Magpie_1

Here is two clips from my favorite Charlie Chaplin films.

This one is titled The Circus. Charlie's Tramp character finds himself at a circus where he is promptly gets chased around by the police who think he is a pickpocket. Running into the ringmaster, he is an accidental sensation with his hilarious efforts to elude the police The Tramp has been asked by the ringmaster to do an audition for his comedy act. During the audition they show The Tramp what the comedy skit looks like then he is to reenact it.


This one is titled The Kid. What has happened so far, Edna deposits her new baby with a pleading note in a limousine and goes off to commit suicide. The limo is stolen by thieves who dump the baby by a garbage can. Charlie's Tramp character finds the baby and makes a home for him. Five years later Edna has become an opera star but does charity work for slum youngsters in hope of finding her boy. A doctor called by Edna discovers the note with the truth about the Kid and reports it to the authorities who come to take him away from The Tramp.


Dose anyone else have some favorite silent films to share?

__________________
"Art is what you can get away with."
- Andy Warhol

Baraka_Guru

Metropolis (1927):

It is as masterful of science fiction as Chaplin's films were of comedy.

__________________
Knowing that death is certain and that the time of death is uncertain, what's the most important thing?
—Bhikkhuni Pema Chödrön

Humankind cannot bear very much reality.
—From "Burnt Norton," Four Quartets (1936), T. S. Eliot

settie

I second Baraka's response. I love metropolis. Incredible film.

Willravel

I love Metropolis as well. And the original Phantom of the Opera (the Lon Chaney version, the best, imho). I never really made time to get into silent films, though. And I still get mad when people talk during them.

little_tippler

I haven't seen Metropolis but it looks amazing! Thanks for that.

I don't know that many silent movies but I do enjoy them. Of course Charlie Chaplin is an easy one to love. I quite like this clip from the film Modern Times.



This movie, 'Sunrise; A Song of Two Humans' is also one of the more interesting silent films I have come across. The story is about a farmer who meets a woman from the city who he falls for, and who then convinces him he must kill his wife to be with her and move to the city. Unusual for the time. Also this film is shot in a very realistic way, in terms of the acting, and has interesting effects.

__________________
Whether we write or speak or do but look
We are ever unapparent. What we are
Cannot be transfused into word or book.
Our soul from us is infinitely far.
However much we give our thoughts the will
To be our soul and gesture it abroad,
Our hearts are incommunicable still.
In what we show ourselves we are ignored.
The abyss from soul to soul cannot be bridged
By any skill of thought or trick of seeming.
Unto our very selves we are abridged
When we would utter to our thought our being.
We are our dreams of ourselves, souls by gleams,
And each to each other dreams of others' dreams.

Fernando Pessoa, 1918

mixedmedia

My favorite silent film is The Crowd by King Vidor - you can watch the entire film on Youtube, but it has not been released on DVD.


Then there is Greed by Erich von Stroheim, also not available on DVD. You can watch this one in its entirety on Youtube, as well.


I also enjoy Napoleon by Abel Gance, but unfortunately they do not have a clip on Youtube.

__________________
Most people go through life dreading they'll have a traumatic experience. Freaks were born with their trauma. They've already passed their test in life. They're aristocrats. - Diane Arbus
PESSIMISM, n. A philosophy forced upon the convictions of the observer by the disheartening prevalence of the optimist with his scarecrow hope and his unsightly smile. - Ambrose Bierce

squeeeb

buster keaton eat's charlie chaplin for breakfast..


and harold lloyd for lunch

__________________
onward to mayhem!

mixedmedia

yes, I love Buster Keaton...there is a great documentary about him...can't remember the name of it, though.

__________________
Most people go through life dreading they'll have a traumatic experience. Freaks were born with their trauma. They've already passed their test in life. They're aristocrats. - Diane Arbus
PESSIMISM, n. A philosophy forced upon the convictions of the observer by the disheartening prevalence of the optimist with his scarecrow hope and his unsightly smile. - Ambrose Bierce

sapiens

I really like The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari


My favorite Buster Keaton film is Steamboat Bill, Jr. It's one of my favorite films.

roachboy

dr. caligari is great.

so's nosferatu


this goes to the whole film.

the fall of the house of usher (the whole thing with some bizarre-o english speaking voice)


dreyer's vampyr (small but very cool sequence)


melies was awesome too. this is the courtship of the sun & moon


here's another clip of his:

__________________
a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite