In his day Buster Keaton’s popularity trailed that of Charlie Chaplin and Harold Lloyd, but now those reputations have switched around. These two ‘lesser’ Keaton features generate more sheer fun than anything going. Seven Chances and Battling Butler are great on remastered Blu-ray — better materials, no missing frames — but do yourself a favor and find a way to see a Keaton picture with a big audience!
Seven Chances & Battling Butler: The Buster Keaton Collection Volume 3
Blu-ray
Cohen Film Collection
Street Date August 20, 2019 / 29.98
Original Music composed and Conducted by Robert Israel
Produced by Joseph M. Schenck
Starring, and Directed by Buster Keaton
Seven Chances
1925 / B&w + Color / 1:37 Silent Ap / 56 min.
Starring: Buster Keaton, Snitz Edwards, Ruth Dwyer, T, Roy Barnes, Jean Arthur, Constance Talmadge.
Cinematography: Elgin Lessley, Byron Houck
Art Direction: Fred Gabourie
Written by Clyde Bruckman, Jean Havez, Joseph Mitchell from a play by Roi Cooper Megrue
Directed...
Seven Chances & Battling Butler: The Buster Keaton Collection Volume 3
Blu-ray
Cohen Film Collection
Street Date August 20, 2019 / 29.98
Original Music composed and Conducted by Robert Israel
Produced by Joseph M. Schenck
Starring, and Directed by Buster Keaton
Seven Chances
1925 / B&w + Color / 1:37 Silent Ap / 56 min.
Starring: Buster Keaton, Snitz Edwards, Ruth Dwyer, T, Roy Barnes, Jean Arthur, Constance Talmadge.
Cinematography: Elgin Lessley, Byron Houck
Art Direction: Fred Gabourie
Written by Clyde Bruckman, Jean Havez, Joseph Mitchell from a play by Roi Cooper Megrue
Directed...
- 8/20/2019
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
MGM’s gigantic silent sci-fi extravaganza took three years to make, by which time the talkies arrived and everything went to pieces. Lionel Barrymore emotes (Emotes!) in his early sound footage, and terrific effects take us to the bottom of the ocean where monsters and a race of Donald Duck creatures menace our heroic adventurers. And don’t forget a few sundry other elements: a Russian revolution, torture scenes, and cool steampunk nautical hardware. All this Life Aquatic lacks is Steve Zissou!
The Mysterious Island
DVD
The Warner Archive Collection
1929 / B&W / 1:37 flat Academy / 93 min. / Street Date March 26, 2019 / available through the WBshop / 19.99
Starring: Lionel Barrymore, Jane Daly (Jacqueline Gadsdon), Lloyd Hughes, Montagu Love, Harry Gribbon, Snitz Edwards, Gibson Gowland, Dolores Brinkman, Karl Dane, Robert Dudley, Sydney Jarvis, Bob Kortman, Angelo Rossitto.
Cinematography: Percy Hilburn
Film Editor: Carl L. Pierson
Technical Effects: James Basevi, Irving G. Ries, Louis H. Tolhurst
Original Music: Martin Broones,...
The Mysterious Island
DVD
The Warner Archive Collection
1929 / B&W / 1:37 flat Academy / 93 min. / Street Date March 26, 2019 / available through the WBshop / 19.99
Starring: Lionel Barrymore, Jane Daly (Jacqueline Gadsdon), Lloyd Hughes, Montagu Love, Harry Gribbon, Snitz Edwards, Gibson Gowland, Dolores Brinkman, Karl Dane, Robert Dudley, Sydney Jarvis, Bob Kortman, Angelo Rossitto.
Cinematography: Percy Hilburn
Film Editor: Carl L. Pierson
Technical Effects: James Basevi, Irving G. Ries, Louis H. Tolhurst
Original Music: Martin Broones,...
- 5/4/2019
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
The latest release of Lon Chaney's most famous silent classic is a Blu-ray, which allows us to marvel at at the actor's artistry in a beautifully tinted HD image. Erik the Phantom is one of the two or three greatest fantasy makeup performances of all time. The release has three separate encodings, of different versions running at different film speeds. A 1929 recut has the best image, while the original 1925 version is uncut. The Phantom of the Opera Blu-ray Kino Classics / Blackhawk 1925/29 / B&W with tints and Technicolor sequences / 1:37 flat Silent Aperture / 78, 92 and 114 min. / Street Date October 13, 2015 / available through Kino Lorber / 29.95 Starring Lon Chaney, Mary Philbin, Norman Kerry, Arthur Edmund Carewe, Gibson Gowland, John St. Polis, Snitz Edwards. Cinematography Milton Bridenbecker, Virgil Miller, Charles Van Enger Consulting Artist Ben Carré Film Editors Maurice Pivar, Gilmore Walker Original Music Makeup Lon Chaney Written by Elliott J. Clawson from the novel...
- 9/29/2015
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
Ramon Novarro and Greta Garbo in ‘Mata Hari’: The wrath of the censors (See previous post: "Ramon Novarro in One of the Best Silent Movies.") George Fitzmaurice’s romantic spy melodrama Mata Hari (1931) was well received by critics and enthusiastically embraced by moviegoers. The Greta Garbo / Ramon Novarro combo — the first time Novarro took second billing since becoming a star — turned Mata Hari into a major worldwide blockbuster, with $2.22 million in worldwide rentals. The film became Garbo’s biggest international success to date, and Novarro’s highest-grossing picture after Ben-Hur. (Photo: Ramon Novarro and Greta Garbo in Mata Hari.) Among MGM’s 1932 releases — Mata Hari opened on December 31, 1931 — only W.S. Van Dyke’s Tarzan, the Ape Man, featuring Johnny Weissmuller and Maureen O’Sullivan, and Edmund Goulding’s all-star Best Picture Academy Award winner Grand Hotel (also with Garbo, in addition to Joan Crawford, John Barrymore, Wallace Beery, and...
- 8/9/2013
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
Chicago – Audiences cry for many reasons other than sadness. They cry tears of joy, of amusement, of recognition…and of awe. When an artist manages to pull off a groundbreaking technical achievement never before brought to the big screen (or the stage, for that matter), it can elicit a response of overwhelming astonishment. Of course, in the age of digital overkill, such reactions are as rare as original scripts.
Watching Cohen Media Group’s unmissable Blu-ray release of Raoul Walsh’s 1924 masterpiece, “The Thief of Bagdad,” was an experience akin to witnessing the Broadway production of Julie Taymor’s “The Lion King” (which I was lucky enough to catch on a high school trip). The ingenious props and fluid choreography that allowed towering animals to suddenly materialize onstage during the opening “Circle of Life” number caused me to bawl out of sheer exhilaration, and the final, incredible moments of Walsh...
Watching Cohen Media Group’s unmissable Blu-ray release of Raoul Walsh’s 1924 masterpiece, “The Thief of Bagdad,” was an experience akin to witnessing the Broadway production of Julie Taymor’s “The Lion King” (which I was lucky enough to catch on a high school trip). The ingenious props and fluid choreography that allowed towering animals to suddenly materialize onstage during the opening “Circle of Life” number caused me to bawl out of sheer exhilaration, and the final, incredible moments of Walsh...
- 3/1/2013
- by adam@hollywoodchicago.com (Adam Fendelman)
- HollywoodChicago.com
Rudolph Valentino, Agnes Ayres in George Melford's The Sheik Long before they became Hollywood's favorite terrorists, Arabs were generally portrayed as lusty, uncouth, infantile beings in myriad Hollywood movies. Turner Classic Movies returns this month with their annual "Race & Hollywood" film series. The "race" this time around: Arabs. Frank Lloyd's long but generally entertaining 1924 epic The Sea Hawk is almost over. TCM has shown this one before a few times; long-thought lost, The Sea Hawk was restored about a decade ago. Popular leading man Milton Sills stars. Next are two silents starring movie idols of the 1920s: The Thief of Bagdad (1924) and The Sheik (1921). One of Douglas Fairbanks' biggest hits, The Thief of Bagdad was directed by Raoul Walsh; this Arabian Nights romp is probably Fairbanks' most enjoyable vehicle of that era. Quite possibly, it's Fairbanks best movie, period. Starring Rudolph Valentino, who set as many hearts aflutter as Justin Bieber,...
- 7/6/2011
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
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