Greta Garbo before Hollywood- Einar Hanson

Motion Picture News explained that Corrinne Griffith would begin filming "Into Her Kingdom", based on a nobel by Ruth Comfort Mitchell, upon the completion of the film "Mllo. Modiste" of which she was then currently on the set.

The photo caption beneath Einar Hanson's photograph Picture Play Magazine read, "Einar Hanson, who, made his debut in Corinne Griffith's Into her Kingdom is romantic adventurous, much more like a Latin than Scandinavian." In the article Two Gentlemen from Sweden, Myrtle Gebhardt relates about having dinner with him, her having at first hoped to interview Lars Hanson and Einar Hanson together in the same room. "For it appeared that Einar was working not for Metro, but for First National...Two evenings later I ringed spaghetti around my fork in a nook of an Italian cafe with Einar Hansen...Prepared for a big, blond man, whose bland face would be overspread with seriousness, I was startled by his breathtaking resemblance to Jack Gilbert. "Ya," he admitted, "Down the street I drive and all the girls call, 'Hello Yack' and I wave to them."

Motion Picture News announced the decision for the directorial assignment to the film with Director or Interpreter, "Svend Gade, the Danish director now making Into Her Kingdom is wondering whether he is engaged as a megaphone weirder or interpreter. In directing Miss Griffith, of course, he uses English; but Einar Hanson receives his instructions in Swedish" Meanwhile it also introduced Griffith's co-star, "Einar Hansen, 'The Swedish Barrymore' has arrived in Hollywood to appear opposite Corinne Griffith in her newest First National starring vehicle, Into Her Kingdom, by Ruth Comfort Mitchell." it had been announced by the magazine during early 1926 that, "Corinne Griffith is already planning to start work the first week of March on Into Her Kingdom though now she is only now finishing Mlle. Moditte, both of which are to be First National releases. It is uncertain whether a viewable copy of "Into Her Kingdom" exists, it has appeared as a lost film among films listed as not surviving made by First National, and it seems omitted on lists of lost silent films as either being missing or as being surviving, but at any rate locating a copy held by a museum which preserve films seems beyond public access.

During 1926, Einar Hanson also starred in the eight reel silent comedy "Her Big Night" (Brown).

There is also every indication that there is no existing copy of the lost silent film "The Lady in Ermine" (seven reels, James Flood) in which Einar Hanson starred with Corinne Griffith during 1927. The photoplay to the film was written by Benjamin Glazer . Two weeks before the film went into production, the periodical Motion Picture News announced that Einar Hanson and Frances X. Bushman has been assigned important roles in the film. The periodical Motion Picture World explained, "While the idea is rather sensational and treads perilously close to the risque in its inferences there are no objectionable scenes and the solution is clever and satisfactory." It neglected mentioning Einar Hansen but noted that Frances X. Bushman had been given a "thankless role". Not incidentally, a print of the film "Three Hours" in which James Flood directed actress Corrine Griffith during 1927 does exist.

Motion Picture Magazine in 1927 published an oval portrait of Einar Hansen with the caption, "In Fashions for Women, Einar is the first man to be directed by Paramount's first woman director. How's that for a record? Incidentally, Einar has become a popular leading man as quickly as anyone that ever invaded Hollywood." The caption to the somber portrait published in Picture Play magazine that year held a more sundry description, "Einar Hansen, the young man from Sweden who looks so like a Latin has fared well during his year in this country. he is now under contract to Paramount and has the lead opposite Esther Ralston in Fashions For Women." The film was the first directed by Dorothy Azner, who had worked uncredited with Fred Niblo on Blood and Sand. Gladys Unger, who a year later worked on the scenario to the film "The Divine Woman" (Victor Seastrom), wrote the screenplay to the film "Fashions for Women". The running length of the film consisted of seven reels. The periodical Exhibitor's Herald explained that it was the first starring vehicle for actress Esther Ralston and the first venture weilding the microphone" for director Dortohy Arzner.

Einar Hanson appeared with Anna Q. Nilsson in the lost silent film "The Masked Woman" (six reels) during 1927. The film is presently presumed to be lost with no known surving copies existing.

Of the film "Children of Divorce", Motion Picture News wrote, "It is a picture which is easy to guess the denoument...Frank Lloyd, the director, has overcome much of the plot shortcomings with his lighting and other technical efforts. he provided some charming settings and gotten every ounce of dramatic flavoring from the story." Joseph Von Sternberg's work on the film is uncredited.

     

     Essayist Tommy Gustafsson almost besmirches Einar Hanson by claiming him to have a Bohemian image, that while carrying with it a "soft masculinity", appeared "unsound" when part of his after hours social life, although the author doesn't specifically include Gosta Ekman, Mauritz Stiller or Greta Garbo leaving it only a generic impression. He noted that there was a posthumous "negative attitude" toward Hanson due to "considerable media exposure he received for 'Pirates of Lake Malaren' and 'The Blizzard' as well as great commotion surrounding the trial following his car accident the same year...This is an example of a new connecting link, a kind of intertexuality, that was created between the real people and the characters they played." Gustafsson stops there, only to infer, without making an obvious conclusion and before speculating that Stiller had brought Garbo and Sjostrom to the United States to avoid having been placed in any nocturnal subculture or artistic society of artists that may not have been entirely accepted in Sweden or Europe.

The six reel lost silent film "The Woman on Trial", directed by Mauritz Stiller was released in October of 1927, more than three months after the death of Einar Hanson. The film which starred actress Pola Negri is presumed lost, with no surviving copies.
The body of Einar Hanson was crushed between the steering wheel and a ten inch drainpipe along the highway. Photoplay Magazine reported, "Here is a tragedy- and a mystery. Einar Hansen was found fatally injured, pinned beneath his car on the ocean road. Earlier in the evening, he had given a dinner party for Greta Garbo, Swedish Silent Film director Mauritz Stiller and Dr. And Mrs. Gistav Borkman...Hanson was unmarried and he is survived by he parents in Stockholm."

Hanson had filmed in Europe before coming to the United States. In his native Denmark, he had appeared in the Danish silent film So "Bilberries" ("Misplaced Highbrows", "Takt, Ture Og Tosser", Lau Lauritzen, 1924) and "Mists of the Past" (Fra Plazza del Polo, Anders W. Sandberg, 1925), the latter having starred Karina Bell.

In Sweden, Einar Hanson starred with Inga Tiblad in "Malarpirater", written and directed by Gustaf Molander in 1924 and with Mona Martenson in "Skeppargatan 40", directed by Swedish Silent Film director Gustaf Edgren in 1925.

Before travelling to Turkey with Mauritz Stiller and Greta Garbo, Einar Hanson appeared under the direction of G.W. Pabst with Greta Garbo and Asta Nielsen in "The Joyless Street" (1925). Greta Garbo biographer Norman Zierold gives an account of Garbo having been offered a second film for Pabst of which Garbo had neglected to inform Stiller who learned of it from Einar Hanson. When Stiller accused Garbo of betraying him she broke off negotiations with Pabst. It had been Stiller who had arranged Greta Garbo's appearance in "The Joyless Street", demanding that Einar Hanson appear with her.

Greta Garbo

Greta Garbo

Greta Garbo

Danish Silent Film

Remade by Greta Garbo

Silent Film

Scott Lord: Greta Garbo in The Divine Woman (1928, Victor Sjostrom)

"The Divine Woman" directed in the United States during 1928 featured three Swedish Silent Film stars from the Golden Age of Swedish Silent film, two of whom, Victor Sjostrom and Lars Hanson, would soon return to Sweden to mark the advent of sound film. Sjostrom would return to act and only act, in front of the camera rather than behind it. Only one reel of the film survives, it being presumed lost with no other footage of the film surviving other than the fragment.

Bo Florin, Stockholm University, in his volume Transition and Transformation- Victor Sjostrom in Hollywood 1923-1930, looks as a film detective not only to film critics and magazine articles printed during the first run of the film, as I have, this webpage in fact subtitled "Lost Films, Found Magazines", (please excuse the trendy contemporary use of subtitles during peer review) but also to the the cutting continuity script, his finding a specific sequence where Sjostrom uses "a combination between iris and dissolve", one which, as an iris down, fulfills the "classic Sjostrom function of an analogy". There are two other dissolves in the same sequence that are used as transitions, spatial transitions, yet both are taken from different camera distances. It is a contonuity cutting script from which author Bo Florin has found fifty four dissolves that were used in the film. Again, no footage from the scene or the reel it is from survives. One can ask if double exposures were only infrequently published in magazines or advertisements as publicity stills, or even as lobby cards or posters and if modern audiences have ever seen photographs from the scene.

Greta Garbo biographer Norman Zierold writes, "Garbo asked for, and got, Victor Seastrom as her director in 'The Divine Woman'." Journalist Rilla Page Palmborg, in The Private Life of Greta Garbo fulfills the search for Lost Film, Found Magazines when giving an account of being on the set of 'The Divine Woman' for a rare interview with Greta Garbo, giving a description of what what on film in a film we at presenent no longer have. "There came a shy little French girl and a young officer walking slowly down the street. They paused in a doorway. The officer asked a frowsy inkeeper for lodgings. The girl looked up shyly at the officer. She hesitated a moment, raised up on her toes and kissed him on the cheek. Then she hurried past him up the stairs. 'Cut' shouted the director." The director was in fact Swedish Silent Film director Victor Sjostrom, Greta Garbo leaving the set in a high collared cape to bring journalist Rilla Page Palmborg to her dressing room. The commodity Garbo at that time? The journalist had obtained the interview not to ask about Lars Hanson, Victor Sjostrom or the upcoming film "The Divine Woman", but was admittedly there to ask Garbo about her tabloid romance with actor John Gilbert. The dressing room was small and on wheels and Garbo politely expressed concern if they both would fit into it. Greta Garbo answered the question regarding her intentions of marriage with "it is only a friendship. I will never marry. My work absorbs me. I have time for nothing else. But I think Jack Gilbert is one of the finest men I have ever known." There would seem a contradiction between the onscreen Garbo who 'nearly invented the torrid love scene' and the extratextural discourse of pursuing the reclusive hermit Garbo everywhere- oddly enough Palmborg claims that the relationship between Garbo and Lars Hanson and his wife Karin Molander was more professional than social although Hanson and Garbo arrived from Sweden at the same time with Victor Sjostrom and Mauritz Stiller. Swedish Silent Film actress Karen Molander explained, " 'Garbo never had any friends with whom she chummed around in Stockholm.' said Mrs. Hanson. 'When we knew her she was devoted to Mauritz Stiller. He seemed to be the only person with whom she would associate.' "

Paul Rotha, in his volume The Film Till Now, commented on the topic that would be taken up by Bo Florin during this century, the artistic differences between the films made by Victor Sjostrom for Svensk Filmindustri, Stockholm and for Metro Goldwyn Mayer, Hollywood. "But Sjostrom has ceased to develop. He remains stationary in his outlook thinking in terms of his early Swedish imagery. He has recently made little use of the progress of cinema itslef. 'The Divine Woman', although it had the Greta Garbo of 'The Atonement of Gosta Berling' had none of the lyricism, the poetic imagery of the earlier film."

Victor Sjostrom and Greta Garbo

Greta Garbo in The Temptress

Greta Garbo in The Torrent
Silent Greta Garbo

Scott Lord Silent Film: Greta Garbo In The Joyless Street (G.W. Pabst, 1...

In The Film Till Now, a survey off world cinema, Paul Rotha writes, “It is impossible to witness the showing a Film by Pabst without marveling at his unerring choice of camera angle for the expression of mood or his employment of the moving camera to heighten action.” Notwithstanding he describes the “tempestuous and badly received” “The Joyless Street” as being only the second film made by the director and that the directors poularity as only having increased later. “With unerring psychology by which he caused the smallest actions of his characters to convey meaning. Pabst brought to his picture moments of searing pain, of mental anquish, of clear unblemished beauty. His extreme powers of truthfulness, of understanding, of reality, of the virtual meaning of hunger, love, lust and greed rendered this extraordinary film convincing.” Rotha noted the collaboration of actress Greta Garbo with the director Pabst. “Mention has been made of Greta Garbo in the film, for it is by this that one theorizes on her beauty and ability. In Hollywood this splendid woman has been wantonly distorted into the symbol of eroticism. But Greta Garbo, by reason of her sympathetic understanding of Pabst, brought a quality of loveliness into her playing as the professor’s eldest daughter. Her frail beauty, cold as ann ice flower warmed by the sun, stood secure in the starving city of Vienna, untouched by the vice and lust that dwelt in the dark Street.”

Roger Manvell, author of Film and Public, writing in 1955, pointed out that Pabst had added a level of tragedy to the events which encompassed his characters, "It was not untill Pabst emerged into the silent German cinema that German melodrama deepened into tragedy....The plots of Pabst's silent film are melodramatic, with happy endings superimposed upon them in almost every case."

Arthur Knight, in his volume The Liveliest Art almost seems to be beginning a discussion on Film Noir while sneaking into the fringes of the subjective camera by positing an "emotional reaction" of the invisible observer, the authorial camera, to its subject, "And there are psychological elements too in the relation of the camera to its subject- close or far, at a strong angle or at a non-commital eye-level, above it or shooting from below. By his choice of the camera's position, the director creates for the audience an unconscious predisposition toward the scene, the characters and the action. Pabst applied his own awareness of this technique to his use of the camera throughout 'The Joyless Street' ". Knight includes the film in a sub-genre of German Silent Film, "street films" including "The Street" (1928), "Tragedy of the Street" (1927) and "Asphalt", perhaps a subgenre of melodrama not reflective of there being a Golden Age of the period.

The script to the film was based on a novel by Hugo Bettauer that only a year earlier had been serialized in a newspaper in Vienna. The length of the film is listed as five reels, but apparently screened with extensive censorship cuts in a version considerably shorter than the modern restored version and in American versions which edited out the character portrayed by Asta Nielsen.

In his volume A Tale from Constantinople, written with Patrick Vondeau, Bo Florin, University of Stockholm, notes that originally actress Vilma Banky had been considered for the lead in the film "The Joyless Street", her having left for America before the shooting of the film. Mauritz Stillerwas on occaision seen at the studio, his apparently having had an interest in directing the film and he in fact having had an offer to direct six films in Europe when he decided to depart for America.

Actress Greta Garbo came directly to America without filming in Sweden after working with G.W. Pabst, and had in fact been working on a Film with Mauritz Stiller before having been given her role in “The Joyless Street”. The Private Life of Greta Garbo, published in 1931 by Rilla Page Palmborg at a time when the world didn’t know how private the life of Greta Garbo would later become, gives an account of Mauritz Stiller, Greta Garbo and Einar Hanson being in Constantinople to film the first movie ever made there. After delays in completing the script, it had finally been finished and Mauritz Stiller had started to direct when its financing had abruptly been discontinued and Stiller’s telegrams had gone unanswered. “In a few days, Mr.Stiller returned with the sad news that the backers of the picture had gone broke. There was nothing to do but disband and go home. But Mr. Stiller had plans for another picture that he wanted to make in Berlin. While she was waiting...Mr. Stiller got her a part in ‘The Street of Sorrow’...During this time, Louis B. Mayer, production head of the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer studios in Hollywood was making a trip through Europe on the lookout for new talent. The night he saw ‘Gosta Berlings Saga’ he saw photography and new directorial tricks that had never been done before.He wanted to see the genius who directed the fine picture.”

Author Forsyth Hardy, typically as he is usually concise, devotes only a paragraph of his volume Scandinavian Film to the Mauritz Stiller endeavor "Kostantinopel", noting that after he had interested them in his already underway project, Stiller involved Greta Garbo and Einar Hanson deeply in the on location making of the film. The brief account continues: subsequently Garbo completed "The Joyless Street" and then agreed to go to Hollywood with Stiller.

Danish Silent Film Star Asta Neilsen remained in Berlin to film similar social dramas about the decadence, or downfall, of society, among them “Tragedy of the Street” (Rahn, 1927) and “The Vice of Humanity” (Meinhart, 1927) . At first glance, the films are connected to “The Joyless Street” by belonging to The New Objectivity, which depicted the cities of Germany realistically as being in post-War poverty. During 1925, already famous for her portrayal of “Hamlet” (Sven Gade, 1921), Asta Nielsen played the title role of Hedda Gabler in a film adapted and directed by Frank Eckstein and starred in the film “The Living Buddhas” under the direction of Paul Wegner. Only five minutes of the original footage of the film now survive, adding the film to the many now lost films of the silent era.

Silent film director Georg Wilhelm Pabst is perhaps best known to contemporary audiences for directing actress Louise Brooks in the films "Pandora's Box" and "Diary of a Lost Girl" (Das tagebuch einer verbrenen"), both filmed during 1929.
Greta Garbo and Mauritz Stiller

Greta Garbo
Greta Garbo

The Abyss (Urban Gad, Afgrunden, Denmark 1910)

Urban Gad directed Asta Nielsen in her first film "The Abyss" (Afgrunden, 1910) in Denmark, a film often written about due to her popularity and to a scene contained in it in which she dances erotically. Uli Jung and Martin Lorperdinger, editors of Importing Asta Nielsen, the international filmstar in the making 1910-1914, see the rise of Asta Nielsen as meteoric with her first appearance on screen, "she became a well-known and popular actress in many countries on the continent in the 1910/11 season." The film is described by Casper Tybjerg as her "breakthrough film". Scholar Casper Tybjerg, University of Copenhagen/online instructor, notes that "The Abyss" was promoted as an art film, a drama in two acts. Author Forsyth Hardy, in his volume Scaninavian Film, sees the principal stars that had brought international recognition to the country's cinema as having been Asta Nielsen and Valdamar Psilander, " It was an immediate success and audiences everywhere responded to a sensitive, expressive acting style of scting which contrasted clearly with the grimmacing antics of her contemporaries."

Film historian Marguerite Engberg, in her article, The Erotic Melodrama in Danish Silent FIlm, chronickes the cienam of narrative integration having emerged from the cinema of attractions by discussing the significance of running legnth and the advent of longer narrative films. In 1910, Fotorama had released a Danish Silent Film that was more than a half hour in running legnth, "Den hvide Slavenhandel" (The White Slave Traffic), it being notable that it was shown in one sitting. "The transition to multireels was a very important step in the evolution of film art. For now, with longer films, it became possible to go into details within a single scene." The longer legnth of the film allowed "The Abyss to become a "fully fledged erotic melodrama, the drama which was to become a Danish speciality" with its then sexually explicit dance scene and "long drawn out kisess, a Danish invention in films." Engeby describes erotic melodrama as a love story with a conflict between the ckasses, or economic backgrounds and notes that it often included a love triangle, as did the films "The Abyss", "Den Sorte Drom" (The Black Dream" and "Balletdanserinden" (The Ballet Dancer".
It was also that year that Urban Gad and Asta Nielsen would travel to Germany to film for Duetsche Bioscop. Asta Nielsen appeared on screen under Urban Gad's direction with cinematographer Karl Fruend behind the camera that year in the films "Moth" (Nachtfaler) and "The Strange Bird"" (Der Frerde Volgel). Asta Nielsen would later star with Greta Garbo for G.W. Pabst in "The Joyless Street" and in a silent version of "Hamlet" (1920). Scholar Isak Thorsen, University of Copenhagen, in his paper,Nordisk Film Kompagni and Asta Nielsen, explains that director Urban Gad had signed a contract with Kunst Films Kompagni (Copenhagen Art Film) which allowed his to direct film abroad, with a similar contract for wife Asta Nielsen stipulating that she play as many parts as permissable; Nielsen who had already gained international recognition in regard to transnational cinema. Peter Cowie, in his volume Scandinavian cinema adds, "Marrying Urban Gad in 1912, she widened her range of expression to embrace comedy as well as vampish roles."

Janet Bergstrom, in her paper Asta Nielsen's Early German Films, chronicles Asta Nielsen asking Urban Gad if he would write a film for her. "Afgrunden" not only secured an international audience for her but it heralded the film itself becoming an art form. Bergstrom notes Nielsen having written that she aspired to improve her acting ability by watching herself on the screen.

Although many films from the time period were adaptations of theatrical plays, "The Abyss" has no dialougue intertitles, but rather insert shots containing written letters. Both insert shots of printed material and dialougue intertitles are part of the diegesis of a silent film, whereas expository intertitles that either summarize the action or prepare the audience for it are not part of the film's diegesis, insert shots of letters bringing a more first person authorial camera that provides identification with the character.
Bela Belazs, in his volume Theory of Film discusses Urban Gad's 1918 book on film criticism, "This wise and sound book makes no mention as of yet of the new form-language proper to the new art- at the time Urban Gad knew nothing of this. Hence he dealt chiefly with the specific new subjects suitable for film presentation. According to him, every film should be placed in some specific natural enviornment which must affect the human beings living in it and play apart in directing their lives and destinies. Thus a new personage is added to the dramatis personna of the photographed play: nature itself." Belaz continues aiming at genre theory, that genre is particular, it has exclusivity and allows specific backgrounds where tropes and metaphors can arise, ie. Westerns occur only where cowyboys can be found. The glaring problem is that the description offerred by Belaz, in the historiography of film theory, is precisely that of the description inordinately used to define the Swedish Silent FIlm, to the point where the camera technique of Victor Sjostrom and Mauritz Stiller is delegated secondary to the relation of man to his overwhelming envirnment. And yet Belazs is discussing the writing of Danish filmmaker Urban Gad published at a time when Sjostrom had just finished the film "The Outlaw and his Wife", a stunning, but still early example of Scandinavian Cinema.

Scott Lord

Scott Lord Film: A Star is Born (William A Wellman, 1937) - Becky Sharp (Mamoulian, 1935) double feature

Goldwyn in 1923 released an eight reel adaptation of Vanity Fair with actress Mabel Balin starring as Becky Sharp, written, directed and produced by Hugo Balin. The film is presumed lost, with no existing copies surviving. A 1922 film adaptation was directed by W.C. Rowden during 1922. Thomas A. Edison Incorporated released Vanity Fair in seven reels, directed by Eugene Nowland, in 1915. Silent Film Hollywood, Color and Tint in Film

Scott Lord Silent Film: Blanche Sweet in Anna Christie (John Griffith Wray, 1923)

Actresses Blanche Sweet and Eugenie Besserer starred in the 1923 version of "Anna Christie", adapted for the screen by Bradley King and directed by John Griffith Gray under the supervision of Thomas Ince. The periodical "Screen Opinions" of 1923 noted the photography of Henry Sharp as being "very good", the type of picture as being "sensational" with a "moral standard" of "average". The periodical Pictures and the Picturegoer reviewed the photoplay as an adaptation, "it is a notable tribute to the power of the screen freed from the limitations that inevitably beset the speaking stage....the story is familiar from the stage play with its stark yet fascinating realism and its true to life portrayal of elemental human passions." The periodical Picture Play Magazine hailed actress Blanche Sweet in the title role, "Most of the interest centers about Blanche Sweet who gives the finest performance of her career as Anna. Miss Sweet has always seemed to me an inspired actress."

During 1923 actress Blanche Sweet also appeared in the film "In the Palace of the King" directed by Emmett J. Flynn and written by June Mathis. The film is presumed to be lost, with no surviving copies existing. During 1924, actress Blanche Sweet appeared under the direction of Lambert Hillyer for Thomas Ince Productions, Incorporated in the eight reel film "Those Who Dance". The film is presumed lost, with no surviving copies existing. Lambert Hillyer cowrote the photoplay with Arthur Statter.

Greta Garbo Silent Film Lost Silent Film

Scott Lord Swedish Silent Film: Triumph of the Heart (Hjärtats triumf, Gustaf Molander, 1929)

Fan magazines from the United States have occaisionally reported that Rasunda Studios in Stockholm had recieved a vistor during 1929. There is an account that Greta Garbo, by then a star of the American silver screen purportedly with the power to avoid her own set while negotiating her salary, had visited actor Carl Brisson, an old romantic acquaintance, on the set of his film, "The Triumph of the Heart". As late as 1934, while announcing that Brisson was in Hollywood filming "Murder at the Vanities", Hollywood magazine introduced Brisson as "Garbo's first love". It having been 1934, Paramount International News was there observing publicity as Greta Garbo attended the premiere of the film, "Equipped with dark glasses and a knowledge of side entrances, she was able to elude her photographers on the way out, but reporters spotted her in the audience just after the picture started." That year, Movie Classic magazine published an article written by Carl Brisson himself entitled "There's No Romance Between Garbo and Me". The modern American reader might be unsure of Brisson's intentions when reading the Photoplay magazine of 1930 which writes, "He held out both his hands to her." in that Brisson may have been romanticlly evasive when sentimentally having said that he only knew her as the Greta that had been at the Dramatic School and that he may have only feigned surprise when being told that he had met Greta Garbo. The actress, who also had been to the set of the film to see Axel Nilsson, an old friend, had in fact known director Gustaf Molander in 1923 when she was still Greta Gustafsson of the Royal Dramatic Theater, whether or not there is conjecture as to Brisson having used innuendo refering to Garbo not having married actor Lars Hanson. Directed by Gustaf Molander, the film “Hjartats Triumf” was written by Paul Merzbach and is listed as having been photographed by J. Julius, a pseudonym used by Julius Jaenzon along with cameraman Axel Lindblom and assistant cameraman Ake Dahlqvist. Starring in the film were Edvin Adolphson and actresses Lissy Arna and Anna Lindhal. Although this was the second on screen appearance for Lindhal, she had only had a brief appearance in the film “Ingmarsarvet” during 1925 under the direction of Gustaf Molander.

Scandinavian Silent Film

Gustaf Molander Gustaf Molander

Scott Lord Silent Film: A Girl's Folly (Tourneur, 1917)

The caption to the review of "A Girl's Folly" (five reels) in the periodical Wid's Films and Film Folk during March 1917 read "Bad Moral and Tells Secrets, But Will Get Money." It elaborated further with "Very interesting, but tells studio secrets, which is dangerous," if that too can be deciphered by a modern audience sauntering through the cannon of silent films left remaining that have not yet deteriorated over time. The periodical then went so far as to, half-heartedly or not, suggest that "exhibitors", theater owners, should "protest" the film's having divulged what were "backstage secrets". The periodical admittedly was looking for the exploitation of silent films but it takes a historian's glance to decided if there was a sensationalism on which the reviewer may have counted during an extratextural discourse. It continued to question "purely from the viewpoint of whether you can get money with it" and conceded, "The thread of the story is quite slender and has a very questionable moral as presented, but the introduction of scenes showing clearly activity about a film studio is sure to prove exceptionally interisting to any film fan." It offerred the theater owner consolation, "Since the producer has already gone and 'done it', I presume you might as well go ahead and get the money with this, because it would be impossible to eliminate the back-stage scenes and have a picture left."
The photoplay was cowritten with director Maurice Tourneaur by Frances Marion and starred actresses Doris Kenyon, Robert Warwick and June Eldvidge. Frances Marion that year also wrote the photplays to to the films Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm and Poor Little Rich Girl both starring Mary Pickford. Actress Doris Kenyon appeared on screen in the films of Alice Guy Blanche, in 1916 in the film "The Queen's Waif" and in 1917 in "The Empress".

During 1917 Robert Warwick and Doris Kenyon also starred together in "The Man Who Forgot" (Emile Chautard). The film is presumed to be a lost silent film, with no surviving copies existing.

Silent Film Silent Film

Scott Lord on Film: A Lady To Love (Victor Seastrom, 1930)

Scholar Bo Florin gives us a point of departure when seeking to analyze the ten reel film “Lady to Love” and the transition from silent to sound film by placing director Victor Sjostrom as part of the M.G.M. Studio, adding that Sjostrom had ushered in the beginning of the Golden Age of Swedish Silent Film with his adapation of Ibsen’s poem Terje Vigen and effected the transition which would be carried through the merger of Swedish film companies that had changed Svenska Bio to Svenska Filmindustri, and in doing so it is important to Florin that both transitions were from quantity to quality when involving Victor Sjostrom.

Bo Florin sees the transition of silent to sound film as one that depicts both off screen and onscreen space through the use of diegetic sound. Florin sees the film "Lady to Love" as important when analysizing "the intersection of different cultures" and "the consequences of the transition to sound for an individual director who was frequently using visual 'sound effects' in his films during the silent era."

Edward G. Robinson starred in both versions of the film, the English languge and the German, as did his co-star actress Vilma Banky, who in 1928 starred in the film "The Awakening" (Victor Fleming (nine reels), a film presently presumed to be lost silent film with no surviving copies.

Bo Florin, Stockholm University, in his volume Transition and Transformation, Victor Sjostrom in Hollywood, 1923-1930, writes, "The making of multi-language versions remains on the side of diversity; here, concrete dialects, accents, and sociolects in different spoken languages enter the public sphere through sound recording, but the concept of the film as a unified work with a potential for universalism is also challenged." There were some "minor changes in camera angles" between the two versions and some alternative filming of a bedroom scene to accomodate the American censors, although Florin sees a metonymy that is suggestive through ellipsis.

Victor Sjostrom would soon return to Sweden, not to direct Swedish Sound Film, but to step into the proscenium arc with the blocking of an actor in front of the camera and under the lights. Bo Florin writes that it had been considered that returning to Sweden would have been only a sabbatical and that he could film for M.G.M. there, on location. Florin mentions that Begnt Forslund viewed "A Lady to Love" as "in some sense unworthy of Sjostrom as a director" without directly attributing the Hollywood production system as a reason for Sjostrom's departure, although it may be recurring that Hollywood methods differred from those of Svenska Bio.

Victor Sjostrom
Victor Seastrom playlist Victor Sjostrom

Scott Lord Silent Film: Clara Bow in Parisian Love (Louis J. Gasnier, 1925)

The 1923 Clara Bow film "The Pill Pounder" (two reels) was discovered to exist when a 35 millimeter print was found in 2024, it evidently having been purchased unknowingly at an auction for twenty dollars.

Directed in 1925 by Charles Giblyn, the six reel film "The Adventurous Sex", starring Clara Bow is presumed to be a lost silent film, with no surviving copies existing.

Motion Picture News avoided flattering the direction of "Parisian Love", "Weak and wandering. Thrill stuff poorly executed, action draggy, footage wasted."

silent Film Lost Silent Film

Scott Lord Swedish Silent Film: Vem Dömer (Who Should Judge?, Victor Sjostrom, 1922)

In Sweden, during 1922, Victor Sjostrom directed Jenny Hasselqvist in “Love’s Crucible”, co-scripted by Hjalmer Bergman and photographed by Julius Jaenzon. Nils Asther and Gosta Emmanuel appear on screen in the filmf. Author Forsyth Hardy, in his volume Scandinavian Film notes that the film was "an elaborate and spectacular historical film". Forsyth Hardy implies that "Vem Dormer" was not only an example of the Golden Age of Swedish Silent Film but an overwhelming attempt to save it, it having been an expensive film to make in hope of regaining an overseas audience that had begun to lose interest in serious Swedish Films. "All the resources of the newly completed Rasunda Studios were mobilized to make the spectacular Vem Dormer."

Vito Adriaensens, in his paper, "A Swedish Renaissance: Art and Passion in Victor Sjostrom's 'Vem Dommer' (1922)" explains the connection between the title and theme and the use of symbolic imagery in the films of VictorSjostrom, "The statue of Christ adorns the local church and is the first and last thing we see in the film. Christ is pivotal for the narrative and for the title, as 'Vem Dommer' literally translates to 'who judges', implicating that only Christ can, not the community that tries to judge Ursula."

During the following year, 1923, Jenny Hassellquist starred in another collaboration between Victor Sjostrom and Hjalmer Bergman, the Film “Eld Ombord” (“The Hellship”)in which she appeared on screen with Victor Sjostrom, while under his direction. Actor Matheson Lang stars with actress Julia Cederblad in the first film in which she was to appear. The cinematographer to the film was Julius Jaenzon.



Victor Sjostrom

Victor Sjostrom Playlist

Scott Lord Swedish Silent Film: Hans nåds testamente (Victor Sjostrom, ...

During 1919, Victor Sjostrom directed the film “His Lord’s Will” (“His Grace’s Will” “Hans nads testamente”) from the writings of Hjalmer Bergman. Photographed by Henrik Jaenzon, it starred actresses Greta Almroth, Tyra Dorum and Augusta Lindberg. In bookstores during 1919, God’s Orchid, written by Hjalmer Bergman appeared published in its first edition, followed in 1921 by the novel Thy Rod, Thy Staff and in 1930 by Jac the Clown. The film was remade in 1940 by Per Lindgren, scripted by Stina Bergman and starring Barbra Kollberg and Alk Kjellin.

Scott Lord Scott Lord Victor Sjostrom

Scottt Lord Silent Film: The Three Musketeers (Niblo, 1921)

Douglas Fairbanks the following year continued his series of films in which he starred as an adventure protagonist, each film seeming to be a story in a different historical period and a different geographical country. In addition to its being a costume drama, author William K. Everson saw "The Three Muskateers" (Fred Niblo, 1921, twelve reels) as being indicative of the influence of D.W. Griffith with its cornocopia of intertiles and various intersecting subplots. Starring in the film with Douglas Fairbanks was actresses Barbara Del La Marr.

Photoplay Magazine, in a full page of six publicity stills, not only explained that "Dumas' famous romance" was a ten reel silent film, but that Douglas Fairbanks' moustache was real. It included publicity stills of acresses Mary MacLaren and Margueritte de la Motte in costume drama attire. Exhibitor's Herald included a six sheet poster "suggesting action and romance" and a twenty four sheet inteded for the "far flung" bilboard".

Douglas Fairbanks in The Iron Mask Douglas Fairbanks Douglas Fairbanks

Scott Lord Silent Film: Douglas Fairbanks in The Iron Mask (Dwan,1929)

Douglas Fairbanks coscripted the film "The Man In the Iron Mask" with Lotta Woods during 1929, adapted from the works "The Three Muskateers" and "After Twenty Years" by Dumas. Directed by Allan Dwan, it was one of the last silent films ever made and paired Fairbanks with actress Marguerite de la Motte and actresses Dorothy Revier and Vera Lewis.

Douglas Fairbanks Scott Lord Douglas Fairbanks

The Silent Film of Alfred Hitchcock

"I first started in 1920...There was a scenario department so you had a scenario editor and his assistant. My job at the time was designing the titles, because titles because titles were very important since whole stories could be changed, characters could be changed merely by the wording inthe title. I was then given odd jobs of going out to shoot odd litlle entrances and exits on exteriors. So gradually I practiced my hand at scriptwriting myself. I took any story and after the script was written it was handed to the director."

Alfred Hitchcock (quoted by Eric Sherman)

The Kinematograph Yearbook of 1928 include with the screen credits then acquired by Alfred Hitchcock those of his having been assistant and scenarist to director Graham Cutts on the films "Woman to Woman", "Blackguard" and "Passionate Adventure". The periodical credits Hitchcock as the director of "Pleasure Garden" (1926) after his joining Gainsborough Pictures in 1925. During filmed interviews late in his career, Hitchcock reflects that he had been trained in American silent film, despite the studios having been located in England- that the influence of Murnau and Eisenstien had only been subsequent.

Interestingly, in his recent academic paper Silent Hitchcock, author Robert Murphy, instructor at De Montfort University, Leicester, asks how important a silent film director Alfred Hitchcock was by wondering if Hitchcock had been killed with F.W. Murnau, that is if he had only made silent film and ended with Blackmail, which would have been his tenth silent, would his films still be studied or overlooked. Oddly, the author has chosen Hitchcock, who in fact often repeated camera set ups in his American sound films that he had previously used in lower budget British silent films, returning to redo elements of scenes and motifs he had used earlier- an ostensible reason for this being that he collaborated as a director on scripts with his wife both in England and in the United States which may have brought a sentimentality when the production costs of his films were much larger.
Murphy, in Silent Hitchcock, surveys Hitchcock's silent career, beginning by noting that "The Mountain Eagle" (1926) is a lost film. "All that survives of 'The Mountain Eagle' are the six stills reproduced in Truffaut's book of interviews with Hitchcock and we have no way of knowing if the film was as terrible as Hitchcock thought it was." It was in fact based on an original script rather than a popular novel or stage vehicle. The film stars actress Nita Naldi.

What miraculously does survive is one of the silent films to which Alfred Hitchock wrote the Photoplay, "White Shadow", directed in 1924 by Graham Cutts. Once thought to whave been lost, the film is now restored and considered incomplete, the first three reels having been discovered in New Zealand during 2010, The film, adapted by Hitchcock from a novel by Michael Morton, stars actress Betty Compson in a dual role of good and bad twin sisters. The film was originall released with a length of six reels and was co-scripted and edited by Alma Reville. As a director, Cutts has been noted by critics for his compositions in the film, particularly for the use of backlighting during night interiors.

Beginning in 1920 with the films "The Great Day" (Hugh Ford, five reels) and "The Call of Youth" (Hugh Ford, four reels) Alfred Hitchcock untill 1922 wrote the titles to a dozen silent films, all of which are presumed lost. "The Great Day" starred Mary Palfrey and Marjorie Hume, "The Call of Youth", Mary Glynne and Marjorie Hume. The scenarios of boths films are credited to Eve Unsell, who returned to America upon their completion. Margaret Turnbull wrote the scenarios to two films directed by Donald Crisp during 1921, "The Princess of New York" and "Appearances", both presumed lost and to both of which Alfred Hitchcock had written the titles.

The British Film Institute presently lists "Woman to Woman", directed a year earlier than "White Shadow" by Graham Cutts in 1923, as being "lost", there being no known surviving copies held in archives around the world and no ongoing prints that are currently being restored. Eight reels in length, it was written by Alfred Hitchock, the assistant director to the film, and edited by Alma Reville, the two apparently having first met during its filming in some accounts. Betty Compson stars in the film.

More likely Hitchcock had known Alma Reville, if only slightly, during 1922 while an intertitle writer for the seven reel film "The Man From Home" directed by George Fitzmaurice and written by Ouida Bergee, who later married the actor Basil Rathbone. Alma Reville edited the film which had not been seen untill only recently when a copy was found in The Netherlands and untill then having had been presumed lost. George Fitzmaurice also that year directed the six reel film "Three Live Ghosts", written by Ouida Bergere, titles contributed by Alfred Hitchcock.

The existing print, and untranslated copy of the film "The Man from Home" was discovered by authors Alain Kerzoncof and Charles Barr, who in their book Hitchcock Lost and Found note that Hitchcok telephoned Alma Reville later when an assistant director.