Feline spooky… The Cat and the Canary (1927), Kennington Bioscope with Jeff Rapsis

This film is not so much a horror classic but a major step forward in spooky-comedy, paving the way not just for Bob Hope’s talkie remake but a whole sub-genre of scarily-funny movies. Paul Leni’s film looks great and takes many visual tropes from the German style and injects laughs into the resultant combination of eerie unease. From the opening titles, showing the title revealed by a horned hand wiping away the dust, it makes its intentions known and it really does achieve that balance between the unexpected, the unnerving and the uncannily-timed.

This being the Bioscope, we were treated to a watch of Kevin Brownlow’s own 35mm, one that resulted from his own restoration for Photoplay. We also got an introduction full of the insider jokes and insights from the man who – nearly – met the all, capturing silent stars on tape from the fifties to the eighties and preserving the oral history of the birth of film.

Guest pianist Jeff Rapsis had flown over from Boston in the morning and was full of praise for the Bioscope – and it’s (thankfully) ongoing contribution to keeping alive the art of improvised accompaniment for which a live audience is just essential. “I have no sheet music, I have nothing prepared I just go with the film and the audience…”

Courageous Creighton Hale

The film had long languished in poor quality but in the 1960s KB found a good print and restored it from 35mm nitrate it parodies the horror film, which hadn’t really started to dominate, although it was popular on stage, where this story began John Willard’s 1923 stage play. KB interviewed the camera man, Gilbert Warrenton, who told him that they had to dig into the floor to get the right angles. Extra lights were also needed to create the right dynamics between dark and shard.

Leni used a gong to drill his play’s movements and claimed that the shadows were as important to the film as the characters… and so it was to prove. Kevin also got to talk with the film’s striking star, Laura la Plante, was too shy to be interviewed and by that time had forgotten every detail apart from the costumes. Ultimately, he feels that The C&C is a commercial film, superbly well-made and one that is critically under-recognised, certainly it had a major influence on the Universal horrors of the thirties, especially James Whale’s Cold Dark House.

Martha Mattox feels the chills

It starts with a dark and stormy night, as it simply had to, but the director of Waxworks and collaborator with Lubitsch, May, Dupont and a host of European film-makers, knew what he was doing… The opening section shows mad old Cyrus West’s spires cross fade into milk bottles which imprison him, wheelchair bound, as viscous black cats encircle this crippled canary: his greedy relatives waiting to get their share of his fortune all, as set out in his will, to be unveiled twenty years after his death.

The action moves to the interior of the West mansion and Leni treats us to the works, wonderfully lit settings with Gilbert Warrenton’s camera swooping round corners with alarming grace then careering down blustery corridors as drapes and curtains fly wildly in the wind. This is a place full of dark surprise, bad humour and menace.

There’s a knock on the old door and West’s faithfully grim retainer, Mammy Pleasant (Martha Mattox) – not very motherly or, indeed, pleasant – opens the door which is almost held back by sheer weight of cobwebs. Enter Roger Crosby (Tully Marshall) West’s lawyer, here on the dot, two decades after his death to reveal the contents of the will. Opening the safe he finds a moth and knows someone has forewarned themselves of the contents… but no one else has been in the house only Mammy and her un-living companion who stares down with intent from his portrait.

Laura La Plante

The guests, all soon to be suspects, all save the murdered… arrive and Leni gives us portraits of people with something to hide; eyes darting, greed nervously bubbling just under the surface and desperation enough to make anyone of them suspicious. There’s Harry Blythe (Arthur Edmund Carewe) who’s already dark eyes take on additional edginess and who almost snarls as his estranged cousin Charles "Charlie" Wilder (Forrest Stanley) arrives. Charles has more regular features but nervousness around the eyes and a mouth that suggests weakness and desperation.

Their more senior cousin Susan Sillsby (Flora Finch) arrives with her niece Cecily Young (Gertrude Astor) both clinging on to the hope that there will be a windfall to compensate for the many obvious disappointments that have etched themselves on their faces: Susan old with bitterness and Cecily just on the cusp as youth fades. Cue the comedy. Paul Jones (Creighton Hale) arrives in a miss-firing motor car, breaking to avoid crossing the path of a black cat and then running into the house convinced his engine’s back-fire was an assassin’s bullet. He’s no Bob Hope but he’s funny alright.

The entourage is completed by the arrival of Annabelle West (Laura La Plante) – youngest of the group and seemingly as sane as sixpence. La Plante takes top billing on the film and had some of the sharpest haircuts in all of silent film.

Gertrude Astor and Flora Finch are shocked!

Anna is revealed as the sole beneficiary and becomes the Canary and the trick is to work out who the Cat(s) might be with pretty much everyone looking as guilty as can be… personally I was hoping it might be Creighton Hale. The mysterious deaths begin to happen, sliding panels start to reveal clawed hands and an escaped lunatic is revealed to be on the loose. What’s more, Annabelle must be proven sane in order to qualify for her prize or else her inheritance will go to another.

Who’ll it be? And will anyone from this strange family emerge as the unlikely hero to protect the true heir? There’s the usual miss-direction and emotional disturbance of the humour but it’s still a fun watch: golden rule of all whodunits… make ‘em all look guilty and then gradually provide them with alibis/good character.

Jeff Rapsis brought a confident narrative-driven dynamism to his accompaniment, different from UK players or just a man with his own style? The top players go world-wide and so this is music without boundaries and here he was perhaps more influenced by the film’s origins as much as he was last year when playing for Salt for Svanetia (1930).

He gave it his all and came good on his stated aim of recreating the tone and collective response to this wonderfully funny and slightly scary film!

Michelle Facey and Meg Morley - two cool cats!

There were further feline treats in the first half tonight with lots of Felix the Cat films celebrating the mad-cat adventurer’s centenary. We saw Felix in Hollywood – even Mr Brownlow couldn’t spot all the characters… and snatched of a documentary on the cat’s cool creator.

Meg Morley accompanied and then played accompaniment to the popular hit, Felix Keeps on Walking, for the Bioscope’s resident chanteuse, Michelle Facey, to sing. Michelle sells these songs so well and I think we have the beginnings of a regular spot here… Pamela Hutchinson famously described the Bioscope as London’s Silent Speakeasy and will molls like Michelle and Meg, we only need some feathers and more-illicit hooch and we’re there!! It brings the music to life, a human voice singing clearly in the new, old-fashioned way.

Brava!!

Felix learns the Black Bottom from Ann Pennington

Our guides through the life of Felix, Glenn Mitchell and Dave Wyatt

A simple soul… Kipps (1921) with Neil Brand, Kennington Bioscope

"…the ruling power of this land, Stupidity… a monster, a lumpish monster, like some great clumsy griffin thing…  like some fat, proud flunkey, like pride, like indolence, like all that is darkening and heavy and obstructive in life…" HG Wells, Kipps (1905)

There is more joy in Heaven (the one that looks like The Cotswolds) over the screening of a decent British silent film than over any number of talkies… It’s probably in the Bible; check out the gospel according to the Saints Pearl and Dean.

It's useful, of course, to have the wonderful source material of an HG Wells' novel and the acting of George K Arthur, who simply “was Kipps” according to the author. Wells was less favourable over the actor’s subsequent film, The Wheels of Chance but, personally, I think that film has almost as much charm as this.

It also helps greatly to have an accompanist like Neil Brand who really understands the period, the source material and the very British story being told. In his introduction he said he hadn’t played with the film for twenty-odd years, but it didn’t show as he patiently built up a thoroughly Edwardian sentiment with flashes of more modern – classic – scoring. All this whilst resisting the temptation to reference a note or two from Half a Sixpence which was based on this story.

George K Arthur headed off to Hollywood not to long after this and I’d last seen him in Lights of Old New York with Marion Davies and Mr Brand again on piano. He has charm and a natural reticence which makes him perfect for romantic comedy but he’s a canny actor with more to his game than he’s often credited. One of his most unusual castings was in Von Sternberg’s The Salvation Hunters in which his vulnerability plays off against the dockside thuggery and, indeed, Paulette Goddard’s own toughness.

"Kipps is Kipps"

Here he is in his element as the man to whom Life just keeps on happening…  The full title of Wells’ book is Kipps: The Story of a Simple Soul and George is the perfect straight man for the jokes perpetuated by the ruling powers of the land. He is Arthur Kipps (don’t delude yourselves that I’m not looking for a way to fit Arthur Sixpence into all this…) an easy-going orphan who lives with his stern and often disapproving uncle, Old Kipps (John Marlborough East) and his wife (Annie Esmond).

He grows up with his best friend Sid, the neighbour’s son and there are lovely scenes of imaginary pirate fights on what looks like the wreck of a Great War battle ship. Arthur takes a shine to Sid’s sister, Ann Pornick (Edna Flugrath) but takes a long time to express his intentions. When he does he finds he is loved back and they split a sixpence in half to remind them of their incompleteness when apart.

Now, having finally got started, Arthur is exiled to an apprenticeship at the Folkestone Drapery Bazaar, run by Mr. Shelford (Arthur Helmore). Wells’ class concerns are still very much in evidence and Kipps’ dialect comes out in the title cards as easily as his discomfort in “polite society”. People like him have little control over their lives and must follow their duty, and, in his case, this means separation from the other half of his sixpence.

Edna Flugrath in 1919

Gradually he forgets Ann and starts to woo his arts teacher – self-improvement was all the rage - Helen Walshingham (Christine Rayner). He also makes a new pal, aspiring playwright and actor, Harry Chitterlow (Teddy Arundell) and whilst their initial meeting ends up with his losing his job after they get drunk, Harry spots an advert in a paper that means Kipps is due a life-changing inheritance.

Newly enriched with his long-lost grandfather’s posthumous generosity, Kipps now has to adjust to his new social status and also to look after his fortune… Will money guarantee his happiness and acceptance, and, as Ann re-appears as a humble housekeeper can true love overcome the phoney concerns of social status?

Director Harold M. Shaw makes light of the story’s literate origins and constructs a deft, enjoyable narrative that allows his actors to shine. Kipps is very enjoyable, professionally-made cinema that even manages to smuggle in some of Wells’ social concerns. You wouldn’t get so much of that in Hollywood... or would you?

The Sun winks

The first half of tonight’s programme featured the Georges Méliès’ masterwork, Voyage à travers l'impossible (1904) which takes the template of 1902’s Le Voyage dans la Lune and swings off even further into the solar system.

Méliès plays an engineer called Mabouloff who has devised an expedition to take his fellow explorers across the Alps, up into space and back down again using steam, airships, rail, automobiles and submarines… it’s madcap and inventive and feels slightly more structured and technically advanced than Moon even as one thing keeps on leading to another. There are fades from one scene to the next and the shot of the Sun's face is what you might a close-up!

Fernande Albany - who would have been 15 - plays the inventor's cheeky servant and one of the few woman among the travellers. She stands out from the grey, bearded boffins adding kinetic interest to the chaotic tableaux throughout. She went on to enjoy a long career in France and it’s good to put a name to one of the faces.

The plans are unveiled - Fernande Albany on the right in light blue?

The version screened was in magnificent colour – originally hand-tinted – and this worked especially well when the travellers hit the stars and get eaten by the Sun. Luckily the rules of physics were suspended for the adventure and they managed to drop back to earth in a submarine, past several disinterested perch or sticklebacks stuck in front of the camera.

It was an absolute joy and John Sweeney played along with his old friend with adventure and much gusto of his own: it’s not just the musical narrative but the ability to create just the right period tone that is so extraordinary about Messrs Brand and Sweeney; the Bioscope piano must look forward to their accompaniment.

Crossfading from one scene to the next...

As if that wasn’t enough we saw an episode of the British Sexton Blake serial The Mystery of the Silent Death (1928) starring Langhorne Burton as Blake and Mickey Brantford as his assistant Tinker. There was some excellent detecting, thrills with spills – possibly down to this being two reels cut down to one. Ultimately the message was, gentlemen clearly in a “funk” almost certainly have something to hide.

We also had the World’s most popular cartoon cat (until Walt ripped him off) in Felix Strikes it Rich (1925) and an adventurous western from the Nestor Film Company, The Awakening of Apeta (?) which was a turbulent tale of mixed-race love and loyalty; in America as in Wells’ Britain, social mores held people down so miserably; you can only hope we can cling onto the changes brought by the ensuing century.

Tonight, we were, once again, spoilt rotten by the Bioscope: enjoy your summer break and see you all again for a lot more in September.

The good old days... Buster, Charlie, Felix, Harold and George at Wilton’s Music Hall with The Lucky Dog Picturehouse

What better place to connect with the spirit of Charlie Chaplin than in Britain’s (and the World's!) oldest surviving music hall, just a hop, skip and a ferry across the Thames from his old stomping grounds. Charlie never played Wilton’s Music Hall but he certainly trod the boards in many similar theatres as did Buster Keaton and Harold Lloyd across the pond and Georges Méliès in Paris.

The silent hipsters gather...

John Wilton bought what had been a public house in the 1850s and built his ‘Magnificent New Music Hall’ in 1859 to play host to the East End’s finest including Arthur Lloyd and George Leybourne - Champagne Charlie himself. The venue was a Methodist hall in Chaplin’s days and after years of post-war decay the hall is back in all its glory as one of London’s most distinctive arts venues, its patchwork eighteenth century fascia opening up to reveal a dusty brick and stucco interior in which you can almost breathe in the history …

Tonight Milton’s had been taken over by The Lucky Dog Picturehouse for an evening celebrating the Comic Heroes of the Silent Screen – this is how the hall could have been in 1924 and it felt altogether wrong not to be in period costume… So, tonight, I blog upon the shoulders of five genuine comedy giants…

Georges Méliès avec Georges, Georges et George

 Un Home de Tetes (1898)

Written, directed and starring Georges Méliès along with four of his heads… this was a brief yet typically inventive comic blast from the godfather of cinema and great to see on the big screen (I was one of those who almost leapt up and cheered during sections of Hugo…). He pops one head after another onto two tables either side of him then – after a failed attempt at singing in harmony – bops the tuneless versions in favour of the one true voice.

This is one of my favourite Méliès as it’s a solo show and you can see the performance craft honed over his years as a magician.

Emily O’Hara, Lucky Dog’s founder, played along on jaunty guitar – what a joy to duet with Georges.

The Adventurer (1917)

So many dismiss Charlie Chaplin for his sentimentalism but in this energetic short you can see his relentless, seriously anarchic comedy in full effect. Charlie is quick, he’s fearless and more than a little bit wicked.

We never know why Charlie’s on the run but he’s an escaped convict trying to out fox the police from beginning to end. We first see his head emerging out of the sand to confront the gun of a policeman taking a breather on a rock and his ensuing chase with the law is one of the most inventive and consistently funny I’ve seen. Charlie ends up in the sea and after evading capture ends up trying to save a woman drowning near a beach, that is until he spies her daughter (Edna Purviance) and decides she’s more in need of rescue – it’s a comically-shocking moment and proof that Chaplin was rather more knowing than some might expect.

Henry Bergman, Marta Golden, Edna Purviance, Eric Campbell and Charlie Chaplin

Charlie falls in with the girl’s family after convincing them that he’s a commodore swimming far from his yacht. He has a running battle with her over-aged and over-grown suitor (Eric Campbell) which involves lots of minor ABH and manages to drink as much as he possibly can. Before the police arrive and the chase resumes, Charlie lives the high life of the rich set… just like any poor boy from Walworth would given the chance to get one over on some nobs.

Peter Coldham provided expert piano accompaniment and helped to ensure the hall was filled with the sound of a collective re-connection with the silent sense of humour: we cast our chin-stroking hipster reserve away and just laughed!

Visions of angels...

Never Weaken (1921)

Any thoughts that Harold Lloyd would struggle to follow Charlie were soon dispelled as his “thrill” comedy wound us up to unexpected heights. Charlie got the most laughs but Harry ran him close and his audience response was laced with our genuine concern for his safety. 93 years on and we still think he might actually fall… that’s genius!

This was Lloyd's last short film, before he focused on features and he went out with a bang, using techniques that would later make Safety Last into a classic. But here the sky-scraper slapstick was used in condensed form – almost too much to bear for those of a nervous disposition: we laughed out our unease and there were genuine gasps and groans as one slip on a mile-high girder led to another and Harold clung on for dear life.

Harold is desperate to impress his girl (Mildred Davis) and attempts to drum up business for her osteopath boss who hasn’t enough patients to cover her pay. All goes well with the aid of a neighbouring acrobat (Mark Jones) but when Harold sees the girl talking marriage with another man, he resolves to kill himself. Harold suicide preparations are surprisingly funny but, just when it seems he’s worked out the perfect death he is lifted out of his office by a girder wedging itself under his chair. For a moment he thinks his plan has worked and as he opens his eyes he sees the statue of an angel on top of the building and a voice like an angel in singing practice on the top floor. But, as a basement jazz band pops his bubble Lloyd’s reactions as he realises where he actually is are precious.

All Harold has to do now is somehow avoid any number of girder perils and get back to ground to get the girl. It was breathless stuff, aided and abetted by Peter Coldham’s piano accompaniment… he deserved the half time break as much as anyone.

Felix meets Charlie

 Felix in Hollywood (1923)

Can’t think how it’s taken me so long to catch up with Felix the Cat; probably amongst my early silent memories thanks to Bob Monkhouse’s TV trawl through his dusty vault of 35mms….

Forget Itchy and Scratchy, Felix was always The Man – sorry Cat – and here he strides coolly over to Hollywood and meets Charlie Chaplin, Douglas Fairbanks, William S. Hart, Ben Turpin and others in the  first animated cartoon to feature caricatures of Hollywood celebrities (and before the celebrities became caricatures etc…).

Funny and so post-modern: every sassy cat that followed was always part-Felix.

Emily O’Hara, played along on cat-quirky banjo this time. 

Sherlock Jnr (1924)

Buster Keaton finished off the evening with one of his best and a film that really does justice to the Wilton’s attempt to recreate that twenties feeling. Sherlock Jr’s film within a film enabled us all to sit watching a film showing a projectionist watch his audience before dreaming himself into the film they were watching. And we all went in there with him.

I’ve previously raved about this film and, again, it was good to see it the way Buster intended. None of these film makers envisaged a world in which we could all watch their work alone at home and tonight, somewhere between the City and Shadwell, we were privileged to experience communal silent comedy in historically-appropriate surroundings.

At the end as Buster kept on glancing from his projection booth to the screen to work out how to make love to his girl, it was almost as if he were looking directly at us too: we’re pulled into the joke and not for a second does his expression waver: I know you’re watching and so am I but I’m not going to let you see that…

Mind your hats!

Tom Marlow provided thunderous piano accompaniment for the big finish and we clapped long and loud before heading to the bar and out into the warm almost Mediterranean air of Tower Hamlets…

The Lucky Dog hope to run more of these evenings and all I can say is, keep the films coming, bring your banjo and we will be there!

Further details about TLD are available on their website whilst details of Wilton’s Music Hall are on theirs. Encore!!