Saturday, July 14, 2018

Scott Lord Silent Film: The Lost World (Hoyt, 1925)

Silent Film

Photoplay Magazine when reviewing the film “The Lost World” In 1925 wrote, “This is a man’s picture, for men like to go puttering through wildernesses seeking big game and women like to wear pretty gowns and powder their noses. A scientist asserts that he has found the large pre-historic mammals that were supposed to be extinct ten million years ago and is promptly called a liar.” As extra-textural discourse, the review puts the audience in a context where gendered Spectatorship and film theory written I. The twenty first century comes in to question, although the tone might not be accurate when looking at the role of women in cliffhangers made a decade before the film.



Wednesday, March 14, 2018

Remade by Greta Garbo: Anna Christie

 



The policy of filming on a closed set that was almost a trademark for actress Greta Garbo may have in part originated earlier. Exhibitor's Herald during 1923 ran an announcement credited to a "Special to Exhibitor's Herald" in Los Angeleas titled "Ince Signs Sweet", which read, "'Anna Christie' star has been signed by Thomas H. Ince for another big special to be made behind closed doors."
     "Anna Christie" was seen as a comeback film for Blanche Sweet for many fan and trade magazines. Picture Play magazine during 1924, in a full page of photos entitled "Fulfilling the Promise" wrote, "Years ago, Blanche Sweet gave promise of being one of the screen's greatest emotional actors. Then we saw no more of her, for illness had forced her to give up her work. To her has fallen the honor of playing the title role in 'Anna Christie', one of the greatest contemporary emotional roles and the photograph at the left suggests what an interesting characterization it will be."



For readers familiar with the photographers of Greta Garbo, the above photograph was published by Clarence Sinclair Bull, who became photographer for Greta Garbo with the advent of sound film and her filming for director Clarence Brown with cameraman William Daniels and set designer-costume artist Adrian. Several photographs of Greta Garbo taken by Clarence Sinclair Bull that were scanned from the original negative and left over from the biography Greta Garbo, A Cinematic Legacy, appear in this page in the margins.
Greta Garbo

Greta Garbo

Greta Garbo

Greta Garbo drawn by Paul Rotha, Film Critic





This appeared in Close Up magazine during 1930. it is a modern rendering of Greta Garbo drawn by the esteemed author Paul Rotha.

Greta Garbo

Greta Garbo

Greta Garbo

Greta Garbo

Greta Garbo

Thursday, January 4, 2018

Swedish Nightingale



It would be less than only a decade after the first film appearance of actress Greta Garbo the Swedish Sphinx, that Virginia Bruce appeared as "the late Mrs. John Gilbert" in a portrayal of Jenny Lind, the Swedish Nightingale.



Greta Garbo

Victor Seastrom

Joseph Sarno, writer, director.

Veil of Blood/Vampire Exctasy, written and directed by Joseph Sarno, begins with nudity and a cauldron, a night exterior of a coven of young women, women experiencing each other, shown mostly in medium close shot, collectively bringing one specific passive member of their group to the building excitement of climax. Not quite cutting on movement, it then abruptly ends the scene during the orgasm without revealing wether the group would turn its attention to the next member, the scene shifting to a train in the countryside in an afternoon exterior with a female being met at the station by a male, both characters introduced during this new establishing shot, the nighttime establishing shot exterior scene having now become a more secretive, undisclosed location.
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Writing a review on Justine and Julliette, directed by Mac Ahlberg as Bert Torn but haven't time to type it in other blog while revising novel. The film is explicit and is more than nude glamour (not entirely a lesbian plot), particularly for the time period. But its Swedish and directed by Mac Ahlberg. Greta Garbo Inga