Best Films – 1928

Evelyn Brent, Emil Jannings in The Last Command
FILM
The Crowd
d: King Vidor; scr: King Vidor, James V. A. Weaver; titles: Joseph W. Farnham
The Docks of New York
d: Josef von Sternberg; scr: Jules Furthman; titles: Julian Johnson
The Last Command
d: Josef von Sternberg; scr: John F. Goodrich; titles: Herman J. Mankiewicz
Sadie Thompson
d & scr: Raoul Walsh; titles: C. Gardner Sullivan
Street Angel
d: Frank Borzage; scr: Marion Orth, Philip Klein & Henry Roberts Symonds; titles: H. H. Caldwell & Katherine Hilliker
The Wind
d: Victor Sjöström; scr: Frances Marion
 

L’Argent by Marcel L’Herbier
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L’Argent
d: Marcel L’Herbier; scr: Marcel L’Herbier & Arthur Bernède
The Patsy
d: King Vidor; scr: Agnes Christine Johnson; titles: Ralph Spence
Show People
d: King Vidor; scr: Laurence Stallings & Agnes Christine Johnson; titles: Ralph [...]

Best Films – 1919

Lillian Gish, Richard Barthelmess in Broken Blossoms
FILM
Broken Blossoms
d, scr: D. W. Griffith
Das Cabinet des Dr. Caligari / The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari
d: Robert Wiene; scr: Carl Mayer, Hans Janowitz
The Hoodlum
d: Sidney Franklin; scr: Frances Marion
 
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The False Faces
d, scr: Irvin Willat
The Sentimental Bloke
d: Raymond Longford; scr: Raymond Longford and (possibly) Lottie Lyell
 
ACTOR
Richard Barthelmess
Broken Blossoms
Werner Krauss
The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari
Thomas Meighan
Male and Female
Arthur Tauchert
The Sentimental Bloke
 
ACTRESS
Lillian Gish
Broken Blossoms
Lillian Gish
The Greatest Question
Mary Johnson
Herr Arnes pengar / Sir Arne’s Treasure
Mary Pickford
Heart o’ the Hills
Mary Pickford
The Hoodlum
Gloria Swanson
Male and Female
 
SUPPORTING ACTOR
Lon Chaney
Victory
Conrad Veidt
The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari
 
SUPPORTING ACTRESS
Josephine Crowell
The Greatest Question
Lila Lee
Male and Female
Clarine Seymour
The Girl Who Stayed at Home
 
CINEMATOGRAPHY
G. W. Bitzer
Broken Blossoms
G. W. Bitzer
The Greatest Question
René [...]

Lost Pola Negri Film Found

The News/Polskie Radio reports that an early (and thus far unnamed) Pola Negri vehicle has been discovered at Rome’s Centro Sperimentale di Cinematografia by the husband-and-wife team of Marek and Malgorzata Hendrykowski from Poznan University. Dating from the 1910s, the Polish production is a detective story set in Warsaw. The print has Italian subtitles and is said to be in good condition.
Born (Barbara) Apolonia Chalupiec in 1894 in Lipno, central Poland, Pola Negri began her show business career dancing with the Imperial Ballet in Warsaw, later enrolling in Poland’s Academy of Dramatic Arts. Following her stage debut in 1913, Negri rapidly ascended to the top of her profession, and by the late 1910s she had become a [...]

THE VALENTINO MYSTIQUE by Allan Ellenberger

Allan R. Ellenberger’s meticulously researched The Valentino Mystique: The Death and Afterlife of the Silent Film Idol depicts in great detail the circumstances surrounding Rudolph Valentino’s death in 1926. (The star of The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse and The Sheik was only 31 years old.)
Allan — I’ve known him for quite some time — also discusses the aftermath of the film legend’s death, including the riots, suicides, fights over the estate, and Pola Negri’s myriad fainting spells. (Negri used to claim that only death prevented Valentino from marrying her.)
Rudolph Valentino is currently back in the news following the discovery of the 1922 film Beyond the Rocks, in which he plays Gloria Swanson’s love interest. Beyond the Rocks had [...]

Best Films – 1950

Simone Signoret, Gérard Philipe in La Ronde
FILM
All About Eve
d, scr: Joseph L. Mankiewicz
Annie Get Your Gun
d: George Sidney; scr: Sidney Sheldon
Caged
d: John Cromwell; scr: Virginia Kellogg, Bernard Schoenfeld
Harvey
d: Henry Koster; scr: Mary C. Chase, Oscar Brodney
King Solomon’s Mines
d: Compton Bennett, Andrew Marton; scr: Helen Deutsch
Madeleine
d: David Lean; scr: Stanley Haynes, Nicholas Phipps
The Magnificent Yankee
d: John Sturges; scr: Emmet Lavery
Panic in the Streets
d: Elia Kazan; scr: Richard Murphy, Edward Anhalt, Edna Anhalt
La Ronde / Roundabout
d: Max Ophüls; scr: Jacques Natanson, Max Ophüls
So Long at the Fair
d: Antony Darnborough, [...]