather (Annette Benson) being filmed in a blossom tree cosying up to both a white cove and her real-life hubbie, Julian Gordon (Brian Aherne) on a wooden horse (and wearing the most outrageous cowboy chaps). The bird pecks Mae’s lips, she shrieks and lets it fly and then chaos breaks loose as the scene is ruined, the crew stand down and the camera follows the chao looking down on the stage from on high then tracking the pursuit of the dove and the characters as they move around the studio cleverly revealing the set up.

 

Mae pauses to watch a comedy being filmed, women in swimming costumes a la Mack Sennet bathing beauties, including the especially eye-catching Dorothy "Chili" Bouchier as one of the girls cheering the Chaplinesque figure of Andy Wilkes (Donald Calthrop) as he makes a fool of someone’s fleshy husband… There’ll be more of that to come as we learn of his affair with Mae who, improbable as it may seem, prefers him to a man who looks every inch – at least six feet of them – the British Gary Cooper. Maybe she’s short on laughs or just finds handsome boring.

 

The marital betrayal and the offer of work in America, with a strictly no-scandal clause, build up the odds as Mae makes a drastic decision and the tone darkens… I hadn’t seen this film since the Restoration Gala at the 2015 London Film Festival and it’s a richly rewarding rewatch especially with the uncanny accompaniment from Stephen Horne who as is his practice, follows every nuance of the narrative in ways that seem to defy the laws of physics but not musicality.

 

Enrique Riveros and Brita Appelgren

His Majesty the Barber (1928) with John Sweeney

 

An altogether lighter tone was struck in the preceding film which I’d missed live at Pordenone 22 (ta C-19…) but seen streaming and had been longing to see in cinema and with accompaniment from Mr Sweeney. Not to be puritanical but you really can not beat seeing a silent comedy in the company of others and will live music; especially when, like me, you’d forgotten the series of twists that come at the end of this hairdressing hilarity.

 

As its title suggests, here we have a perfectly ordinary tale of a man who may, or may not, be an actual barber and who is operating as a street hairstylist in complete ignorance of a royal heritage that might immediately make him question his choice of career. Sounds plausible doesn’t it but director Ragnar Hyltén-Cavallius has some form in this arena having produced the marvel of mirth that is A Sister of Six an extraordinarily silly film that featured Britain’s Queen of Happiness (no, not Camilla Parker Bowles but Betty Balfour!).

 

The film was a coproduction between Sweden and Germany not to mention Tirania, that ancient state nestled in the lower regions of the Ruritanian Alps in which it is set. An outstanding international cast includes Swedes Julius Falkenstein (known from films by Lubitsch, Murnau, and Lang), actress-director Karin Swanström (whose last directed film was the marvellous Girl in Tails (1926), and the teen Brita Appelgren, who, born in December 1912. must have been just 15 during filming; a scandic Loretta Young in looks and youth.

 

Karin Swanström and Hans Junkermann

The romantic hero/barber/potential Prince Nickolo was played by the Chilean actor Enrique Riveros who was much older at 21 and bizarrely touted as the Swedish Valentino. The German, Hans Junkermann plays the key role of André Gregory, the local barber and is the centre of much comedy as well as the underlying plot. He’s the former hairdresser of the Tiranian King who’s baby son and rightful heir, was placed in his care after a revolution. He has kept this even from Nickolo but now the moment of truth approaches and affairs of state and the heart collide in the most wonderful of ways.

Li Lili born Qian Zhenzhen in Beijing

 

Volcanic Passions aka Loving Blood of the Volcano (1932) with Stephen Horne

 

The “europudding” was preceded by a Chinese concoction performed with great gusto and culminating in the best fist fight climbing up a volcano that I’ve ever seen. Mr Horne is the man for protracted pugilism though with a wealth of experience including the extraordinarily vicious Behind the Door (1919). The film is not without its charm and power though – far from it! - and there’s an extraordinary motivation for the hero Song ke (Junli Zheng) when a local warlord, Cao Renjie (Congmei Yuan), lusting after his younger sister, ends up murdering her father and brother after she opts to jump to her death rather than become one of his concubines.

 

Director and writer Sun Yu’s film plays like a cowboy drama in a country dominated by such men in the period between colonial subservience and communist rule. Culturally it shows far more Western influence than you might expect, Sun having studied theatre and film in the USA at the University of Wisconsin and Columbia in the 1920s. There is also the Dietrich-like presence of the legendary Li Lili, in the first of her dozen collaborations with Yu. Lili plays a show girl in a bar, strutting around in confident style showing a sexual confidence and level of agency that marks her out as a real star.

 

Junli Zheng with his cinematic siblings playing Cat's Cradle

Song ke travels away from his family devastation a man obsessed with ridding the world of all monsters such as Cao. He’s miserable and turns to drink, especially in the Coconut Grove Tavern, where he is known as “the man who never smiles”, he needs to get together with Olga Baklanova from The Man Who Laughs perhaps but instead he meets Willow Blossom, a beautiful dancer recently employed there.

 

Willow reminds him of his home – same name – as well as his sister which makes his growing affection for her rather unusual… but they are the same sort of beautiful, independent women so let’s forgive him. As his heart starts to soften old enemies resurface and the fight of their lives is about to begin.

 

It’s pure entertainment and very well made, and it’s always such a treat to see such gems screened and given serious attention. The Li Lili fan club starts here!

 

G.O.A.T.

Angora Love (1929) and Bacon Grabbers (1929) with Meg Morley and Frank Bockius

 

The first of these was Laurel and Hardy’s final film before they went on to conquer the world of sound as well as silence. The boys are adopted by a four-legged friend who really gets their landlord Edgar Kennedy’s goat and it’s a tour de force of comic violence. As with all their best work the two are seemingly incapable of letting things go and rather than just hoping on a bus – there are 50 Ways to Leave Your Goat after all… they try and live with it without letting the landlord know. It’s a bad plan and we loved seeing it go wrong.

Mr Kennedy is back again this time improbably married to a young Jean Harlow and owing money on a radio he bought on the HP. Stan and Ollie are trainee repo men sent to serve papers for reclamation by the Sherriff’s Office.

 

Things do not go to plan completely unlike this festival which was the epitome of a good time as organised by The Queen of Scottish Silents: Alison Strauss. I’ve manged events and teams in my career but I’ve rarely seen a more effective and happier crew than this one. You guys deserve all the awards going and thank you, by the way, for the one you handed to me for these reviews. It’s been my pleasure, absolutely!

 

See you in 2024!!

 

The light goes down on Bo'ness for another year...

Cricklewood Babylon… Shooting Stars (1927) on Blu-ray and DVD

“The success of the production will depend to a great extent upon the excellence of the photography… The most modern form of technique is involved.”

After featuring this superb restoration at last year’s London Film Festival Archive Gala, the BFI have now released Anthony Asquith’s bravura debut – nominally directed by A.V. Bramble - on a generously-priced Blu-ray/DVD dual format set and it’s a worthy package for this gem.

Persuading ourselves that we had little credibility as a film-making culture began almost as soon as the first British hands cranked a camera. Perhaps moving images were seen as too cheap a trick for a nation with such a proud theatrical history yet, all the same, quality films were made in the UK and there’s a growing number restored and projected that show that we could hold our own.

Annette and Brian sitting in a tree...

Here Asquith – already seeped in film culture – takes aim at the darker and dafter side of the business and creates one of the first domestic films about film: a narrative that manages to be both effective as satire and affecting as a story of love gone awry.

This film opens with a stunning overhead tracking sequence that you could have sworn belonged in a German studio rather than one in Cricklewood. The stars of the film are stars in a film – Prairie Love -  and after an amusing opening showing Annette Benson being filmed in a blossom tree cosying up to Brian Aherne on a wooden horse (and wearing the most outrageous cowboy chaps), the camera looks down on the stage then follows the characters as they move around the studio.

By the time the motion has finished Benson has removed her phoney blonde wig and Ahern’s four-wooden-legged friend has been revealed: they’re not “acting” now and are a man and wife about to see their relationship move into very stormy seas.

Benson’s character, Mae Feather has walked up the stairs to another stage on which they are filming a comedy featuring madcap Andy Wilkes (Donald Calthrop… last seen blackmailing Anny Ondra) a man of no fixed moustache.  Bizarrely, she sees him as an alternative to her handsome husband Julian Gordon (Aherne)… maybe she’s short on laughs or just finds handsome boring.

Brian Aherne on his steed

Mae skips seeing her own film to stay in with Andy whilst Julian ends up on his own, watching their film next to a couple of school boys – he’s barely older than them and even starts cheering himself on screen, easily lost in the process. Julian’s clearly very imaginative and easy to play but this miss-aligned love triangle cannot carry on for ever and in a moment of madness Mae loads a gun due to be fired at her husband on stage…

As previously mentioned in my rave after the live presentation, Asquith brings out the best in his performers, especially Annette Benson who manages to bridge the gap between spoilt bractress, bored stage-wife and guilt-ridden devastation whilst still retaining a lightness of touch that makes her likeable. It’s her emotional flexibility that makes the story special as the reality of her violent plan could simply have appeared as ruthless.

Insert "gets the bird" line here

But there’s regret and the realisation that sometimes we get so mired in routine we forget to find the obvious truth but will it be too late? You have to hope for the best – that’s usually the best you can hope for… and all plays out in the film’s superbly anxious closing sequence.

No spoilers – you have to see for yourself.

The film has a surprisingly-high consistency of tone for a first time effort but Asquith’s script notes – quoted at the top - showed how well he had already thought through the photo play before the shooting began: the sequence described above is pretty much as he planned it although credit must also go to his cinematographers Henry Harris and Stanley Rodwell – the “expert cameramen” he sought.

Donald Calthrop and Dorothy "Chili" Bouchier

Live, the score from John Altman and the Live Film Orchestra swung in an emotionally-emphatic way and the studio version on this disc reveals levels of more nuanced feeling  – with a predominant theme of bittersweet endeavour: love’s labour’s inevitable loss amongst misaligned affection and ambition. It’s a hard mix to get right and whilst some may feel the score a little too defined at times, for me it enhances the flavours already present. Hearts will be broken and it’s almost as if the protagonists know this from the start: not that this sentimental premonition will ever stop them trying.

The crew of Prairie Love

Shooting Stars comes with an extensive side order of extras including an illustrated booklet with revelatory essays from Bryony Dixon, John Altman, Henry K Miller and Chris O’Rourke.

There are seven shorts, the longest of which Starlings of the Screen (1925, 15 mins) is of the most interest to me as it features my friend Nikki’s Great Aunt Sybil Rhoda who, in addition to acting in Hitchcock’s Downhill (1927) and Boadicea (1927) also enjoyed a career as a chorus girl and model. She lived to 102 and only passed away in 2005 - by all accounts one of the family’s great characters!

Then there are further glimpses backstage including Secrets of a World Industry  - The Making of Cinematograph Film (1922, 8 mins),  Around the Town: British Film Stars and Studios (1921, 2 mins),  Opening of British Instructional Film Studio (1928, 4 mins) and a chance to Meet Jackie Coogan (1924, 11 mins)

It’s a very handsome package and available on Monday 21^st March direct from the BFI online Shop and other less reputable digital emporia…  Either at home or in cinema I cannot recommend Shooting Stars highly enough not just for fans of silent cinema but for anyone who expects good storytelling from cinema and to simply be touched sat there, almost alone, in the silvery darkness.

Shooting Stars (1927), John Altman, Live Film Orchestra, BFI London Film Festival Archive Gala

Annette Benson, naughty white dove and Brian Aherne

So, to the Leicester Square Odeon for one of the few occasions in the calendar when silent film gets to be the big shot… even in this palace built for the talkies. The red carpet was rolled out and in the absence of the film’s original stars this could be construed as a recognition of the special audience silent cinema attracts although it’s probably just Festival branding…

This was Anthony Asquith’s first feature and, whilst he may have co-directed with A.V. Bramble and co-written along with John Orton this feels very much like what was to come with Underground and A Cottage on Dartmoor. In short, Shooting Stars is another late period British silent that shows we were much, much better than we thought.

Annette Benson: new favourite actress alert!

Shooting Stars is one of the first British films about film-making – although Hollywood had got there much earlier with the under-rated Souls for Sale, the lost Merton of the Movies and others. The business of film provides perfect fodder as the impudent young director sets about the delusion industry with relish… But then what do you expect from Herbert’s son, ex-Winchester and a Balliol alumnus: he was a bright lad with a background in confidence.

Newly restored by the BFI National Archive, the film was presented with a live score by BAFTA and Emmy award-winning composer John Altman whose work includes some of the more elegant sections of Titanic and who, more importantly, has worked with the genius Nick Drake.

Beach cheeky: Donald Calthrop

Here he employed the 12-piece Live Film Orchestra to superb effect in playing his elegantly-energetic themes.  The music moved with the emotional flow of the film with sections of jazz-age swing flowing into romantic themes that hopped between the action on film and the action being filmed and which were infused with the promise of somehow-inevitable sadness even amid the hope. At times the playing seemed to be within the film; echoing the characters’ sentimental journeys with sweetly mournful lines from Chris Garrick on violin, Simon Chamberlain on piano, Jim Hastings, Bob Sydor and Robert Fowler on woodwind: is there anything sadder than the Clarinet?

That’s not to say that Shooting Stars is a sad film it is funny, saucy and very poignant: a study of human frailty and hope. Annette Benson is quite superb as aspiring superstar Mae Feather – enough of a prima donna to bring the show to a halt when nipped on the lips by a dove but somehow lost in her marriage to the blue eyed and frankly dashing leading man Julian Gordon (Brian Aherne who is so-o cool he manages to carry off the most outrageous pair of cowboy leathers).

A British Coop?

Benson isn’t quite pretty enough to be a Hollywood star but she is all the more interesting for that especially playing alongside this Anglo-Gary Cooper. She’s bored and he’s a bit detached not even bothered enough to stop her going to see their own flick with the cheeky comedian Andy Wilkes (Donald Calthrop – the blackmailer from Blackmail). Andy’s rather underfed in comparison with Julian but he’s funny and at least he pays attention.

The action shifts from studio to homes as Mae goes out to stay in with Andy whilst Julian ends up watching his own film next to a couple of school boys – a marvellous glimpse of cine-watching culture as the actor, almost forgetting his own story starts to cheer along with the audience as he (acting) comes to the rescue.

Andy struggles with the telephonics

Their triangulated affections play out across the backlot and studio with some eye-popping set pieces from Asquith and his cameramen Henry Harris and Stanley Rodwell. There’s an audacious opening when the camera pulls back from a cosy blossom tree cuddle to reveal the mechanisms of the studio and then the camera floats overhead as the characters move from stage to stage. As BFI head curator Robin Baker pointed out in his introduction, the script prepared by Asquith shows just how much of these shots were already in his head. The consistency of tone is remarkable throughout and he clearly works so well with the performers.

With apologies to the BFI... the camera floats over the action within the action...

Then there is a marvellous final sequence that I won’t discuss save to say that it is a suitably emotional coda to a wonderful film: pure cinema in a way that wouldn’t be equalled for decades once the microphones popped up to restrict movement, imagination and the visual drama. This film moves like the best of European silent cinema but is very British all the same.

The restoration was another triumph for the BFI and Robin’s pre-show demonstration of the “before and afters” illustrated just how much had to be done. The film looked spanking new even though only one reel of the original negative survived. Watching this wonder, in cinema and with such a score brought more audience engagement than a dozen iMax/3D films involving grim-faced crime fighters and Norse gods. It was almost too much of a shock to walk out to the outside world where Leicester Square was being loudly serenaded by a longhaired man with an electric guitar.

Mae's mellow in the process of being harshed...

As my friend Mary from Santa Barbara would say: “don’t let it harsh your mellow…” and it didn’t.

BFI, can we see this one again please?

There’s more detail on the film on the BFI site with an excellent essay from Bryony Dixon - How to make your first (silent) movie count.

The Live Film Orchestra site is here whilst John Altman’s Facebook page is here – he really has worked with everyone – and there’s an interview with him talking about Nick Drake on MIMO. He also received the Anthony Asquith Award for Achievement in Film Music for Hear My Song...

Red carpet for silent film...