Rich mix… Kennington Bioscope 9th Annual Silent Weekend Day One

 

 

Carboard Lover (1928), with John Sweeney, introduction Ben Model

 

At the end of UK premier of restored Cardboard Lover, Dave Glass asked the audience if it was indeed, as restorer Ben Model asserted in his introduction, as good as if not better than The Patsy and Show People her other two smashes of 1928? Answer there came none… we were all too busy absorbing the film, and the fine-timing of Marion and Nils Asner in one of those silent films in which you can almost hear the dialogue, a speedball of a proto-screwball, amazing pace and so knowing. The simple answer was that we couldn’t judge on a single viewing especially against two films that many had seen on numerous occasions but, one our later it feels at least on a par.

The Cardboard Lover was the second to be filmed and the last to be released and so it absolutely shows Davis hitting a peak and also displaying a perfected screen persona incorporating influences from Mabel Normand to Stan Laurel but also so much of her own mischief. She’s a force of nature in character and performance with an energy that would be hard to catch in sound: like Douglas Fairbanks after a six-month bootcamp at a clown school run by Buster Keaton, Harry Houdini and Roscoe Arbuckle.

She’s aided by a spritely performance from Nils Arsner who shows that Swedish sense of humour to great effect, matching her gurn for gurn in a face off I did not expect. He plays elite tennis player Andre who is engaged to the sublime Simone as played by Jetta Goudal who gets impersonated to death by Marion in a scene prefiguring her taking the mickey out of Marsh, Negri and Gish in The Patsy.

Nils. Jetta and Marion. In drag. Again.

Marion Davies is Sally a preppy young woman on vacation with a group including Marion’s niece Pepi Lederer as Peppy by name, peppy by nature. In life she was Louise Brooks’ best friend and the actress wrote an chapter on the tragic Pepi in Lulu in Hollywood entitled Marion Davies’ Niece, a woman who struggled to be “… a person in her own right, not a way station or would-be friends of Marion and Mr Hearst…”. Best not to dwell on what she wrote about Marion though.

 

Here Miss Davies is at her peak and sparkling through the romance and the comedy as Sally sets her sights on Andre’s autograph and then acts as his one-woman defence against the allure of Simone who he cannot stand and yet cannot resist. He makes Marion promise to prevent his will from wavering even if it means giving him a sock on the jaw, a punchline that we know is going to arrive at some point for his struggle is real!

John Sweeney played along with Marion and Nils with a deftness of touch and laughter in his hands, what’s that modern saying about game recognising game? He was swinging!

I was one of the 600 plus silent film fans who backed Ben’s Kickstarter campaign to restore and produce a Blu-ray of The Cardboard Lover and I can’t wait to see it in May and share it with my family: watching it with an audience always brings out the reaction the comedy deserves.

 

Rediscoveries and restorations 1 – with John Sweeney, introduced by Dave Glass

To my over-caffeinated and sugar-pumped corporeality this was an injection of an accelerant that provided a high impact sucker punch after being left dazed by the emotional heft of Sprechende Hande aka Talking Hands (1925), a German documentary about the Oberlinhaus Nowawes care home and school for the deafblind neat Potsdam. Directed by women’s rights activist and co-operative pioneer Gertrud Da­vid neé Swiderski, it is a humbling film that shows the patient and richly rewarding work of the church run Oberlinhaus which won a gold medal at the Paris World's Fair in 1900 for its holistic approach to treatments that brought the deafblind into the world.

The film follows the painstaking introduction of language based on hand movements which taught the subjects language through which they were then able to communicate and understand the exterior world. There’s one moment in which a group communicate by hand as a sighted teacher rads the newspaper: watching people overcome disability together places so much of our daily struggles into context.

John Sweeney had seen the film and accompanied it here and almost the first thing everyone asked after the screening was what had happened to the institution after the Nazis came to power. Luckily they were protected by their National Socialist governor Dietloff von Arnim and after surviving the war – being used as a hospital to treat the wounded in 1945 – the Oberlinhaus continues its work today with over 2,000 employees and many more residents.

Also included was another previously mislaid film rescued by Chris Bird in 2022 and screened probably for the first time on well over a century, A Victim of Circumstances (1913), from the Thanhouser studio. This featured a reporter played by Harry Benham who was romancing a woman played by Mignon Anderson although her father disapproves. The young man is arrested for photographing a rich man – I know, typical eh? – and whilst be cleared of any charge, this is enough reason for the father (Justus D. Barnes) to forbid the marriage as clearly his potential son-in-law is the wrong sort.

Things are nicely turned around though once the old bigot himself is arrested after being found in possession of stolen goods foisted on him by a fleeing snatch thief. It’s not a fair cop but the film takes us through his ritual humiliation as he is photographed, finger printed and even filmed by the forces of the law before realising that not only is Justice blind it is also fallible.

 

Young John Gilbert 

The White Heather (1919) with John Sweeney

 

Directed by Maurice Tourneur, this fab restoration from the San Francisco Film Preserve was only rediscovered in 2023 and is a beautifully filmed drama of faithless cads, true brave-hearts and financial skull-duggery that you can find on the SFFP website. I’ve previously written about it here, but it was great to see it on the big screen and with live accompaniment. Holmes Herbert plays the increasingly unlikeable Lord Angus and Mabel Ballin as Marion, the woman he wrongs. She has steadfast friends though in the form of the youthful John Gilbert playing Dick Beach who sets off in search of the Captain (Gibson Gowland later of Greed…) and Alec McClintock (Ralph Graves) who also loves Marion and will fight through hell and deep waters to save her… A cracking adventure and with some exceptional underwater scenes.

 

Ivor and Isabel

The Triumph of the Rat (1926) with Costas Fotopoulos, introduction from Bryony Dixon

The more I see of British silent films the more I wonder how they got such a bad reputation in the first place. Granted this one is strangely uneven but it’s also deeper than you’d expect allowing Ivor Novello to demonstrate the most existential of triumphs against the most intractable adversity…

Graham Cutts’s direction was very fluid with lots of deft camera movement around the ballroom and, capturing it’s grimy decadence in most expressionist ways, the Coffin Club. It really is a film of two halves as the reformed Rat, Pierre Boucheron (Ivor), rather bored with being the kept man of Zélie de Chaumet (Isabel Jeans is A Queen!) who, as fans will recall, he seemingly spurned in the first of these three films… makes a bet that he can capture the heart of the stunning Madeleine de l'Orme (Nina Vanna) after glimpsing her at a ball.

This begins a charming rat and mouse between the former rodent and the young woman with Pierre using his wiles to catch her attention before, somewhat inevitably, falling for her. This is too much for the controlling Zélie who tells all to ruin their relationship. Pierre is too decent to make excuses and tumbles into a descent that sees him falling into poverty and being forced away from his friends at the Coffin – the always watchable Marie Ault (from Wigan) playing proprietor Mère Colline and Julie Suedo as Mou, one of the club’s dancers who has a soft spot for our hero.

 

Ivor relishes the chance to show he can play despair although he’s no Lillian Gish (but could she sing?). It’s heart-rending and his only triumph might well be to just survive… we’ll have to wait for the final film in the trilogy, The Return of the Rat (1929) to find out where this story ends up. The three have the same characters but tend to not follow the dramatic instructions left by their predecessor.

 

Week-End Wives (1929) with Cyrus Gabrysch, introduced by Lisa Stein Haven

The day started with another very fine British film which was a pretty-much perfectly exercised bedroom farce directed by Harry Lachman and starring Monty Banks. Following on from her presentation of her research into the Italian born-American star at the previous day’s silent Film Symposium (of which more later!), Lisa gave us another expert overview of this impeccable comic actor with the tiny moustache who was born Mario Bianchi in Cesena in North Eastern Italy just down the E45 from Bologna… before emigrating aged 17 to the USA. He started on stage then joined the Arbuckle company in 1918 making 35 short comedies by the early twenties.

 

Of course, for course many Britishers Monty is always down as the future Mr Gracie Fields – they wed in 1940 – but this was a marriage of Lancashire wit and talent with Umbrian nous and charm: they were a powerhouse couple and obviously great fun at parties. Banks’ British adventure began after he was declared bankrupt in 1927 after which he came to work for British International Pictures (BIP) in 1928. As Lisa points out this was after the passing of the 1927 Cinematographic Films Act which brought in the Quota Quickies. His films included Adam’s Apple (1928), Compulsory Husband (1930) and this one, the most complete and thankfully in the BFI archives on 35mm.

 

Monty has adventurer Max Ammon who cannot keep his driver in his golf-bag for long and forms a potential relationship with bored housewife Helene Monard - played by the spirited Annette Benson of Hitchcock’s Downhill fame and also Anthony Asquith’s brilliant Shooting Stars… One misunderstanding leads to another especially as Helene’s husband, uptight and grouchy Henri played with dashing flair by Jameson Thomas, is also bored and certainly fed up of egg and bacon breakfasts. It’s the little things…

 

The love quarter is, almost, completed by wannabe divorcee Madame le Grand, played by the fabulous Estelle Brody, so interesting to see her so far from the cotton mills of Hindle Wakes in this more vampish role. Brody was another American emigree who enjoyed success in the UK although this was not long to survive the coming of sound. Madame seeks legal advice from Henri and soon they are playing consultations of a more amorous kind. Then we discover that there is a fifth element and it’s the violent and unpredictable Monsieur le Grand (George K. Gee) out to win his wife back and to remove any obstacle.

Everyone gets wonderfully entangled and just when you think it’s getting too complicated it just gets more so and funnier. Comedy is precision work and Harry Lachman directs with near perfect timing.

 

I like Monty a lot and look forward to Lisa’s upcoming biography! She has also written about Sid Chaplin who made his Hollywood exit at the same time as the movies changed.

 

Der Student von Prague (1926) with John Sweeney, introduced by Michelle Facey

I missed the evening show which was the classic Weimar gothic adventure directed by Henrick Galeen and starring Conrad Veidt as the hellraising student who makes a deal with the Devil and has to confront the horror of his own dark soul. Based, as was the 1913 version, on a mix of Faust and a short story by Edgar Allan Poe, William Wilson, this is a fabulous tale of a man who haunts himself with marvellous location shots and overall cinematographic excellence from Gunter Krumpf – Veidt vs Veidt is something to behold.

There’s a recent Blu-ray release from Deaf Crocodile which features the recent restoration which  runs at 133 minutes with a score from Stephen Horne. If you haven’t got it already, why not? It also has Brigitte Helm in Alraune (1928) – absolutely essential!

 

It was a day of rich content at the Cinema Museum and the best thing is, we have more of the same tomorrow! *

 

 

*Written before the Day Two write up for reasons best known to the author…

Never lands... Peter Pan (1924)/The Thief of Bagdad (1924), BFI Anna May Wong: The Art of Reinvention

 

Two blockbusters on a scale that influenced the next century of film right up to the mighty world of extended universes and modern franchises most specifically in the impact the former had on a certain Walter Disney but also in the incredible scale of the latter. Surely impressive appearances in both would help establish Anna May Wong as a rising star in Hollywood but in spite of her extraordinary ability to shine through and energise even the most confined role, it was not to be although she worked as hard as anyone could to maintain her own momentum and if it wasn’t going to be at home it would have to be away or even, far, far away. Still, she was noticed in Europe, especially in Britain and Germany, second star on the right, straight on till morning…

 

In the USA both films were amongst the most successful in 1924 with Thief bringing in $1.5million in 4^th place and the Christmas released Pan, eventually getting more than $600k. They were two of the six films Anna made in 1924 and the following year she made just two with four in 1926 and then a mixed bag of eight in 1927. Her last Hollywood film of 1928 was the Joan Crawford vehicle, Across to Singapore and she was uncredited but, for her first Anglo-German film she got star billing for Song (1928) and of course Piccadilly and Pavement Butterfly in 1929.

 

But these two films were spectacular and high impact proving her abilities in top-level company especially the phenomenon Fairbanks – so kinetic he makes Tom Cruise look like late period Ralph Richardson – and the mighty Betty Bronson who if ever there was a female equivalent to Doug, demonstrates it in Neverland. This was an afternoon of the highest quality with two major silent works that I had been saving up for the big screen with splendid accompaniment and a passionate informed audience. One of those special BFI days.

 

Mary Brian sews on Betty Bronson's shadow: this may hurt!

Peter Pan (1924,) with Costas Fotopoulos

 

Betty Bronson was a pocket rocket and was selected by JM Barrie over 100 others tested for the role¹ and we can absolutely see why. She made quite the impression on Fairbanks’ son Doug Jnr as he had later admitted she was his first crush on watching her in Peter Pan; she was 17 when she made the film and he was 15 when it was released and they were friends afterwards, the actor recalling in his autobiography that It was not fully requited. She only flirted with me…. No worries champ, you’ll be married to Joan Crawford within five years!

 

Betty is certainly full of Fairbanks’ zip in every single scene of this film, radiating health and laddish enthusiasm as the boy who never grows up. JM Barrie’s seminal Edwardian fantasy began as a play in 1904 before being novelised as Peter and Wendy in 1911. The first performance was at the Duke of York's Theatre in London on 27 December 1904 with Nina Boucicault in the title role and so Peter was always played by a woman on stage which is noteworthy in itself in terms of the British drag tradition and the “trouser role”.

Anna May Wong brings the noise

 

The story and the film despite their fantastical nature are about parenthood and also loss with Peter possibly being inspired by the death of David the 14-year-old son of Barrie’s friend Sylvia Llewelyn Davies, a “Lost boy” who would never grow old and yet was happy to stay in Never Never Land. The character first appeared in the 1902 novel The Little White Bird, written for adults. The author ended up adopting Sylvia’s children after she and her husband died and this too is reflected in the story with Mrs Darling taking in the Lost Boys.

 

The film is a pure delight and a celebration of childhood with opening title cards explaining that viewers need to connect with their childish selves – no problem personally – in order to understand the photo play. It was lovely to see a number of children in the audience too, some very responsible parenting in evidence! The film has more of the intentions of the play along with a portion of the dialogue and is quite different to Disney’s 1953 cartoon which smooths out the sense of loss and the overt celebration of motherhood as well as the romantic frisson between Wendy and Peter. Disney, as ever, uncomfortable with reality.

 

Esther Ralston is key to setting the tone as Mrs. Darling, a woman of compassion and unconditional nurturing love. It is she who first encounters Peter in the children’s nursery and accidentally cuts off his shadow closing the window on him. She puts it in a draw and sees Peter again as he tries to retrieve what is perhaps a metaphor for his memory, soul and/or his loving existence on Earth… he recognises her but he can’t remember why, an extension of the same amnesia the younger Darlings experience after time in Never Land. Philippe De Lacy is boorish Dad Michael Darling who pranks his children and won’t keep his end of the bargain in taking his medicine instead feeding it to Nana the Dog, an extraordinary creation played by George Ali a puppeteer and animal impersonator who was incredibly flexible for a 58-year-old. He also plays lion and a crocodile… animal magic!

 

Mother Esther Ralston

Nana may only be a dog but is the children’s nursemaid making sure they get to bed on time and take their bath. Grumpy Dad chains her to the garden kennel meaning she is not on hand to protect the children when Peter and Tinkerbell arrive and, after Wendy (Mary Brian) sews Pan’s shadow back onto his feet, whisk them into the air and off to the island of Never Never Land. Wendy’s brothers John are played by Jack Murphy and Michael by Philippe De Lacy who went onto play the young prince in Lubitsch's The Student Prince in Old Heidelberg, before becoming a producer and director once he grew up!

 

They land in the Forest of Make-Believe and the fun really begins with mermaids, pirates and native Americans – not for nothing did this film come with a warning about the screening containing “racist attitudes, language and images, including red face”, it’s a document of its time. Here we find Anna May Wong as Tiger Lily, one of a group of “red Indians” who inhabit the forest, she’s not in many scenes but obviously brings the required pep to everyone although her band are unable to defeat the evil pirates led by the infamous Captain Hook! Ernest Torrence leaves no parts of the scenery unchewed and is spectacularly nasty as the pirate with the heart of lead… he’s the archetypical villain from Lex Luthor to Dr Doom up against a boy that can fly and knows no fear.

 

Peter and the Pirates... Ernest Torrence is terrfic.

We watched a 35mm copy from George Eastman House which ran at just over two hours with Costas Fotopoulos, seeing the film for the first time as well, filling his accompaniment with playful inventions suitable for an audience Barrie implored to go back to the nursery and once more believe in fairies as the play moved on.

 

Today was the 55^th anniversary of NFT2 and what better celebration than an audience clapping along as Betty Bronson urged us to signal out belief in magic and save poor Tinkerbell. Wonderful!

 

Doug on a magic carpet over a cast of thousands, still not sure how this was done?

The Thief of Bagdad (1924), with Neil Brand

 

Follow that and the BFI did with the shock and awe of Douglas Fairbank’s and Raoul Walsh’s epic adaptation of One Thousand and One Nights which was based on a story written by the actor under the pseudonym of Elton Thomas according to Kevin Brownlow and David Gill whose Photoplay restoration we watched. It is perhaps the ultimate Doug surpassing even Robin Hood (1922) and we had fabulous accompaniment from Neil Brand whose orchestral score for the former film demonstrated such an uncanny connection with the star and screen. Here, Neil was The Orchestra and for 164 minutes, albeit with a very short intermission, bringing his singular style and understanding of motion picture composition to the fore as the picture and the action towered over the rapt audience sat in NFT1.

 

The film’s sets were bigger than Hood’s and even Intolerance and were the work of William Cameron Menzies and they were so spectacular that Fairbanks fitted the action around them: there’s no elaborate staircase Doug can’t ascend with bounding flamboyance, no wall he can’t climb or descend or window he can’t slide down. He is his own special effect and, with his 21^st Century physique on topless display he is the epitome of health and efficiency – no chocolate on top of his cappuccino or cheeky pastry before the screening in the RFH for him… he reminds me of the moving statue in My Grandmother (1929).

 

Doug plays Ahmed, the Thief of Bagdad who starts the film off as self-interested and faithless taking whatever he wants whenever he wants to and laughing in the faith of authority of any kind. All of this changes when he chances to see and fall in love with The Princess of Bagdad (Julanne Johnston) and, after his cheeky ways lead him into more trouble than he can bear, he resolves to win her heart through honest endeavour. It’s interesting to see quotes in the intertitles from the Quran and to see Ahmed making peace with the Imam (Charles Belcher) who tells him, naturally, to follow his heart… try making this film these days and screening it in our flag-infested high streets?

 

Julanne Johnston and Fairbanks Snr

Against this regal and religious Bagdad stands Cham Shang, Prince of the Mongols (Japanese actor Sōjin Kamiyama) who wants to invade and enslave the kingdom and to have the Princess for his own. He has a spy in her handmaidens in the form of Anna May Wong who as you’d expect makes the most of her role especially in the scene in which Ahmed first breaks into the royal quarters and pushes a very phallic knife against her back, at least in the interpretation of filmmaker Michelle Williams Gamaker in her introduction.²

 

Ahmed must compete with the Mongols and also the princes of the Indies and Persia to bring home the greatest wonders from the furthest reaches of the world a grand quest involving flying carpets, flying horses, crystal balls and a box of delights. It is perhaps the most spectacular silent film ever made and certainly one of the most thoroughly enjoyable especially with Mr Brand’s flying accompaniment.

 

Both films are glorious and I am glad I waited to see them first on the big screen in a live setting. Now I can’t wait to watch my Blu-rays and work out exactly how the magic is wrought.

Meanwhile, plenty more Anna May Wong to come over the next three weeks... details on the BFI site.

 

Anna May Wong a spy in the house of love?

1.       According to The New York Times, 16^th August 1924 who reported that Bronson had sent a thank you telegram to the author: "I feel like a new Cinderella, thanks to you. I realize the importance of your trust in me and my tremendous responsibility. I am the luckiest girl in the world. Betty Bronson."

 

2.       Michelle Williams Gamaker featured a clip from her film Thieves (2023) part of her Fictional Activism initiative which is concerned with “… the restoration of marginalised film stars of colour as central figures, who return in her works as brown protagonists to challenge the fictional injustices to which they have been historically consigned.” Details on her website here.

 

Game of thrones… Die Nibelungen: Siegfried (1924), with Costas Fotopoulos, Kennington Bioscope

 

First Bioscope of the year and it’s an epic evening for one of the cornerstones of Weimar Cinema, one in fact that I’ve been saving up for just such an occasion and, judging from a non-too scientific sampling of the audience, I’m not the only one with the DVD/Blu-ray at home on the shelf, waiting to be watched after a proper screening and the Bioscope made sure that this was indeed a special screening.

 

A 16mm print was shown tonight, slightly shorter the restoration on which our home media is  based but still very impressive, astonishing even given the scale and verve of the film making. Regular KB, MC, Michelle Facey gave her usual high-content introduction, providing the background on director and cinematic visionary Fritz Land and his script-writing partner Thea von Harbou, as well as explaining the film’s link to early 13^th Century Saxon epic poetry, Der Nibelungenlied, written in High Middle German and by unknown hands in Passau in what is now southern Bavaria.  This tale was itself based on oral traditions dating back centuries and mentioning historic events and individuals of the 5th and 6th centuries.

 

There are similar stories across German speaking Europe and up to Scandinavia and, there are some similarities with later Middle English stories such as Sir Gawain and the Green Knight or Le Mort d’Arthur, they are all epics in which it is how the characters live as much as if they die: chivalric romances with logic and outcomes based on magical and religious certainties. The link as a noted medievalist pointed out, may well be the French writer Chrétien de Troyes, who, writing in the late 12^th  Century, told tales of Arthurian legend; setting up a style and subject matter that led to the Extended Chivalric Universe, spreading across borders and language.

Paul Richter provides some scale

Der Nibelungenlied is altogether fuller of dungeons and dragons than usually found in Arthur, it is peculiarly Germanic and this appealed especially to Lang and von Harbou who were looking to take their countrymen out of themselves by presenting a folk-fantasy many would recognise on a grand scale, something even the Americans would struggle to better. There’s no getting over the links between the story and German identity though with elements not only quoted after German reunification in the 1870s, but forming the basis for Wagner’s Ring Cycle, a celebration of the loyalties rather than the more courtly aspects. After the First World War – and Lang’s film – it’s even possible to see Siegfried as literally representing the betrayal of German interests, “the stab in the back”, seen by many at home after surrender in 1918. Politics and culture pick and choose each other in odd ways, for more on this see von Harbou’s output in Germany after 1933…

 

No doubt the primary purpose in 1924 was to deliver rousing entertainment every bit as stirring as Arthurian legends, swords and sorcery. This is something of a superhero epic with a hero who, having bathed in dragon blood, is almost invulnerable. It’s not too much of a stretch to imagine two young friends, sons of recently migrated European Jews, Joe Shuster and Jerry Siegel, both ten on this film’s release, perhaps seeing it in the USA and getting a few ideas. The Italians had their own strong man, Maciste, the German Übermensch went back a bit further.

 

The film is huge in scale and features many tropes that are now staples of the explosion in fantasy films, although Lang’s vision is decades before Tolkien or CS Lewis set their templates, let alone Game of Thrones, House of Dragons and all the rest. Like modern blockbusters, Lang’s film was also in two parts and tonight’s screening was only of the first part, still some two hours even on 16mm and well over half an hour longer on the reconstruction found on the Eureka Blu-ray.

 

Siegfried holds aloft his sword

It tells the tale of Siegfried (Paul Richter), son of King Siegmund of Xanten, who becomes an expert swordsmith, fashioning the perfect blade which the artful blacksmith, Mime (Georg John) tests by dropping a feather onto the edge and slicing it in two. Siegfried is a genetically lucky blonde, yes, an Aryan, who attains success through bravery, guile and killing the right dragon. After the sword is struck he leaves on his white charger (possibly called Tonto or Comet the Superhorse) after hearing about the kings of Burgundy who reign at a mighty castle at Worms on the Rhine, where the beauteous Princess Kriemhild (Margarete Schön) awaits just such a knight as he.

 

I shall set out for that place so that I may win Kriemhild!

 

Mime tells our hero how to find Worm but he sends him to almost certain doom as there is a dragon blocking his way. Siegfried is of course fearless and wily and outthinks the, actual fire-breathing creature, who looks a little sad as he’s blinded and then fatally stabbed by the knight’s blade. This blood has magical qualities and a little bird, literally, tells him that if he bathes in it, he will become impervious harm which leads to some  long-distance nudity as Siegfried takes the bath of invulnerability. One last twitch of the dragon’s tail though and a leaf lands on his shoulder meaning that he has one area of weak human flesh… every superhero needs their kryptonite or Achille’s Heel.

 

He also gains additional super powers and wealth after being attacked by Alberich, King of the Dwarves (Georg John, again) who wears a net of invisibility but is soon overwhelmed and forced to promise Siegfried his fortune, the treasure of the Nibelungs, if he will spare him. Naturally Alberich double-crosses but fails and as he dies curses all in his subterranean kingdom to be turned to stone. Siegfried heads off and goes from strength to strength soon conquering 12 kingdoms and presenting a suitably heroic prospect to the Burgundians. 

Margarete Schön

In her introduction, Michelle referred us to Lotte H Eisner’s Haunted Screen¹ for an analysis of the film’s incredible design and mix of the usual expressionist/UFA studio work with stunning location shots; all perfectly controlled by Lang and his team led by art director Otto Hunte. Eisner quotes early film critic Béla Balázs in saying that “the soul of a landscape or milieu did not always present itself in the same way” and so it was up to the director to “seek the eyes of the landscape…” Nature had to be “stylised” for film to become a work of art (Rudolph Kurtz²) and plain nature was not enough in itself to “make man’s destiny understood” and Stimmungsbilder, “mood pictures” had to be used.

 

Lang certainly took control of his landscape and it is very much a major character in this film, reflecting and setting the moods of the characters and the narrative. The studio constructs are huge dynamic depictions of nature; rocky outcrops, dense pine woods and treacherous pathways whilst the building of Worm are massive in scale both for the interiors and exteriors, with huge stairways dwarfing the players, who move across them, black or white, like pieces on a chess board.

 

Talking of which, Lang also micromanages the way his human resource was aligned and where exactly they where in the frame. There are so many examples of this that I was tempted just to leave 150 screen shots in place of all these words. The opening sequence is almost balletic, as Siegfried hammers out his sward and Mint recoils in horror as he sees how powerful he has become and then, when we first see the imposing King’s Castle, the guard are spaced out symmetrically as the nobles walk past, as if the audience, commoners all, are held at a distance. We quickly switch to the interiors and the almost sterile atmosphere.

 

Order in the castle

All this will change when Siegfried strikes a deal with King Gunther of Burgund (Theodor Loos) to help him gain the hand of the fearsome Queen Brunhild of Isenland (Hanna Ralph who is great value!) in exchange for allowing his new friend to give him his sister Kriemhild’s hand in marriage. They head off to Brunhild’s realm and Siegfried uses his net of invisibility to make sure that the puny King Gunther wins the three trials of strength he needs against the woman he wants to marry. Brunhild is down but not quite out and, whilst she has to accede, she suspects something is wrong.

 

All is now set for some court intrigue in Burgundy and, as with other characters who break the code of chivalry, there is always a price to pay and an uneasy peace will not last for long at the King’s castle.

 

It’s hard to think of many films with this kind of scale in 1924, and the direction as well as cinematography are first rate with cameraman Carl Hoffmann, Günther Rittau, and Walter Ruttmann as good if not better than almost anyone in Hollywood. Paul Gerd Guderian’s costumes also match the set designs and there’s a striking mix of strong modern design with traditional folk stylings. Everything is larger than life from the hairy hobbits working in the smithery to the dwarfs and the brown back coiffeurs of Siegfried and Brunhild. There’s also a moody turn from the King of Burgundy’s general, Hagen of Tronje (Hans Adalbert Schlettow), eye patch over one eye and huge black wings attached to his armoured helmet.

Hanna Ralph is not to be messed with

It's operatic, and fantastic with an emotional sweep designed to sweep the audience away. To this end, Costas Fotopoulos’ tirelessly inventive accompaniment also played its part, never flagging during the epic mood and melded to Lang’s vision as everything else. It contributed mightily to the unfolding ultra-drama with lines and themes as intriguingly structured as the architecture and design on screen.

 

Die Nibelungen was premiered in the at the Royal Albert Hall in London, where it played for 40 performances between 29 April and 20 June 1924. A hit and an influence on film for all eternity. It was certainly a hit tonight and here’s to the second part when it can be arranged… no spoilers but it’s called: Die Nibelungen: Kriemhilds Rache (Kriemhild's Revenge).

1.       The Haunted Screen, Lotte H Eisner, first published in 1952 and updated with translation and new material for Thames and Hudson in 1969.

2.       Rudolf Kurtz’s Expressionismus und Film, published in 1926, was one of the first, if not the first, art historical treatises to examine film as an equal of the other arts.

 

Asta invests... The Queen of the Stock Exchange (1918)/The Guinea Pig (1913) with Costas Fotopoulos, BFI Asta Nielsen Season

An intellectual of great refinement… the quintessence, the epitome of her era… Lotte Eisner in The Haunted Screen

 

Another dramatic change of look for Asta in The Queen of the Stock Exchange, Nielsen plays Helene Netzler and has two kiss curls framing her face making her almost unrecognisable from the two other characters she’d played tonight at the BFI. That’s not all though as Helene runs a mining business and is clearly at home in the very male world of both mining and the stock exchange. This is a fascinating character and I wonder how this would have seemed to a European audience at the time who had grown more used to women at work during the Great War. It’s a nod back to her character in Die Suffragette (1913), a proto feminist who may or may not be happy settling down to have babies.

 

Here Asta has achieved the parity once dreamt of and she is in charge of almost every aspect of her life. Directed and written by Edmund Edel, it’s clear that Asta called the shots in terms of the films she wanted to make, even before the establishment of her own production company in 1920. Helene’s company is running out of coal though and she’s in trouble until one of her engineers, Lindholm (Aruth Wartan) spots a new seam that might just save them.

 

Asta in Man's World

The initial investigation is encouraging and so Helene plays the market and buys up most of her own stock at rock bottom prices in order to make a killing when the news is confirmed. Whilst providing comment on the capitalist greed that would become an increasing issue in Europe, this shows a woman being a ruthless as men and Asta is imperious. She even promises Lindholm co-ownership if the seam is as valuable as he thinks and there’s a clear sexual frisson there as well… the thrill of the power.

 

Things work out and Lindholm is promoted but not everything in Helene’s life can be controlled… she has employed her poor cousin Lina as a domestic and the young woman catches Lindholm’s eye. As the two are drawn together Helene’s jealousy knows no bounds and she engineers the most awful revenge even after Lina has left.

 

What use are my riches if the one who was dearest to me is dead?

Asta with the workers

This is the most overtly political of the films shown so far and it’s interesting that this one dates from May 1918, the tide was turning and anti-capitalist sentiment was on the up as Russia revolted and the cost of war became ever clearer. The film’s conclusion, as Helene’s grief is played out amongst scenes of dozens of mine workers running to assist after an accident at the mine, is very powerful and she ends up deciding that her workers deserve full recompense for risking their lives in her business.

 

A different side to Asta…

 

From socialism to sublime silliness and proof that Asta could goof about with the best of them. The Guinea Pig (Das Versuchskaninchen) isn’t as funny or as polished as Der Eskimo Baby but Asta does a good job with a very odd story which includes some cringe-worthy references to mental health – a century being a long time in psychiatry.

 

Directed again by Edmund Edel, the film finds Asta who was 32, playing a teenager called Jesta who is low on attention span and high on energy constantly frustrating her father (Alfred Kuehne) and coming between him and his fiancée. Amazingly, Jesta has a love of her own, played by Fred Immler who seems normal enough but clearly likes her sense of humour.

 

Asta menaces her future step mother...

Tiring of been worn down by his daughter’s constant comedy, Dad decides to send her off to a strict school but, due to various mishaps, she ends up at a lunatic asylum where the doctor quickly diagnoses insanity and proceeds to try and treat her using the modern of methods including electric shock treatment and a padded cell. It’s largely not funny anymore but still interesting to see Asta playing in a weird kind of Mary Pickford role.

 

Her fiancé comes to rescue her only to be also diagnosed as insane before the telegram explaining it all is finally found. These things happen…

 

Costas Fotopoulos provided sprightly accompaniment for both films and kept a straight face for the finances and the “loony tunes… there was more than enough going on there anyway. Again, Asta dominates the attention so much you wonder what impact this has on the playing; with both accompanists today, there was a deep blend with the narrative that showed how sure footed Nielsen’s performances were and how hard it is to not watch/play along with, her every move.

 

The Asta Nielsen season continues apace through to March, full details are on the BFI site.

There are delicious tints for The Queen of the Stock Exchange and, of course, once again, Asta wears the trousers...

Asta arrives... The Black Dream (1911)/The Film Primadonna (1913), with Costas Fotopoulos, BFI Asta Nielsen Season

Asta and Valdemar - great Danes

I realised that this woman was the first artist in the medium of film. * 

Seasons like this only come round once in a blue moon, at least for the silent cineaste. Not since the Weimar season have so many silent treats been gathered together in the UK and here, we have dozens of films featuring Asta Nielsen mostly made before 1920 and pre-dating living memory. For this we have the BFI and programmer/historian/Astavangelist Pamela Hutchinson to thank and, if you see this woman, please buy her a drink and a vegan cupcake!

 

Nielsen too cannot be lauded enough, being one of the major players who developed the nascent art of screen playacting, but also one of the first genuine stars, acting and producing with a global appeal albeit with a bigger impact in Europe than across the Atlantic. Before Asta, few took the time to casually swat flies away sat in a sunny café or otherwise relished the miniature pleasures of the moments between “lines”, whether flies there were or not this helps create the impression of reality. She presents drama in as natural and relatable way as any modern performer and her pact between character and audience remains as unbreakable as when she first swivelled her hips in leather skirt.

 

A graduate of the Royal Danish Theatre who had spent most of her twenties in rep with various companies, Nielsen made her screen debut with Urban Gad's sensational Afgrunden in 1910. The Black Dream (Det sorte Drøm) was her second film with husband-to-be Urban and followed similar themes of love, sex and retribution: in the end lives must be at stake for miss-spent passion... we’re years away from the culture of getting away with it all.

Asta arrives on horseback

Asta plays a circus performer, Stella, who rides horses acrobatically in front of her adoring public and Gad shows this is very economical ways with Asta riding her horse into a foreshortened area set, rising to acclaim in a single take with no camera movement… bigger budgets were soon to come you two! Nielsen’s leggy costume is a world away from Griffiths’ Victorian waifs and this is a real woman (on a very real horse) willowy and probably taller than average? There’s no tale of the tape on Wikipedia but we want to know, don’t we?

 

Stella is being pursued by the scheming toff Aldolf Hirsch (Gunnar Helsengreen) but her true love is Johann Graf von Waldberg (Valdemar Psilander, the other great Dane of early cinema who died tragically young). Hirsch forces himself on Stella and is knocked to the ground by Johann. Hirsch challenges him to a card duel and, presumably cheating, leaves him defeated and in debt. Unable to raise the money, Johann considers suicide only to be stopped by Stella who has a plan to save them if she can steal pearls from Hirsch for Johann to sell and clear his debt.

 

It's a long shot but it just might work…

This scene alone is worth studying for the amount of expression Asta puts in...

There are very few intertitles here, barely half a dozen and this puts the onus on director and actors to tell the story. That they manage this with such subtlety and impact is impressive given the vintage. Asta Nielsen plays a large part in this but Gad was also a ground breaker in his own right with his well-paced narratives, surprising range of shots and compositional sense (...around the streets, the actors, the horse... Die Asta!). This film also has an abundance of exterior shots (including some with a window-full of fascinated on-lookers!) that give a great view of contemporary Copenhagen not to mention curious locals who pop up around the edges of the action.

Asta is also featured in an array of beautiful costumes, she was a clothes horse and whilst not being a conventional beauty, is positively protean acting sexy in such a relaxed way breaking ground and the fourth wall whilst still in character, luring the viewer in without the need for a nod or wink. Her looks were a debating point at the time, certainly in Denmark where her dark colouring and slenderness did not conform to some standards. Indeed, one Carl Theodor Dreyer was particularly cruel writing that she “… truly has some terribly unfortunate features. She is lanky and overgrown, flat like an ironing board in back, flat-chested and with no calves to speak of…” **

 

Luckily for Asta the rest of Europe begged to differ and she was – literally - the shape of things to come. Besides, even if some male gazes were less impressed, Asta loved the camera and the optical device loved her back… sincerity is the sexiest look of all.

THAT foot up on the bed... nothing happens without consideration

By the time of The Film Primadonna (1913), Asta was established as a superstar and this film, directed and written again by Mr Nielsen, sees her playing a huge film star, Ruth Breton, a post-modern, meta move with modern equivalents abounding from A Hard Day’s Night to Spice World. It’s great to see the studios and the set up as sequences are filmed and Asta part directs and walks confidently across stage preparing for her exit. Then we see the reddened dark room and the production lab with Ruth studies the rushes and calls out bad lighting.

 

Sadly, only less than a quarter of the film survives but we have most of the first reel that shows Stella as a slightly controlling and flighty woman, encouraging the endeavours of screenwriter and actor Walter Heim (Fritz Weidemann) for her own ends. Walter is useful as far as he goes but Ruth starts to become attracted to a Count von Zornhorst (Paul Otto) and… the film ends with the restoration pleading for further information should anyone know where to find the film.

 

Here's hoping as it’s a good-looking film and we get to see Asta acting as Ruth but also as Ruth acting as a blonde woman made good judging from the rags in the early scenes.

Costas Fotopoulos accompanied both films with assured and lovely lines, in touch with tone and narrative pace. I wonder what affect Asta has on the players improvising for these films... there's surely some unique alchemy at play in following her lead and we love to hear it. 

Asta's Ruth paying attention to every detail

We may be short on the ending here but there’s PLENTY more to come and the Asta Nielsen season continues through February and March and full details are available on the BFI site where you can, and must, reserve your tickets!

 

*German producer Paul Davidson who signed contracted Asta for a massive $80,000 a year in 1911, a stunning amount for the time (millions in modern terms) for an actress who had made just a few films. He was spot on.

 

** Julie K Allen in Importing Asta Nielsen: The International Film Star in the Making 1910-1914 (Kintop Studies in Early Cinema) who also confirms that the actress got just $200 for Afgrunden… a film she made only hoping to enhance her profile for theatrical roles.

 

PS Also worth checking out The Black Dream on the Danish Film Institute site which looks in much better quality than my old DVD.

Bonus screen shots!!

The Film Primadonna

The Black Dream 

Appointment TV… Kidnapped (1917), MS and KBTV with John Sweeney

Back in the days when you couldn’t stream on demand and when even recording on VHS just wasn’t enough, the pull of certain television shows was such that you just had to watch them live. Who shot JR?, Ross and Rachel’s wedding, the fight between Ken Barlow and Mike Baldwin over Diedre in Coronation Street, certain things you were desperate to watch and to share in the knowledge that everyone else was as well.

Throughout lockdown the Kennington Bioscope have been broadcasting shorter films on their YouTube channel but tonight was something else as, in addition to a programme of shorts, there was a full feature film with live accompaniment from John Sweeney and an introduction from Fritzi Kramer, America’s premier silent-blogger with Movies Silently and the woman who crowdfunded the restoration and DVD release of the film in question. 

The face of KBTV

As usual KB MC, Michelle Facey, held the whole programme together, the Kennington Bomb-chelle, surrounded by a magnificent floral display and briefed to the hilt on the treasures we were about to watch. There were times when it was clearly live – the odd glitch that merely added to the collective buzz - yet it’s amazing how quickly the KB has evolved its offering over the five episodes – or webisodes if you will, although I know most of you won’t  - under Cyrus Gabrysch’s technical direction, Michelle’s presentation as well as Tod Higginson’s facilitation of the live chat – he also does the translations. The chatter was enlivened by Fritzi feeding us good-humoured background as the film progressed; if Swanson had access to a keyboard (and was alive), this is exactly her tone of voice.

The audience was again international, from the Wild West to Walthamstow (the Untamed East) via the Highlands of “Scotch” and the lowlands of Holland with a number spreading the word via social media snaps of Michelle on the big screen. In our world this was an event and we were re-connecting with a shared experience unlike almost any other since the middle of March. Marshall McLuhan may have declared TV, cool as opposed to “hot media” radio, but he reckoned without the “lean-forward” engagement of social media immediacy and, indeed, the Piano Cam showing us Cyrus, John and Costa’s accompaniment.

So, to the films…

All white mate?

For a man of so many names, it is surprising that Marcel Peréz is the most successful silent comedian most people have not heard of. Marcel, also known as Robinet, Tweedy, Tweedledum, and Twede-Dan was a very talented filmmaker who devised and directed as well as performed. I especially like his deranged serial The Extraordinary Adventures of Saturnino Farandola (1913) but his shorts are near always great value. Robinet’s White Suit (1911) is typical of his high-energy style, man wears impossibly clean suit which gradually gets filthy with the passing of unfortunate events until, ta-dah!, he bumps into a group of painters and their cans of matt white!

Not rocket but comedy “science” with every element mixed to perfection. Cyrus Gabrysch added to the alchemy hitting all the notes in exactly the right order.

Then off to the Turin for a gorgeous travelogue, The River Pescara (1912), watching boats head through the soothing waters to the coast. Costas Fotopoulos accompanied helping us keep a cool head on this hottest of June days.

As with other KB episodes, both shorts came courtesy of the EYE Filmmuseum and the Jean Desmet Collection.

When the river Pescara meets the sea...

"A film for all the family"… Kidnapped (1917), with John Sweeney

Fritzi’s aim in putting this film out on DVD was to recreate the typical programme of a night at the picture house in 1917 and along with the feature there are various short films including some of the same players all from the Edison Film Company and their series of Conquest programmes. Conquest was designed, as Fritzi quoted, to create “… the open road to entertainment and knowledge…” and to provide “… the first definitive contribution in the propaganda to popularise clean and wholesome films for all right-thinking Americans.”

Directed by Alan Crosland – who would make The Jazz Singer a decade later – this is the first feature-length adaptation of Robert Louis Stevenson’s Kidnapped and as per the positive reviews of the time, is a very decent and highly watchable effort. I have my own special relationship to this story after having been given an illustrated copy of the book for Christmas aged two and, being told I couldn’t read it, them opening it up to discover that no, I couldn’t read. Things have changed on that front but I poured over the pictures as a toddler and was delighted to see how many of the scenes are replicated in this film.

David asks a friendly crone if she's seen a big castle...

Raymond McKee stars as a slightly too old David Balfour (17), who is robbed of his inheritance by his evil Uncle Ebenezer (Joseph Burke) who first tries to arrange his accidental death on a rickety staircase in the tower of his castle and then arranges for him to be abducted by the nefarious crew of the brig, Covenant. Captain Hoseason (Franklyn Hanna) who has plans to sell him into slavery in the Carolinas.

Kidnapped was set against the backdrop of the Jacobite Rebellion and some actual events, in particular the "Appin murder", which occurred in the aftermath and for which the chief suspect was one Alan Breck Stewart. In the film, the Covenant accidentally rams a boat carrying Breck (Robert Cain in fine swashbuckling form), killing all but him. The crew soon realise who their new companion is and attempt to kill him and take his money, together with young david, Breck proves more than a match for them and even outnumbered succeeds in fighting them off.

Robert Cain about to swash...

Beck and David escape to the Highlands trying to dodge the Sassenachs as they resolve their own political differences through honest dialogue (seriously, take a flipping note Trump and Johnson). They witness the killing of the King’s loathed agent, Colin Campbell (Horace Haine) at Appin and are assumed to be the assassins by the English soldiers. They escape to safety with rebel Cluny McPherson (Samuel N. Niblack) before planning how to recover David’s fortune from his Scrooge of an Uncle.

The famous dénouement is a classic case of entrapment and whilst I am fairly sure a smart modern lawyer could get the old man off, here at least, justice is done!

John Sweeney accompanied live with the piano cam allowing us to wonder even more about how he flexes the musical narrative and tone with such apparent ease; the sounds and the sights are bound together instantly in his hands.

David has troubled dreams

You can order copies of Fritzi’s Kidnapped DVD which comes with the main feature and the four shorts that accompanied the Conquest programme: Friends, Romans and Leo, Little Red Riding Hood (also based on a true story?), Quaint Provincetown and Microscopic Pond Life. Ben Model provides excellent accompaniment of his own and there’s a twelve-page booklet from Ms Kramer providing more details. It is an education and a joy! Links to retailers can be found on the Movies Silently site right here. 

Another superb live experience to lighten the locked-down load but if you missed it and or simply want to relive the show, it’s on the Bioscope’s YouTube channel.

Superb! Until the next time… PJ

Supplementary: The full title of the book is essentially a plot summary and a little like a pre-internet collection of key tags:  Kidnapped: Being Memoirs of the Adventures of David Balfour in the Year 1751: How he was Kidnapped and Cast away; his Sufferings in a Desert Isle; his Journey in the Wild Highlands; his acquaintance with Alan Breck Stewart and other notorious Highland Jacobites; with all that he Suffered at the hands of his Uncle, Ebenezer Balfour of Shaws, falsely so-called: Written by Himself and now set forth by Robert Louis Stevenson.

It’s well worth seeking out by boys and girls of all ages and there’s even a sequel, Catriona, published in 1893 and featuring, women, unlike the film which has just one “Old Crone” and, as Fritzi pointed out, was sold on the basis of the “all-male” cast. How times were to change…

All Kidnapped screenshots lifted from the Kidnapped DVD. Buy it, buy it now!