Betty Balfour Lost and Found, Kennington Bioscope

 

In the darkened hush of the former workhouse home of Charlie Chaplin we were watching Betty Balfour on film that so far as is known, does not exist anywhere else in the world. Think about that, in a digital landscape in which seemingly everything is available to stream (or not stream) at the whims of faceless copyright owners who seek to monetise and control IP. Things were not much different back in the Twenties but things got lost, events overtook the physical media and even the films of Britain’s Queen of Happiness were misplaced.

 

Chris Bird screened a fragment of an unidentified Betty Balfour film, 20 seconds or so, with a couple of other players who might have been familiar.  A tantalising glimpse and, maybe, there’s more out there somewhere. Then he introduced us to a film from his collection, a 9.5mm copy of her 1926 British film, Cinders which is no relation to Ella Cinders staring her American counter-part Colleen Moore. Originally in 20 reels and designed for, patient, home viewing, Chris had transferred the spools onto three larger reels – as much as he could without fear of too much stress on the celluloid from the projection process.

 

Betty's Cinders is along way from the Ball. (All images courtesy of Christopher Bird)

This 95-year-old film was projected from Chris’ 70-year-old projector* and, unsurprisingly there were one or two unexpected additional stops on the way as the past was revealed in vivid action accompanied by the fleet fingers of Colin Sell on the piano. Colin had not seen the film, few others have, but he was able to anticipate the rhythms of Balfour’s perfectly timed comedy whether she was getting trapped in revolving doors, falling down or simply turning her sparkling peepers towards the camera. She has perfect timing, a mix of Stan Laurel, the aforementioned Miss Moore and even Mary Pickford with whom she was often compared. The jewel in the crown of British silent stars and voted in the top two by readers of the Daily Mirror along with Ivor Novello.

 

As Chris pointed out, 9.5mm was only ever intended for home projection but, on the big screen here it looked fabulous – the use of a single central sprocket allows the gauge to pack more punch than it’s diameter might suggest and it was Film Club as only the Kennington Bioscope can provide with every break in the film filled by improvisational flourishes from Mr Sell and the story continuing in the determined hands of Camera-Chris! Just to add more jeopardy, Chris also provided a live translation of the French intertitles on this precious celluloid survivor.

 

The Ball is in full swing and Betty is having it...

The story centred on Betty from the get-go as the down-trodden – but unbowed! – chamber maid in a guest house who gets to assist a reasonably mad Professor Pottiefax (Fred Wright) as he looks after his beetles at the expense of all other cares. He rewards her fortitude after winning a fortune and a hotel in the south of France (always a favourite hang-out of the British film set. The professor has too a time on the dance floor and is photographed in compromising positions with some of the dancers who, for reasons best know to themselves, are wearing kilts.

 

Evil French hoteliers try to blackmail him out of his good fortune but they’ve reckoned without our Betty and also her ability to make handsome friends who will pitch in when the going gets industrial, in this case Richard Dalrey (André Roanne). It’s a slight film in some ways but this is primary evidence of the extraordinary appeal of Balfour and further explains the good humour she was so effortlessly capable of supplying on the screen!

  

The view from the projectionsist (Christopher Bird)

Daughter of the Regiment (1929) was an altogether bigger budgeted affair being a British/German co-production released in Germany as Die Regimentstochter and directed by Hans Behrendt: a Euro pudding as they used to be called. This was a 16mm print courtesy of Bob Geoghegan/Archive Film Agency and, once again, the only copy of the film left anywhere. Chris and Bob projected and Ashley Valentine accompanied this slightly more robust stock and again we were drawn in by the uniqueness of the experience and the privilege of seeing a film not in circulation, not digitised, and only in a private collection.

 

The plot was based on Gaetano Donizetti’s 1840 opera which explains some of the grand gestures and the joyful mood of a nimble if predictable story arc. Betty is Marie, a foundling who has become the “daughter” of a French Regiment stationed in the Pyrenees on the French Spanish border. They guard against incursions from Spanish smugglers and gangs, with Quippo the sergeant, acting as Marie’s adopted father.

 

One of the gangs breaks into their compound whilst the troop are away and Marie bravely – or as she thinks – frightens them away by firing a single shot that Quippo hears and brings his men back to then suffer his charge’s boasting about her soldierly prowess. She goes out riding in the hills and falls trying to collect wildflowers. She is rescued by a handsome young man Tonio (Alexander D’Arcy) who is reluctant to give her his name even though she clearly wants to know all about him… Maria and Tonio… this is a Southwest Side of France Story?

Directed by Hans Behrendt the film shifts in scale from these locations shots of the parched Mediterranean hinterland to the crowded traffic of Paris as the visiting Countess Brascani (Olga Limburg) notices her lost brother’s family crest on the swaddling Maria had been found in and which is now frames on her wall. There can be no doubt that she is a Brascani and has to leave her regimental family for a noble lifestyle in the north. Naturally she must marry another noble and her response when the countess shows her “the man she is going to marry” is hilarious “what, that?!”.

 

But, what about Tonio I hear you ask? Well, after reacquainting themselves as Maria rides her pony through Paris and spots him in his car, she starts to suspect that he might be a smuggler. She loves him but how can she marry such a man and, is the unattractive wealthy man the least worst option?

 

We’ve all been there, to varying degrees, and I hope you get your chance to see this film sometime. Any Betty is good Betty and despite the mixed reviews Chris read out from the British press, the Germans seem to have been far keener. We have more in common that that which divides us in Europe, especially our sense of humour!

 

Ashley Valentine competed the picture with elegant flourishes and good anticipation for this unseen film and is fast becoming a vital part of the Bioscope operation. London’s Silent Film Speakeasy** is flourishing and we’ve never need it more! Thank you all!

 

And not forgetting this glorious audience! Pic from Christopher Bird

Screen shots from Cinders... courtesy of Mr Bird - unseen in a long time!

*Designed by a Czech refugee, J Danek, in the 1930s - Chris' was made in the 1950s at their factory in Windsor.

**As PH from SL famously put it!