The Pre-1920s List: Discussion and Suggestions (Decade Project Vol. 4)

[matrixschmatrix]

I haven't, but it sounds interesting- is there a release you could suggest?

[knives]

The Image release is good and was cheap the last time I checked. It comes with a second Todd Browning movie which is good as well.

[Tommaso]

Maciste (Romano Luigi Borgnetto & Vicenzo Dénizot, 1915): The strong guy from Pastrone's "Cabiria" apparently was so popular with audiences that the producer made a spin-off with him as the central character, which in turn was so successful again that it became only the first of a seemingly endless number of films in which Bartolomeo Pagano played Maciste in the silent years. But unlike "Cabiria" this is not set in the historical past but follows the formula of the contemporary crime/action thrillers and serials. In this respect, the film goes directly in medias res: a girl is pursued by some crooks in the service of the sinister Duke Alexis, and seeks refuge in a cinema, where they show - "Cabiria". Seeing Maciste's heroic deeds on screen, she writes a letter to the actor in which she expresses the wish that "Cabiria's saviour will also defend her."

I liked the very clever way of how the film not only re-introduces the Maciste character on the screen to the audience, but also how it's an early example of dealing with the infatuation with cinema and the conflation of film and reality. It is shown how the letter is received by the actor who played Maciste, but the rest of the film seems to make it clear that the actor is indeed Maciste and thus has all the physical prowess to deal with the evil guys. Unfortunately, nothing is made of this 'film on film' situation in the rest of the film, which is a pulpy thriller in the style of the times without too much individuality. That Pagano can't really act doesn't help much (but okay, Arnold Schwarzenegger or Bud Spencer in later years weren't better, either), and as a character Maciste is simply less interesting than the heroes of Feuillade or, to give a closer comparison, than someone like Harry Piel (whose films from the 1910s all seem to be lost...). Nevertheless, I felt quite well entertained, but if it comes to Italian adventure thrillers from the 1910s, I'd definitely give my vote to Filibus rather than to Maciste.

[TMDaines]

Tommaso, have you watched the HD version of Maciste alpino that was shared online? Criminal that no release is planned and so it was leaked. Probably the best restored film pre-1920. Looks stunning and is really quite fun too.

[Tommaso]

Not yet, but it's on my to-do list. Not least because I like mountain films.

[TMDaines]

I watched it tonight and the mountain scenes are sensational considering they date several years before Fanck and Trencker. Obviously they don't feature the same kind of ski action, but it's a great film and will feature highly on my list. It's just great fun.

[TMDaines]

I need to recommend Die Pest im Florenz (1919), which is available in an HDTV recording with English fansubs (made by our own Tommaso).

It takes a while to get going, perhaps deliberately so, but tells a fictionalised, fantastical account of the Black Death in Florence and the immoral decay that it represented according to the church. A diva-esque courtesan turns up to the city and has the cardinal suspicious of her morals, whilst his son lusts after her. She soon begins to shift the mood of the city from one of chastity and restraint to lust and excess.

Some of the later parts of the film with hallucinations and personifications of death are genuinely stunning and foreshadow the likes of Metropolis, which both feature the contributions of Lang. For 1919 this is impressive stuff.

[Tommaso]

Ah, now you've saved me the trouble to promote Die Pest in Florenz here myself.

This was indeed perhaps the silent discovery of the last years for me, at least as far as the pre-20s period is concerned. Directed in 1919 by Otto Rippert, whose Homunculus serial is legendary (and which is currently being restored by the Munich Film Museum, but most likely the result will not be available on disc in time for this listmaking), Die Pest in Florenz is indeed so impressive that it actually managed to reduce my admiration for Lang's "Der müde Tod" quite considerably, because it basically has the same intensity and lavishness in re-creating its historical epoch as Lang's film, only that it was made two years earlier and might well have been a direct model for the Lang. There is a general sense of richness, excess and decadence to this film that you'd rather expect from a film from the late 20s than from something made in 1919, the hallucinatory sequences are indeed outstanding, and the whole thing breathes an atmosphere of alluring sickliness. It's completely beyond me why - given how great the new resto looks - this hasn't become officially available even in Germany. But if you have a chance to see the TV recording, please do so. Currently this film is in my Top Five of the list.

[TMDaines]

If anyone wants to see this, just PM me.

[Tommaso]

Have just watched Maciste alpino. I'd also say that the mountain scenes are spectacular for 1916, even though the mountain troopers' crossing over the valley, holding only on to ropes, was only very nicely faked (fine use of paper cut silhouette special effects, or something similar) whereas Fanck of course would have done this with real actors. The war/mountain scenes in general seem like a predecessor of Trenker's much more elaborate 1931 "Berge in Flammen", but still the whole of Maciste alpino feels much more original than the first Maciste film.

Nevertheless, I was rather annoyed by its completely unsubtle anti-Austrian/German propagandistic stance. The enemies of the Italians are invariably shown as either lecherous - at one point there are two officers gambling for the sexual possession of an Italian lady in what almost appears like an early 'bondage' scene - or simple-minded brutes (or both) who completely deserve the - equally unsubtle - treatment that our hero has in store for them. The propaganda is so overdone that it completely works against its own goals in my view. Still, the film remains rather entertaining all the time, and even Pagano's acting is a little less hammy than in the first film.

Most likely it won't make my list, but it's interesting and not without merits. And yes, the resto is spectacularly good.

[matrixschmatrix]

I watched an interesting pair- A Fool There Was and Madame DuBarry- in the reverse order. Which is a shame, really- I enjoyed quite a lot of the latter, as the sort of airy exchange of sex for power and Lubitch's always-refreshing disinterest in judging people for their sexual mores really dominates the first half or so, as Dubarry uses the nigh-S&M level domination she has over the king to check the continual attacks that come at her from the more conscious schemers, whom Lubitsch seems to despise as much for their gaucheness as for their evil, while trying to reconnect with her original fiance. There's interesting material, too, in the way that the former peasant girl becomes so comfortable in power that she becomes an oppressor of the poor herself- but the last half hour or so, in which the full on Revolution comes, seemed a bit frustrating. Perhaps I was just too haunted by Renoir's take on the material- and in particular, the beautiful scene in which the soldier throws down his arms and recognizes the revolutionary as his brother- but Lubitsch seems confused in this section, simultaneously showing the revolution as necessary and justified while also making it feel feral, bloodthirsty, and perhaps most unjustly, petty- from the movie's depiction, one might imagine that the entire thing happened as much out of sexual jealousy as out of rage at economic and political injustice and inequality. Lubtisch obviously had, or at least, would have a real genius for dramatizing massive political conflicts in the context of his adulterers, goofballs, and cravens- Ninotchka and To Be or Not to Be are surely among his finest- but it doesn't gel here, and the messy ending almost makes one forget the sublime beginning.

A Fool There Was, however, reminded me of those parts, if it did nothing else. It is a movie that feels so thoroughly old fashioned that one forgets it was possible to be sophisticated in 1915- not technically, as there are several nice elements to it in that respect (the titular Fool looking more and more like a corpse as his vitality is drained from him, a few nice tableaux on a red tinted beach, and generally solid-if-unspectacular visual storytelling)- but in terms of the actual story, which seems like a classic A->A throughline. A happy family is interrupted by a woman who seduces the husband and father. He remains seduced, and then dies. The end. The movie never fully sells the idea that Theda Bera is more to blame for this than the husband- it skips the seduction itself, only setting up the means by which she introduces herself to him, and perhaps it does so because the key moment in which he lets it happen could only show that the power to proceed or to stay with his family is with him all throughout. Indeed, he has any number of chances simply to leave, but appears addicted to her- again, shades of S&M. The movie never really figures out much to do beyond this, though- the only surprises it holds after the first twenty minutes or so are just how far it will go in showing the man's degradation. For me, his willingness to be degraded- and the utterly boring rigid morality of his wife- put me on Theda Bera's side, since at least she did things. Which, of course, reminds one of Lubitsch, surely (alongside Von Sternberg) the greatest poet of being upon the side of the notorious women. So, this movie will likely not make my list, but it may have bumped Madame DuBarry up and on to it.

[TMDaines]

If anyone wants to see this, just PM me.

Had three takers for Die Pest im Florenz. Can't keep it on my Dropbox indefinitely as there is other rarities I'd like to share and space is limited. So if anyone else wants the HDTV recording and fansubs, then just PM me.

[knives]

Joan the Woman
DeMille provides relentless surprises across this entertaining little epic not least of which is just how good this is. The film provides a surprisingly complex view of the Joan story. The present day framing device (which is so reminiscent of Shaw's that I wonder if there's not some inspiration going on in one direction or another) seems to exist for propaganda purposes, but it doesn't lead into the obvious call to war this story provides. Instead DeMille gives a story of reconciliation wherein France and England can now work together. There's no explicit mention of the Kaiser nor what the reconciliation means for that. I can't believe I am saying this, but DeMille has made a subtle and intelligent film. This may be his best film when measuring for things other than entertainment.

It is also interesting to consider the film's approach to religion. Joan's visions and their religious nature are underplayed to emphasize the reconciliation and is even treated suspiciously by the film as if it were just a fiction. Even the call to her sainthood seems like an emotional call for reconciliation rather than anything religious. It doesn't help that all of the villains are religious leaders developed like slimy animals, one is even called the Spider. It is a move that feels entirely modern and further casts a shadow on his later religious films. This sense of areligiosity is aided by Farrar's Joan which is unlike any other I've seen. Instead of Seberg's doe or Falconetti's fanatic melancholy she has a butch warrior's sense of the world with several scenes showing her as politically savvy and a real thinker. You could really see her lying to accomplish her goals of a free France which doesn't apply to the others. That DeMille changes her renunciation of admitting to blasphemy from a religious/ patriotic one to one summed up as cross dressing speaks volumes. I saw this through Image's old disc and it still holds up very well.

Ramona
This is the sort of ideologically messy melodrama that all the same overpowers with its technique that could only have come from Griffith. There's a lot to potentially cast aspersions about such as having Ramona be Spanish rather than English, but what it does well is so rare (though weirdly more common for this era than during the sound one) and advanced that seems like dismissing a million dollars because they are housed in a smelly room. This is a film that is pro a sort of miscegenation and perhaps more radically against the sort of cruel colonialism that has damaged Native Americans so much. This is another notch complicating Griffith's legacy instead suggesting him as a (much more talented by a comical degree) Stanley Kramer sort.

The Hoodlum
The most pleasant surprise here is how little overlap there is between this and The Poor Little Rich Girl. The basic setting and character dynamics are the same, but the characters themselves and how the action develops from it are very different. Pickford in particularly is amazing in how different she is living up to the title all too well and thankfully playing a character a lot more grownup (basically akin to the spoiled heiresses in many a screwball film). The tone as well is different in such a satisfying way. While this is certainly not a comedy Franklin induces a real screwball feel out of the material that feels totally unlike Tourneur's fantastical dramatics. Also while heightened and hyperbolic it gives a real amazing feel for the New York, or at least its idea, at the time focusing on the idea of language as the real divider of class in a metropolis. The film, in a screwy way, knows that it isn't just wealth or social standing that makes for class, but a whole host of things that force the hierarchy into existence. Admittedly the presentation of some of this is not very good (Pickford does not make for a convincing graduate of the slums whatever the title card may say), but the whole mostly works thanks to a few pieces of contrast of her fantasy against some reality.

P.S. I find it hilarious the Milestone is pimping this set as for kids and yet this has so many racial slurs. I guess since none of them are obvious (e.g. snowball instead of nigger) it's okay, but it was still a surprising contrast.

P.P.S. It's not eligible for the list, but Sparrow is basically every creepy thing I was expecting from Pickford playing a kid plus ten years. That said the creepiness works really well as the movie is basically a horror picture.

[matrixschmatrix]

The Oyster Princess is an absolute delight, and the first thing I've seen from Lubitsch in this era that competes with Die Puppe- Ossi Oswalda is clearly his secret weapon, but this one manages to build off of her to a whole structure of absurdity. It's got that Lubitsch thing of being so full of wonders it's hard to pinpoint everything, but maybe the most salient reason this one was fun without leaving a sour taste in my mouth is that nobody learns anything; Ossi comes into the movie smashing furniture out of boredom, and goes out of it full of horny teenager enthusiasm for consummating her marriage, but at no point in between does she pay any kind of price for her riotous behavior, nor does she ever repent of any of it. She's just this freeflowing ball of energy, doing exactly what she feels like at that particular moment, and the movie more or less acknowledges her as a force of nature.

Beyond Ossi, though, there are all sorts of great little moments- the magical mansion where so much of it takes place invites all sorts of little Tati-esque gags, like the ersatz prince pacing (and eventually, in his boredom, skipping) along the design in the tiles, before batting at a servant's bellpull like a kitten. The absurd number of servants turn everything into a dance- when dinner is served, it's done in volleys, and when Ossi is bathed, it's done like mechanics changing tires on a racetrack. The pinnacle of this is the foxtrot- everyone is literally dancing, and when Lubitsch has given us our fill of the actual toffs dancing together, he cuts to the servants dancing in kitchen- including the waiters, still bearing trays, and dancing while keeping them perfectly in place. There's even a three strip split screen effect, so we can enjoy the sight of three different kinds of feet dancing at once.

There's a couple of nice bits outside the mansion, too- the prince's friend (and future imitator) stealing the matchmaker's hat over and over, and the prince's friends drunkenly stumbling into benches in elegant choreography- but ultimately, the mansion feels like its the real locus for the movie's sense of humor, much of which is just standing back and mocking at the sheer idea of wealth. The Oyster King himself is perhaps even more ridiculous than his daughter- a man so wealthy and powerful that he hardly moves (shades of the latter parts of Eisenstein's Ivan the Terrible) but of course Lubitsch makes this absurd, both by having the things done for him earthily undignified (having his nose blown) and by giving him a ridiculous walk when he actually does move. Even the presence of black servants, which is almost always cringeworthy, doesn't feel too awful- they're no more or less dignified than any of the many other servants in the home, they're played by actual black men, and one of them actually gets a fun piece of business (when he's calmly hauling the drunken fake prince back to the door of his room.) Without being remarkably progressive, it's enough that it's not the stumbling block it might otherwise be to the enjoyment of the movie.

The later Trouble in Paradise depicts great wealth as being staging grounds for elegance; here, great wealth is just a joke, a device that makes those who have it utterly alien. It would be biting satire were it not so entirely without venom- this, much more than many of the movies to which the term is later applied, is a trifle in the best possible sense, just a goofy, useless, beautiful puff of sweet air.

[denti alligator]

Yeah, the Oyster Princess is pure gold. Definitely top 5 for me. My favorite pre-Hollywood Lubitsch. I love how Ossi acts out the principle of destruction (we first see her trashing a room) in the perfectly ordered mansion in which everything proliferates, and apparently could do so to infinity. The scene in which the father is reading the newspaper and Ossi keeps taking it from him and ripping it up illustrates this beautifully: there is no end to newspapers (there's always another one in the father's pocket), and there is no end to Ossi's destructive desire. Like any comedy the idea is that Ossi is to be tamed. But she isn't entirely. Marvelous stuff.

[kidc85]

Die Pest im Florenz is absolutely stunning. It's difficult to talk too much about its greatness because a lot of it comes in the form of narrative and imagery surprises and I wouldn't want to spoil this for other people. Suffice to say, I spent the last fifty minutes with my jaw hanging open.

Does it prefigure Metropolis? Sure, but it also prefigures films decades later. The Devils jumps easily to mind (although the films come to strikingly different conclusions about their shared themes): the desecration of the cross in Florenz, although no 'rape of Christ', is particularly shocking, not just in terms of imagery but also in terms of what it means for the character. The imagery from the journey undertaken by two of the characters in Florenz would not look a bit out of place in a Coffin Joe film...
(This picture might be a bit of a spoiler for Florenz and is also fairly NSFW.)

Spoiler

An amazing amount of thanks to both Tommaso and Daines, I will be pre-ordering this the second a blu-ray is announced.

[matrixschmatrix]

I've just jumped into Les Vampires, after having tried and failed to enjoy Fantômas a few years ago, and I'm enjoying it a lot- I don't know if it's that I've grown as a viewer, or that this one actually represents a significant improvement, or just that the print quality is good enough for me really to get aboard, but I'm two episodes in and fairly excited to keep going. Now that I know that it's at least possible for me to enjoy (though still not to spell) Feuillade- is Flicker Alley's the best release of Judex? Apart from The Spiders, which I've already watched, are there any other pulpy adventure serials I should seek out?

[TMDaines]

Not sure what was worse. Watching Southampton 0 - 0 Manchester United or the first three Keystone Chaplin films. Dear God.

[jindianajonz]

Not sure what was worse. Watching Southampton 0 - 0 Manchester United or the first three Keystone Chaplin films. Dear God.

The early Keystone stuff was a bit of a slog, but it does get a little better. I enjoyed The Knockout (which ironically doesn't feature much of Chaplin), The Property Man, and The Face on the Barroom Floor.

[matrixschmatrix]

A Modern Musketeer

I'm a little torn about this one- for the most part, it's wonderful. From the start, it feels like Fairbanks is finally finding his footing- not only do we see him in period costume that suits him (and a mustache that, while itself ugly, makes him handsomer), but we get a movie that opens with two excellent brawls and then a good bit about Kansas tornadoes. His character, too, is better defined and more suited to him as a performer than the rest of what I've seen in the set- finally, he's not just a straight man dropped into a Harold Lloyd role, nor just a merry, athletic young man, but an actual character- and 'an irrepressible, boyish man, defined by his sense of chivalry' fits Fairbanks and his skills wonderfully. For the first big chunk of the movie, everything goes along very well- his rival is a rich, dickish Vanderbilt type, the girl is charming and gets at least a few hints of having a character of her own, and we get setpiece after setpiece in which Fairbanks gets to show his stuff- including, at one point, ghost riding his car, for the sheer fun of it.

Unfortunately, the back half of the movie- though still loaded with great physical stuff- is burdened by the introduction of a secondary villain, who is both dull and pretty super racist in conception. Were he just a bandit who was also a Native American, it might not feel that unpleasant, but there is an entire conversation about how the villain is going after 'white women', and the implicit horror of this is such that another bandit becomes our hero's ally. The actual setup- Fairbanks Solid Snake-ing his way into a desert encampment of bandits- is actually pretty good, though the Western vibe feels like an odd turn from the rest of the movie- but the bandit leader is also burdened with a bunch of business about a symbol which he feels makes him an invincible king, which he brings up virtually every time he's on screen, and it drags even apart from how cringeworthy it is. There is a nice beat in which the movie makes explicit the moral equivalency between an outright bandit and a brutal capitalist, though.

I think in terms of high notes, and a starring vehicle that shows Fairbanks and what he can do at their best, this is absolutely worth seeking out- but I'm going to have to let it sit for a while before I can resolve how I feel about it overall. I haven't finished the pre-20s entries in the set, and I'm still hoping that there will be something else- or maybe something like His Majesty, the American that isn't featured here- that will have the virtues of this one without the weaknesses. I can say that I feel like, going into the 20s list, I'm excited to see the full flowering of Douglas Fairbanks, the mature artist; I've seen The Thief of Badgad and The Black Pirate, and I enjoyed both, but I think seeing this context will make me like them all the more, and hopefully some of his other work of the era will surpass even those.

[thirtyframesasecond]

Not sure what was worse. Watching Southampton 0 - 0 Manchester United or the first three Keystone Chaplin films. Dear God.

José is just playing for the Europa League (and getting his excuses in for not finishing top four anyway!)

[thirtyframesasecond]

Also, I think I had three of the Chaplin Mutual shorts in my list before - Behind the Screen, The Rink, Easy Street - should I go back any earlier?

[knives]

Not really. The Mutuals are definitely when he started to get actually funny. Earlier is mostly of historical worth.

[matrixschmatrix]

I've enjoyed some of the Essanays, though they're not so well constructed- his sense of gags was already there, but it wasn't nearly so well honed as it is already by the Mutuals. The Keystones I've seen thus far were uh, of mostly historical interest

[domino harvey]

All of the Chaplin shorts run together for me anyways, not sure I could tell you the difference between any two from memory and I never got around to picking one of the newer sets up after offloading the older OOP Image set for $$$$$