Defend Your Darlings, You Sad Pandas! (Lists Project v 3.0)

[essrog]

1. The President (Dreyer, 1919) -- for the record, I didn't even notice the goddamn sparsely decorated walls. But I responded to what nsps pointed out: "the palpable feelings of guilt, regret and the aim for redemption are why I hold the film in such high esteem." Also, the torchlight procession was one of the most beautiful moments of the project for me -- it looked beautiful, but the irony of it (because the protagonist didn't deserve such recognition) made it a tragic beauty.

Well, I often wonder if you would react as friendly towards such films if you wouldn't know that the director is THE Carl Theodor Dreyer of later fame. I'm quite happy with quoting Tom Milne'd Dreyer monograph: "The President is an absurdly contorted melodrama involving much breast-beating, three seductions spread over three generations, with attendant illegitimacies, and several wild coincidences (...) but since the drama is is conveyed largely through the medium of an apparently unending series of letters delivered to the hero ...

Complaining about plot information being conveyed through letters in early silents is like complaining about all the horses in Westerns. If I let that annoy me, I would've quit the project before Valentine's Day. As to wondering whether I would've liked the movie as much if I didn't know it was Dreyer directing, that's a pretty easy statement to make and an impossible one to prove. You might say the same about my refutation of that statement, but here I go anyway with a few examples: No one's had more ink spilled on them regarding this period in film history than Griffith, and I didn't rate his films particularly high. When starting this project, I read a lot about Tourneur's accomplishments, but his films didn't blow me away. Anyway, I don't want to seem too defensive -- you might've just been making panda small talk.

[nsps]

I wasn't expecting it to be that great, to be honest. It was Dreyer's first film, so I didn't know how firm a grasp he had on the craft yet, and I'm not a huge fan of some of his other earlier films (THE PARSON'S WIDOW is pleasant but not astounding, MICHAEL never really did it for me). I hadn't really heard the film mentioned as essential Dreyer.

As for the letters, the information is necessary as exposition and couldn't be summed up visually. We were either going to read it on intertitles or read it in a letter. Lubitch's top choice (and a high-ranking film on my list), Sir Arne's Treasure, throws in several plot-summary intertitles that could have easily been conveyed visually. What makes that preferable to the letters in "The President?" To say that "the drama is conveyed" through the letters is ridiculous. The drama is conveyed in flashbacks. Most of the letters are bureaucratic in nature—reporting on court cases. Then there's a letter that he's saved for his entire adult life, but it's more of a punctuation mark than anything else.

(The main problem with the letters is that the DVD uses a small, scripty font that's impossible to read on split-language inter-titles, but that isn't the film's fault.)

[Sloper]

Well defended, essrog and nsps - I think this argument happened somewhere before, but I'd just reiterate that it isn't a very strong critique that hangs on an accusation of 'fanboy-ism'. I also wasn't expecting much from The President, and thought it would be interesting at best. But that Tom Milne quote just doesn't correspond to the film I know. Anyway...

On a closing note with Bauer. I viewed a (experimental) documentary film -- Ostrov myortvykh/Island of the Dead about Vera Kholodnaya, and the Russia before the revolution. It was made in 1992 by Oleg Kovalov (who also made an edit of Eistenstein's Mexican footage a few years later). For anyone interested in Bauer, the film will be a real find. Not only does it incorporate many fragments of his films into a rich mosaic of other film clips, acutalities and documentary recordings from the period; it also has a brief glimpse of Bauer at a social function (possibly the opening party of one of his films(?) And finally, it has what is one of the most impressive of all shots in any Bauer film -- the tracking shot in A Child of the City, closing in on the couple drinking champagne at a night club, and passing the woman, as an exotic dancer enters a stage in the background. The tracking shot lasts for about ten seconds, but if I remember correctly, this shot is ruined a little bit on the Milestone release, as it cuts right before the end to a medium shot of the dancer, then comes back a moment later to pick up the tracking shot, but it actually repeats a few moments of the shot from before the cut to the dancer. All in all, it is not a big deal, but it does jar an otherwise virtuoso moment. In Kovalov's film -- if my memory is correct, we get the whole shot without interruption.

How interesting; I just assumed it was one of those tracking shots that hadn't quite come off, and had to be broken up a bit. There's one like this in Hypocrites (and I think they had to do something similar with that famous 'ascending into the ceiling' shot in All the President's Men). But I wonder why anyone would break the shot up like this if it wasn't necessary? Anyway, the scene still works beautifully. Deti Veka was a bit of a challenge for me, largely thanks to the lack of intertitles, and it also seemed less ostentatiously brilliant than some of the others, but I expect it will grow on me. By the way, did anyone notice, in this film, the recycling of a couple of the sets from Daydreams (the study full of portraits of the dead wife, and the staircase adorned with - if memory serves - an owl and a statue of cupid)? I'm assuming they were being re-cycled in Deti Veka, because they seemed rather incidental there, whereas much more was made of them in Daydreams. This may be very common, but it was the first time I'd noticed it.

[thirtyframesasecond]

OK, here's my top fifty. Not too many surprises near the top. I didn't go for the most popular Bauer, but 'For Happiness' was a film I saw back in February and had it marked as the one to beat even this early. There wasn't much Chaplin in the polling, but 'Behind the Screen' had a nice blend of physical slapstick and deconstructing the film making process for an audience who'd be pretty much clueless as to how the films they're watching would've been made.

For Happiness (Evgenii Bauer, Russia, 1917)
Broken Blossoms (D. W. Griffith, US, 1919)
The Cameraman’s Revenge (Wladyslaw Starewicz, Russia, 1912)
Behind the Screen (Charles Chaplin, US, 1916)
I Don’t Want To Be a Man (Ernst Lubitsch, Germany, 1918)
The Child of Paris (Leonce Perret, France, 1913)
The Great Train Robbery (Edwin S. Porter, US, 1903)
Tram Ride into Halifax (Sagar Mitchell and James Kenyon, UK, 1902)
Suspense (Lois Weber, US, 1913)
After Death (Evgenii Bauer, Russia, 1915)

Interior New York Subway, 14th Street to 42nd Street (‘Billy’ Blitzer, US, 1905)
The ? Motorist (R. W. Paul, UK, 1906)
Les Vampires (Louis Feuillade, France, 1915)
Panoramic View of the Morecambe Seafront (Sagar Mitchell and James Kenyon, UK, 1901)
The Birth of a Flower (F. Percy Smith, UK, 1910)
Intolerance (D. W. Griffith, US, 1916)
Scene from Elevator Ascending Eiffel Tower (James White, US, 1900)
When the Clouds Roll By (Victor Fleming, US, 1919)
Easy Street (Charles Chaplin, US, 1917)
Daydreams (Evgenii Bauer, Russia, 1915)

Arrival of a Train at La Ciotat (Auguste and Louis Lumiere, France, 1895)
The Oyster Princess (Ernst Lubitsch, Germany, 1919)
Blind Husbands (Erich von Stroheim, US, 1919)
Grandma’s Reading Glass (George Albert Smith, UK, 1900)
The Whispering Chorus (Cecil B. DeMille, US, 1918)
A Trip to the Moon (Georges Melies, France, 1902)
The Battle of the Somme (Geoffrey Malins and John McDowell, UK, 1916)
Child of the Big City (Evgenii Bauer, Russia, 1914)
Let Me Dream Again (George Albert Smith, UK, 1900)
The Doll (Ernst Lubitsch, Germany, 1919)

The Mystery of the Rocks of Kador (Leonce Perret, France, 1912)
Life of an American Fireman (Edwin S. Porter, US, 1903)
Dream of the Rarebit Fiend (Edwin S. Porter, US, 1906)
The Immigrant (Charles Chaplin, US, 1917)
History of a Crime (Ferdinand Zecca, France, 1901)
A Chess Dispute (R. W. Paul, UK, 1903)
Leaving Jerusalem by Railway (Auguste and Louis Lumiere, France, 1897)
South (Frank Hurley, Australia/UK, 1919)
The Magic Sword (Walter R. Booth, UK, 1901)
The Kiss in the Tunnel (George Albert Smith, UK, 1899)

The Melomaniac (Georges Melies, France, 1903)
The Birth of a Nation (D. W. Griffith, US, 1915)
Inferno (Giuseppe de Liguoro, Italy, 1911)
Fantomas (Louis Feuillade, France, 1913)
The Dragonfly and the Ant (Wladyslaw Starewicz, Russia, 1913)
Panorama of Eiffel Tower (James White, US, 1900)
J’accuse (Abel Gance, France, 1919)
Cabiria (Giovanni Pastrone, Italy, 1914)
The Impossible Voyage (Georges Melies, 1904)
A Fool There Was (Frank Powell, US, 1915)

[knives]

Ehh, only five orphans for me. Better than usual that is. Though I am surprised that no one else gave Nana a vote given how enthusiastic many members are about that film. Here's my whole list since nobody cares:
1. The Passion of Joan of Arc
2. The Merry Widow (von Stroheim)
3. 7th Heaven
4. Sunrise
5. Sherlock Jr.
6. Man with the Movie Camera
7. La Chute de la Maison Usher
8. The Docks of New York
9.The Playhouse
10.Days of Youth
11.Munchen-Berlin Wanderung
12.Street Angel
13.Metropolis
14.Orochi
15.Kino-eye
16.Dr. Mabuse the Gambler
17.The Wedding March
18.The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari
19.Aelita
20.Lonesome
21.One Week
22.A Page of Madness
23.Neighbors (Keaton)
24.Napoleon
25.Greed
26.The Boat (Keaton)
27.Faust
28.The Thief of Bagdad
29.Seven Chances
30.October
31.The Great Gabbo
32.The Cat and the Canary
33.The Last Command
34.The Wind
35.Our Hospitality
36.Nana
37.The Black Pirate
38.Foolish Wives
39.My Wife's Relations
40.Queen Kelly
41.The Phantom Carriage
42.Battling Butler
43.The Love Parade
44.Grass
45.The Skeleton Dance (Disney)
46.Underworld
47.Micheal
48.Destiny (Lang)
49.The Fall of the House of Usher (Watson/ Weber)
50.The End of St. Petersburg

[lubitsch]

Ehh, only five orphans for me.
44.Grass

It almost would have been 4 because Grass was exactly 51st on my list. I also have five orphans.
I can live with Why worry? it's a very funny film though, the giant alone provides laughs aplenty.
I'm quite surprised that I'm the only one who voted for Opus I. Zedz? I'm not even that much into experimental cinema so that's all the more ironic.
I think it's a great pity that nobody else cared for Isn't Life wonderful?, Schreck would probably have saved the day, but this realistic, sensitive film exhibits few of Griffith' flaws, many of his strengths and some qualities you didn't know he even had in him. The lack of a DVD is all the more puzzling since Kino and Image released far lesser films of his 20s output.
Liberty is representative for the general lack of love for Laurel & Hardy in this poll. Skyscrapers aren't that new to comedy in 1929, but the clash between their befuddled attitude and the dangerous situation creates an even higher tension than with Lloyd.
And then there's the one film where I'm really p***ed off that nobody voted for it, Die Bergkatze or The Mountain Cat. There are DVDs all over the world. The film has a scene design which outranks pretty much everything in silent cinema plus the wild experiments with the masked camera. It has Pola Negri, lots of good jokes, satiric moments and hilarious exaggerations. So what exactly made this film an orphan???

[YnEoS]

Die Bergkatze almost made my list, but I have a really rough time picking a single film by Ernst Lubitsch to throw on my list. I wanted to put several but there really wasn't any room. Ultimately I went with Marriage Circle (my own orphan) but it could've just as easily been Lady Windermere's Fan. Though I find Die Bergkatze remarkable in quite a few ways, I also think it drags a bit in the later half of the film, and that's why it didn't quite make the cut for me. I think my favorite silent Lubitsch's are from the 1910s though.

My second orphan were Tell It to the Marines which I kind of expected to be orphaned. Probably only interesting to Lon Chaney fans, as it very much follows the Chaney formula, but without a lot of the horror elements that attract people to his other films. I also think it's his best performance though the film itself is perhaps a bit lacking in quality.

My third orphan was Starewicz's L'horloge magique. Certainly Starewicz's best work is in the 1930s, but he has some strong 20s output to, and I think L'horloge magique best showcases his ability to create fascinating and creative worlds on top of his amazing stop-motion animation talents.

Fourth was Clair's Italian Straw Hat, which provided some of my biggest laughs in the silent era. Completely shocked this didn't get even a minor vote from anyone else. I don't really like a lot of Rene Clair's silent films, but this is easily my favorite Clair film of all time.

West of Zanzibar, Way Down East, It, and Feu Mathias Pascal, were all films that were on my original list, but eventually got pushed off as I watched more great films and had to open some slots for them.

[Gregory]

Die Bergkatze or The Mountain Cat. ... plus the wild experiments with the masked camera.

That really grated on me (seemed like a complete gimmick), and otherwise the film didn't make up for it. It's been a few years since I saw it, and I will revisit it at some point.

[Tommaso]

If I haven't miscounted, I have 8 orphans. Most of them don't surprise me too much, as they are either not out on dvd (Kozintsev/Trauberg's The devil's wheel or Otsep's Land in captivity ) or because there was little chance to champion them as repeatedly as I did with "Nina Petrowna" because I discovered them very late in the project, like Ein Walzertraum and Lady of the Night. However, I'm really surprised that apparently nobody else voted for Vertov's Sixth part of the world, as this is easily available with subs from Filmmuseum, an edition which has found a little bit of attention here in the last year. Not yet available is Gade's Hamlet (finally coming in February, fingers crossed), and I hope that with the next round this very unusual Shakespeare adaptation with Asta Nielsen as Hamlet (sic!) finds a little more love.

And seriously, guys, you can't really understand the history of the Weimar silent era without seeing a 'commercial', mainstream film, something NOT produced by Erich Pommer. And what better than to choose something by Harry Piel? That man was HUGE, and his Was ist los im Zirkus Beely is SUCH a lot of fun...

But I'm afraid, I'm with Gregory on Die Bergkatze. I tried several times, but the framings still strike me as a mere mannerist toying-around, Pola Negri is an awful case of over-acting (in general, with Czinner's "Way of lost souls" a possible exception), and indeed Lubitsch may be the one and only German director from whom I prefer the American films all around....

[lubitsch]

It's quite interesting to listen to the negative Bergkatze comments. Heartbreaking though ...

My third orphan was Starewicz's L'horloge magique. Certainly Starewicz's best work is in the 1930s, but he has some strong 20s output to, and I think L'horloge magique best showcases his ability to create fascinating and creative worlds on top of his amazing stop-motion animation talents.

During the first half I was sure this would end up on my list, it was full of dry humour gleefully deconstructing every fairy and knight tale cliche around. Then the film switched to the little girl's story which might be pretty daring narratively, but these new characters and story never captured my attention as the older ones did. But Starewicz has Le Roman du renard and Fetiche in the 30s contest and these are arguably his best films.

[Gregory]

Starewicz's The Frogs Who Wanted a King made my (unsubmitted) list. A great political satire, and easily one of the best, most beautiful renderings of an Aesop fable I've ever seen.

[knives]

Starewicz's The Frogs Who Wanted a King made my (unsubmitted) list. A great political satire, and easily one of the best, most beautiful renderings of an Aesop fable I've ever seen.

I've been having such a hard time finding his films on DVD(I would go to the internet, but he really deserves better). It amazes me that the only film of his available in the US(there's probably some great Russian or Polish release I'm not aware of)is a special feature on a completely unrelated film.
As for The Wildcat hundrum I would have loved for more Lubitsch on my list, but the MOC set still hasn't come in the mail yet. Didn't the Vertov disc.

[Gregory]

^ The Cameraman's Revenge and Other Fanstastic Tales DVD, a must-own.

[knives]

Thank you so very much. I can't believe that went under my radar.

[Steven H]

my poor pandas:

#9. Brumes d'automne (Kirsanoff, 1929) - I honestly don't know how someone can love Menilmontant and not love this (this is the only film on my list I feel shocked to have to defend). It is everything a silent cinema mood poem should be in pacing and the images are utterly arresting. This film does RAIN better than Ivens. stunning, unforgettable, hyperbole, hyperbole, etc.

#12. Die Frau, nach der man sich sehnt aka The Woman Men Long For (Bernhardt, 1929) - This may fall into one of those "personal, subjective, hard to defend" places, but I found this film extremely interesting in style, and it goes far beyond the lusty Dietrich vehicle it portends to be in the title by having impeccable "train scenes" and being more of a noir precursor than maybe any other Golden Twenties film. The socialite party scenes are slightly campy but are never boring.

#16. West of Zanzibar (Browning, 1928) - Impossible to defend this film's racism, and I won't, but I find it an underrated Chaney flick that capitalizes intensely on its stars versatility and it's director's interest in the bizarre and exotic. I love Chaney to death and enjoy almost all of his films, but this one (maybe oddly) stuck with me at a level his others did not.

#18. Nogent, El Dorado du dimanche (Carné, 1929) - this film is like a fast paced People On Sunday that seems to be wholly invested in French New Wave tropes... just a few years prior to their arrival. Probably didn't hurt that I saw it accompanied by a lively accordion soundtrack (when are lively accordion soundtracks BAD?)

#21. Oueufs d'epinoche aka The Stickleback's Egg (Painlevé, 1929) - I know this is going to sound terrible, but after seeing this film paired with a Boards of Canada track on youtube, I could really never look at it the same way. The life that the music breathed into it gave it a pulse (no pun intended) and afterwords even when watching in silent it's hard for me to not be moved.

#26. Melodie der Welt aka Melody of the World (Ruttmann, 1929) - I liked the way it looked. Some IMDB reviewer called the camera work "clumsy" if so I guess I'm a fan of clumsy.

#37. Hangman's House (Ford, 1928) - Despite the crude moralistic currents in this film, the imagery and set design stuck with me. I think I found myself sitting up in my seat during this film more than any other silent Fords from the Fox box, and so kept giving it more looks. Before I knew it I was falling for it scene by scene.

#38. Histoire d'un Detective aka Detective Story (Dekeukeleire, 1929) - Incredible, surreal. I have nothing to add to what Bordwell said here. worth reading!

REGRETS: forgot to list Applause and Cottage on Dartmoor! *UGH* at self.

[YnEoS]

Starewicz's The Frogs Who Wanted a King made my (unsubmitted) list. A great political satire, and easily one of the best, most beautiful renderings of an Aesop fable I've ever seen.

I've been having such a hard time finding his films on DVD(I would go to the internet, but he really deserves better). It amazes me that the only film of his available in the US(there's probably some great Russian or Polish release I'm not aware of)is a special feature on a completely unrelated film.

There's also quite a bit of Starewicz available on French DVD. The Tale of the Fox has a great release with English subtitles. There's also 2 collections of his shorts that are less English friendly. "Le Monde Magique" doesn't need subtitles for any films except the last one (subtitles for it available on the internet), the others either have minimal dialogue, or are in english in the case of The Mascot. The "Les Contes de l'horloge magique" DVD is weird because it has all inter-titles removed and un-subtitled French narration added over it. I found them quite enjoyable without translation, but would definitely prefer to see and English-friendly unaltered release someday.

[myrnaloyisdope]

Looking over my list, I feel it is a bit inadequate. I feel pretty well versed in Hollywood silents and early talkies, but almost wholly ignorant of the rest of the world during the decade. I have seen some of the key Weimar films and a couple L'herbiers, but I really don't feel like I was able to cover near as much as I would have liked, so forgive my list for being so Amerocentric. I really wish I had gotten through my Lubitsch Kino boxset amongst many other things. But darned if this decade isn't among the most difficult to wrap one's head around.

Anyway here is my poor pandas:

13 Ring, The 1928 Hitchcock, Alfred - It really bowled me over, given I knew pretty much nothing about the film. I'm a sucker for boxing movies and the boxing sequences are filmed in suc a wonderfully artful and impressionistic manner, that I couldn't help but love the film. The Lionsgate DVD is really very nice as well.
14 Dance of Life, The 1929 Sutherland, A. Edward & Cromwell, John - I read about this one in Scott Eyman's The Speed of Sound and decided to track it down and was very impressed. It's not as daring (or self-consciously artsy) as Applause, but it's a fine example of what a talking film could look like. There is some nice use of the subjective camera and the performances of Nancy Carroll and Skeets Gallagher are marvelously understated and filled with rich nuance.
25 For Heaven’s Sake 1926 Taylor, Sam - I adore Harold Lloyd and it took a great deal of willpower to only put three of his films on my list. I think I enjoy this one in part because of the spiritual themes (essentially it boils down to one man being drawn to God through the sheer power of circumstance), but also the absurdity of some of the situations...particularly the massive chase sequence through the Bowery, which culminates in Lloyd leading an impossibly shady group of cons in some old-time hymns.
41 Hands Up! 1926 Badger, Clarence - A delightful and fun comedy from the mainly forgotten Raymond Griffith. I'm not really surprised this one's an orphan given the general difficulty of finding Griffith's films, but it's a shame that few people know much about it.
45 Tess of the Storm Country 1922 Robertson, John S. - I really hate the film's ending, it's the kind of thing that makes me swear at the TV, but darned if the rest of the story isn't incredibly engaging and pretty fucking devastating. Pickford really carries the film and in lesser hands it would be maudlin, but in hers, it is very affecting.
46 Trail of ’98, The 1928 Brown, Clarence - Beautiful cinematography, filmed on location in the Klondike, Karl Dane in comic relief and Harry Carey heeling it up with gusto. The final fight between Carey and Ralph Forbes is perhaps the most brutal fight you'll see in a silent film.

[the preacher]

It looks like Phil Jutzi's Mother Krause's Journey to Happiness was my top orphan. With only 41 IMDb votes, I guess it's a little seen gem that deserves more attention.

Agile camera and phenomenal editing, half-documentary scenes mixed with melodramatic moments, and Ilse Trautschold, unforgettable.

[myrnaloyisdope]

It looks like Phil Jutzi's Mother Krause's Journey to Happiness was my top orphan. With only 41 IMDb votes, I guess it's a little seen gem that deserves more attention.

It's on my list of silents I want to get around to tracking down and watching, but unfortunately I have yet to track down or watch it.

[Sloper]

Here's my list - 7 films no one else voted for, which I've marked in bold. The first four are quite surprising, the last three not so much...

1. Michael
2. Leaves From Satan’s Book
3. Die Nibelungen
4. Our Hospitality
5. Battleship Potemkin
6. The Crowd
7. Der Letzte Mann
8. The Passion of Joan of Arc
9. Greed
10. The General
11. The Last Command
12. La Merveilleuse Vie de Jeanne d’Arc
13. The Parson’s Widow
14. Sherlock Jr.
15. The Hands of Orlac
16. Tol’able David
17. Just Pals
18. L’Atlantide (Feyder, 1921)
19. Johan (Stiller, 1921)
20. Berlin, Symphony of a Great City
21. Lucky Star
22. The River
23. Diary of a Lost Girl
24. Sunrise
25. Ménilmontant
26. The Man With a Movie Camera
27. My Wife’s Relations
28. The Freshman
29. The Golem (Wegener, 1920)
30. Foolish Wives
31. A Cottage on Dartmoor
32. One Week (Keaton, 1920)
33. Storm Over Asia
34. Street Angel
35. Lonesome
36. Lady Windermere’s Fan
37. Master of the House
38. Strike
39. The Kid Brother
40. Asphalt
41. Paris qui dort
42. Three Bad Men
43. A Page of Madness
44. L’Invitation au Voyage
45. The Saga of Gösta Berling
46. Pandora’s Box
47. Sumurun
48. Seventh Heaven
49. The Bride of Glomdal
50. October

I've been waiting several months for an opportunity to use the term 'Drey-hard'; clearly it applies to me. The only Dreyer I'd seen and didn't vote for was Der Var Engang; and I'm sure I'd have given Die Gezeichneten its all-important third vote if I'd seen the damn thing.

There were quite a few films I had to tearfully leave out (Regen, Finances of the Grand Duke, Mother, The Marriage Circle, There It Is and Napoleon spring to mind), an awful lot I respect/revere but don't love (Die Strasse, Erotikon (Stiller and Machaty), People on Sunday, Wings, Faust, etc), and then some I really have to apologise most profusely for just not liking at all (Die Bergkatze (sorry lubitsch, and indeed Lubitsch), La Chute de la Maison Usher (sorry Schreck), He Who Gets Slapped, La Roue, Arsenal and Zvenigora; to be fair I've only seen this last one in an un-subbed copy online, and look forward to getting the imminent Mr Bongo release so I can finally discover what the hell was going on).

Oh, and then all the films I didn't manage to see. Like Joyless Street. Or any Chaplin films.

I know, I know, shoot me in the head with a big gun.

I know not everyone likes to post their full lists, but I for one would be glad to see them...

[Tommaso]

All right, here's my full list. Pandas are in bold, and also-rans in italics.

1. The man with a movie camera (Vertov, 1929)
2. Sunrise (Murnau, 1927)
3. Die wunderbare Lüge der Nina Petrowna (Schwarz, 1929)
4. La passion de Jeanne d'Arc (Dreyer, 1928)
5. Die Nibelungen (Lang, 1924)
6. Metropolis (Lang, 1927)
7. Nosferatu (Murnau, 1922)
8. Dr. Mabuse der Spieler (Lang, 1922)
9. Das Kabinett des Dr. Caligari (Wiene, 1920)
10. Foolish wives (Stroheim, 1922)
11. Lonesome (Fejös, 1928)
12. Zvenigora (Dovzhenko, 1928)
13. The Battleship Potemkin (Eisenstein, 1925)
14. Der letzte Mann (Murnau, 1924)
15. Menilmontant (Kirsanoff, 1926)
16. Hintertreppe (Jessner, 1921)
17. Berlin (Ruttmann, 1927)
18. The wedding march (Stroheim, 1928)
19. The docks of New York (Sternberg, 1929)
20. Street angel (Borzage, 1928)
21. Asphalt (May, 1929)
22. Erotikon (Machaty, 1929)
23. The bridal party in Hardanger (Breistein, 1926)
24. La chute de la maison Usher (Epstein, 1928)
25. Der müde Tod (Lang, 1921)
26. Invitation au voyage (Dulac, 1927)
27. A throw of dice (Osten, 1928)
28. Die Straße (Grune, 1923)
29. The last command (Sternberg, 1928)
30. Ungarische Rhapsodie (Schwarz, 1928)
31. The sixth part of the world (Vertov, 1926)
32. Queen Kelly (Stroheim, 1929)
33. Die Büchse der Pandora (Pabst, 1929)
34. The thief of Baghdad (Walsh, 1924)
35. A page of madness (Kinugasa, 1926)
36. Die freudlose Gasse (Pabst, 1925)
37. Ein Walzertraum (Berger, 1925)
38. Scherben (Pick, 1921)
39. Hindle wakes (Elvey, 1927)
40. The love parade (Lubitsch, 1929)
41. Der Student von Prag (Galeen, 1926)
42. A cottage on Dartmoor (Asquith, 1929)
43. Land in captivity (Otsep, 1928)
44. Was ist los im Zirkus Beely? (Piel, 1926)
45. The overcoat (Kozintsev/Trauberg, 1926)
46. Der große Sprung (Fanck, 1927)
47. Jenseits der Strasse (Mittler, 1929)
48. Lady of the night (Bell, 1925)
49. Hamlet (Gade, 1921)
50. The devil's wheel (Kozintsev/Trauberg, 1926)

[reno dakota]

Here's my complete list (orphans in bold; also-rans in italics):

1. The Passion of Joan of Arc (Dreyer, 1928)
2. Lonesome (Fejös, 1928)
3. Finis Terrae (Epstein, 1929)
4. Walking from Munich to Berlin (Fischinger, 1927)
5. A Cottage on Dartmoor (Asquith, 1929)
6. Asphalt (May, 1929)
7. Coeur fidèle (Epstein, 1923)
8. Ménilmontant (Kirsanoff, 1925)
9. Man with a Movie Camera (Vertov, 1929)
10. Der letzte Mann (Murnau, 1924)
11. The General (Keaton, 1927)
12. Underworld (von Sternberg, 1927)
13. Faust (Murnau, 1926)
14. Battleship Potemkin (Eisenstein, 1925)
15. Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans (Murnau, 1927)
16. Frau im Mond (Lang, 1929)
17. Nosferatu (Murnau, 1922)
18. Spione (Lang, 1928)
19. Metropolis (Lang, 1927)
20. The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (Wiene, 1920)
21. The Phantom Carriage (Sjöström, 1921)
22. The Crowd (Vidor, 1928)
23. Homecoming (May, 1928)
24. Once Upon a Time (Dreyer, 1922)
25. The Parson’s Widow (Dreyer, 1920)
26. 7th Heaven (Borzage, 1927)
27. L’Argent (L’Herbier, 1928)
28. The Last Command (von Sternberg, 1928)
29. Michael (Dreyer, 1924)
30. Phantom (Murnau, 1922)
31. Lucky Star (Borzage, 1929)
32. The Holy Mountain (Fanck, 1926)
33. La Roue (Gance, 1922)
34. Pandora’s Box (Pabst, 1929)
35. Zvenigora (Dovzhenko, 1928)
36. Gunnar Hede’s Saga (Stiller, 1923)
37. La chute de la maison Usher (Epstein, 1928)
38. The Docks of New York (von Sternberg, 1928)
39. Leaves from Satan’s Book (Dreyer, 1921)
40. The Student Prince in Old Heidelberg (Lubitsch, 1927)
41. Die Straße (Grune, 1923)
42. Napoléon (Gance, 1927)
43. The Kid (Chaplin, 1921)
44. Arsenal (Dovzhenko, 1928)
45. The Wedding March (von Stroheim, 1928)
46. Tartuffe (Murnau, 1926)
47. Steamboat Bill, Jr. (Reisner, 1928)
48. The Gold Rush (Chaplin, 1925)
49. The Saga of Gösta Berling (Stiller, 1924)
50. Häxan (Christensen, 1922)

Apologies for all of the high-ranking films (Nina Petrowna, Maldone, Die Nibelungen, etc.) and pandas that I did not see.

[PillowRock]

II'm afraid, I'm with Gregory on Die Bergkatze. ........ Pola Negri is an awful case of over-acting

But in that particular case *everything* is so stylized (the set designs, all of that camera masking, etc.) that Negri's overacting really seems to me to fit that movie; and because of how it fits, I find her hilarious in that movie.

[Michael Kerpan]

I found Bergkatze fun -- but probably (at best) only my third most favorite Lubitsch of the decade (and I still have yet to see all his contenders from these years).

[myrnaloyisdope]

Here's my list, since all the cool kids are doing it. I noticed that The Virginian is another one of my sad pandas. It's a very nicely done early talkie, with Gary Cooper doing his usual and some very nice outdoor photography and use of sound. I think I was most struck by how archetypal it seemed. It felt very much like a template for the million or so talking westerns that followed.

Ranking Title Year Director
1 Crowd, The 1928 Vidor, King
2 Safety Last 1923 Newmeyer, Fred
3 Applause 1929 Mamoulian, Rouben
4 Sherlock, Jr. 1924 Keaton, Buster
5 Phantom Chariot, The 1920 Sjöström, Victor
6 Big Parade, The 1925 Vidor, King
7 Lonesome 1928 Fejos, Paul
8 Sunrise 1927 Murnau, F. W.
9 My Best Girl 1927 Taylor, Sam
10 Wind, The 1928 Sjöström, Victor
11 Show People 1928 Vidor, King
12 Never Weaken 1921 Newmeyer, Fred
13 Ring, The 1928 Hitchcock, Alfred
14 Dance of Life, The 1929 Sutherland, A. Edward & Cromwell, John
15 Seven Chances 1925 Keaton, Buster
16 Blackmail 1929 Hitchcock, Alfred
17 Kid, The 1921 Chaplin, Charles
18 Beggars of Life 1928 Wellman, William A.
19 Passion of Joan of Arc, The 1928 Dreyer, Carl Theodor
20 Big Business 1929 Horne, James W.
21 Chang: A Drama of the Wilderness 1927 Cooper, Merian C.
22 Circus, The 1928 Chaplin, Charles
23 Greed 1924 von Stroheim, Erich
24 Die Nibelungen 1924 Lang, Fritz
25 For Heaven’s Sake 1926 Taylor, Sam
26 General, The 1926 Keaton, Buster
27 Joyless Street, The 1924 Pabst, G. W.
28 Hindle Wakes 1927 Elvey, Maurice
29 Last Command, The 1928 von Sternberg, Josef
30 Page of Madness, A 1926 Kinugasa, Teinosuke
31 Queen Kelly 1928 von Stroheim, Erich
32 Steamboat Bill, Jr. 1928 Reisner, Charles F.
33 Tol’able David 1921 King, Henry
34 Wonderful Lies of Nina Petrovna, The 1929 Schwarz, Hannes
35 7th Heaven 1927 Borzage, Frank
36 Wings 1927 Wellman, William A.
37 Within Our Gates 1920 Micheaux, Oscar
38 He Who Gets Slapped 1924 Sjöström, Victor
39 Last Laugh, The 1924 Murnau, F. W.
40 Last of the Mohicans, The 1920 Tourneur, Maurice
41 Hands Up! 1926 Badger, Clarence
42 Little Match Girl, The 1928 Renoir, Jean
43 Man with a Movie Camera 1929 Vertov, Dziga
44 Miss Lulu Bett 1922 de Mille, William
45 Tess of the Storm Country 1922 Robertson, John S.
46 Trail of ’98, The 1928 Brown, Clarence
47 L’argent 1928 L'Herbier, Marcel
48 Virginian, The 1929 Fleming, Victor
49 Berlin: The Symphony of a Great City 1927 Ruttmann, Walter
50 Variété 1925 Dupont, E. A.