Yearly Archives: 2013

Mary and Max

Posted on November 10, 2013 by John Grant

The animated and satirical comedy, “Mary and Max,” released in 2009, features two main characters with some very serious problems.  Mary, who lives in a small town in Australia in the 1970s, has a birthmark on her forehead and possesses … Continue reading →

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Nothing Sacred

Posted on November 7, 2013 by John Grant

Carole Lombard and Fredric March are a capable screwball comedy duo in the 1937 Technicolor film “Nothing Sacred.”  Despite requiring 11 writers to work on either the screenplay or the treatment, the film succeeds as a witty newspaper story involving … Continue reading →

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Blancanieves

Posted on November 4, 2013 by John Grant

Silent films tell a story in a different way, with images instead of dialogue, and they rely on those images to convey the emotional depth of the tale.  With the modern reliance on booming sounds and excessive dialogue, it’s nice … Continue reading →

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Of Human Bondage

Posted on November 1, 2013 by John Grant

Bette Davis, so closely associated with Warner Brothers Studios, made her first big splash at RKO Radio Pictures in a 1934 Pandro S. Berman production called “Of Human Bondage.”  Under the capable direction of John Cromwell, Davis enthralls and invigorates … Continue reading →

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A Cottage on Dartmoor

Posted on October 28, 2013 by John Grant

In the opening sequence of “A Cottage on Dartmoor,” a prisoner escapes from jail and races desperately across the moor to an isolated cottage where a woman attends to her infant.  He enters the cottage and waits in the darkness … Continue reading →

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Kansas Silent Film Festival

Posted on October 25, 2013 by John Grant

The 2014 Kansas Silent Film Festival, which takes place in Topeka, Kansas on Friday, February 28 and Saturday, March 1, features a Colleen Moore film from 1926 (“Ella Cinders”), and Marion Davies in the wonderful “The Patsy,” from 1928.  On … Continue reading →

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Shkurnyk

Posted on October 22, 2013 by John Grant

“Shkurnyk,” a silent film from 1929 that I saw at the 2013 Pordenone Silent Film Festival (Giornate del Cinema Muto), is a very funny satire about the civil war in the years following the Russian Revolution.  The title means “The … Continue reading →

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The Little Tramp at 100

Posted on October 19, 2013 by John Grant

The San Francisco Silent Film Festival presents “The Little Tramp at 100:  A Charlie Chaplin Centennial Celebration” on Saturday, January 11, 2014, at the Castro Theater in San Francisco. The program for the event includes the following showings: Our Mutual … Continue reading →

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People Among Each Other

Posted on October 16, 2013 by John Grant

A 1926 German silent film called “Menschen untereinander,” or “People Among Each Other,” employs a handy storytelling device to introduce its characters without the extensive use of title cards.  The story concerns the inhabitants of an apartment building in Berlin, … Continue reading →

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Too Much Johnson

Posted on October 13, 2013 by John Grant

Pordenone, Italy — On October 9, 2013, I had the honor of viewing a short silent film made by Orson Welles, only recently discovered in this great town. The film, “Too Much Johnson,” made in 1938, features a man name … Continue reading →

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