2/8/2007

Every so often, people ask why we don’t show silent movies. Lon Chaney’s “Phantom of the Opera” is one that comes up a lot. Sadly, the audience for silent movies is not very large. A lot of people don’t want to sit through a silent film- I don’t know if it’s the lack of voices, having to read title screens, not liking the musical sound tracks. Some feature extremely over-the-top gesturing and acting- mainly because the actors were trying to convey as much emotion as possible without the benefit of sound. For today’s audience, silent films are definitely an acquired taste. They certainly can be enjoyable, though…as far as horror films, if you’re interested, you definitely should take a look at the afore-mentioned Chaney “Phantom”- if only to be amazed by the painful make-up job he did. It’s an impressive film- the sets, which remained up at Universal Studios for many many years after the filming, Chaney’s performance as the Phantom- worthwhile just to see the original master of Universal horror films. Another Chaney film to check out is “Hunchback of Notre Dame”- where you will not only be amazed by his make-up job- which included a very heavy rubber hump- but also by his amazing athleticism, as he bounds and swings around the outside of the cathedral! Chaney was an amazing man- if you’ve ever seen the old James Cagney flick “Man of a Thousand Faces,” you at least get some sense of what he was all about. It wasn’t completely accurate, and he had a dark side- but you learn a little about how much he put himself through for his craft. Another interesting silent horror film is “Nosferatu.” Yes, that film was remade with Klaus Kinski in the 80s…but the F. W. Murnau silent film is a very odd tale of …well, actually, it’s the “Dracula” story, but there were copyright-infringement problems that resulted in original English-language versions of the film to change the Count’s name to Orlok . The vampire, played by one Max Schreck (“schreck” means “scream” in German- and , yes, that was the name of Christopher Walken’s character in “Batman Returns”)-is an eerie-looking, almost-alien vampire count. Some of it seems sort of laughable- that’s the case with many of these silents- but, you can get into them and enjoy them. I love some of the silent shorts done by Laurel and Hardy- you really appreciate their craft as actors with those silent films, and their timing and pacing, though some modern viewers just don’t get it, are outstanding. We’ve discussed doing silent films in “Svensurround” (which is basically what the great Jay Ward series “Fractured Flickers” was- silents redubbed with funny dialogue.) It would take a lot of production time to put it together, but- we may try it sometime. Even today, there are viewers who wish my show was silent…especially when I’m singing…