Cinesation 2009

Mary Pickford, Thomas Meighan in M’Liss

Cinesation 2009 is currently taking place at the Lincoln Theater in Massilion, Ohio. The four-day festival, which ends on Sunday, will screen a number of hard-to-find titles, including:

James Cruze’s 1925 political-historical Western The Pony Express, starring Betty Compson, Ricardo Cortez, Wallace Beery, and George Bancroft in a tale of powerlust and media manipulation. Hey, sounds like life in the early 21st century? Well, that’s a mere coincidence, as The Pony Express is set in mid-19th-century California, a time when Sen. Glen (Al Hart) and his Knights of the Golden Circle scheme to have the state secede from Union, annex another chunk of Mexico, and form a new empire.
The 1918 Mary Pickford vehicle M’Liss, in [...]

Best Films – 1927

Ramon Novarro, Norma Shearer in The Student Prince in Old Heidelberg
FILM
Breakfast at Sunrise
d: Malcolm St. Clair; scr: Fred De Gresac, Gladys Unger
The Enemy
d: Fred Niblo; scr: Willis Goldbeck, Agnes Christine Johnston; titles: John Colton
The Student Prince in Old Heidelberg
d: Ernst Lubitsch; scr: Hans Kräly; titles: Marion Ainslee, Ruth Cummings
The Unknown
d: Tod Browning; scr: Waldemar Young; titles: Joseph W. Farnham
The Valley of the Giants
d: Charles Brabin; scr: Gordon Rigby
 

George O’Brien, Janet Gaynor in Sunrise
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The Cat and the Canary
d: Paul Leni; scr: Alfred A. Cohn, Robert F. Hill; titles: Walter Anthony
Die Liebe der Jeanne Ney / The Love of Jeanne Ney
d: G. W. Pabst; scr: [...]

Best Films – 1925

Ramon Novarro and May McAvoy in Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ
 
FILM
Ben-Hur
d: Fred Niblo (assisted by Christy Cabanne, Alfred L. Raboch, B. Reeves Eason); scr: Carey Wilson, Bess Meredyth, June Mathis; titles: Katherine Hilliker, H. H. Caldwell
The Big Parade
d: King Vidor; scr: Laurence Stallings, Harry Behn; titles: Joseph W. Farnham
Her Sister from Paris
d: Sidney Franklin; scr: Hans Kräly
Lady Windermere’s Fan
d: Ernst Lubitsch; scr: Julien Josephson; titles: Maude Fulton, Erik Yorke
The Merry Widow
d: Erich von Stroheim; scr: Benjamin Glazer, Erich von Stroheim; titles: Marian Ainslee
 

Battleship Potemkin
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Bronenosets Potyomkin / Battleship Potemkin
d: Sergei Eisenstein; scr: Nina Agadzhanova, Sergei Eisenstein; titles: Nikolai Aseyev, Sergei Tretyakov
 

Renée Adorée, John Gilbert in The Big Parade
ACTOR
John Gilbert
The Big Parade
 

Constance Talmadge, Ronald [...]

Kansas Silent Film Festival 2009

The 13th annual Kansas Silent Film Festival (KSFF) will be held on February 27 and 28, 2009, at the White Concert Hall on the Washburn University campus in Topeka, Kansas. Sponsored by Washburn, admission is free.
This year’s KSFF highlight is the American premiere of the restored 1926 swashbuckler Bardelys the Magnificent, which until recently was thought to be a lost film. Based on a novel by Rafael Sabatini, and starring John Gilbert and Eleanor Boardman, Bardelys the Magnificent is set in 17th-century France, where a local Don Juan steals female hearts but is unable to conquer the one woman he truly loves. Directed by King Vidor, Bardelys was a major hit for [...]

Honorary Oscars & Women II

Walter Pidgeon, Greer Garson in Mrs. Miniver (top); Don Ameche, Claudette Colbert in Midnight (middle); Corinne Griffith, Victor Varconi in The Divine Lady (bottom)

Honorary Oscars Bypass Women: Part I
Among the distinguished female film professionals in Hollywood and elsewhere — some of whom dating back to the early days of cinema — who have gone to the Great Beyond without receiving the Academy’s career achievement Oscar are actresses Greer Garson, Claudette Colbert, Gloria Swanson, Audrey Hepburn, Rosalind Russell, Marlene Dietrich, Alida Valli, Simone Signoret, Joan Crawford, Anna Magnani, Susan Hayward, Dolores del Río, Norma Talmadge, Anne Baxter, Joan Bennett, Lilli Palmer, Constance Bennett, and Kay Francis.
Also, Ann Sheridan, Constance Talmadge, Irene Dunne, Colleen Moore, Betty Grable, Gene Tierney, Jean Arthur, [...]

Norma Talmadge and Constance Talmadge Screenings

February 2007 will be Talmadge month at New York City’s Donnell Library Center Auditorium. As part of the "Meet the Music Makers" series, which explores the artistic symbiosis between the silent screen and live musical accompaniment, three Constance Talmadge vehicles and one Norma Talmadge comedy will be screened on four consecutive Wednesdays, beginning February 7, at 2:30pm. Admission is free.
The musicians accompanying the screenings — and discussing their craft — are Bruce Loeb, Stuart Oderman, Judith Rosenberg, and The Biograph Players: Edward Hupton, Joe Kerr, and John Francis.
The series, made possible by the New York State Council on the Arts, and organized by the Donnell Media Center’s Joseph Yranski, a silent-film connoisseur if there ever was one (I’ve [...]