Categories
This Film Is More Than 100 Years Old

Skating In Oulton Broad (1922)

Skating In Oulton Broad is a minute of home-filmed footage of people skating on the frozen lake of the title, in Lowestoft, in 1922.

There is beauty in the badly framed, endless wonder in the out of focus, entire worlds built up through every decade of decay, hiding there in those undignified ruins at the end of every sliver of film.

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Notes

1. I watched this on the BFI Player.

2. Recently I was reading about the restoration of an old painting at the National Gallery

3. How in their restorations they removed all traces of life and wonder from what they had.

4. And often too I think about the weird hypnotic beauty of the Salvator Mundi

5. Before they scrubbed him clean of any sense of mysticism.

6. And of course no one’s going to try and upgrade these skaters into 4k ultra HD

7. Every blemish digitally erased until everything is as sharp as the eye can see

8. (Although maybe if they were French…)

9. But if they do

10. All we’ll be left with is

11. Nothing much at all.

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Film Information

Title: Skating On Oulton Broad
Year: 1922
Duration: 1 minute
Watch: BFI Player

Categories
This Film Is 100 Years Old

Various Bits Of Football News (1923)

A round-up of up to the minute football news, live from 1923.

First, in a news piece entitled £6,000 Paid For A Centre Forward, we discover Chelsea have broken the transfer record to sign some randomised player who, from the wonderful 30 second portrait of him at the start (see above), already seems to be deeply regretting his life choices.

Then, in They Call It Football, we discover that Spurs are no better than a bunch of clowns (see below). Poor old Spurs.

More live football news as and when I receive it.

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Notes

1. I watched all these on the BFI Player.

2. I watched some 100 year old football on here a couple of years ago too, which you can read about here.

3. When Spurs weren’t clowns, due to the year ending in 1.

4. Not that that numerical trick works these days anymore

5. That Spurs charity match footage also features a nice bit of “Ceremonial kick-off” footage.

6. Which seems to have been retired ever since Diana Ross brought shame upon such antics at the 1994 World Cup.

7. But which in 1923 was still all the rage.

8. There’s a particularly fine example of it here.

9. In which the Lord Mayor of Manchester looks spectacularly pleased with himself for managing to kick a football of its spot without messing the task up at all.

10. “Look at his face! Just look at his face!” etc etc

11. (Also there’s a few minutes of extra bonus early 1923 football footage here)

12. (Which I completely forgot to add)

13. (Or grab any screenshots from)

14. (But I’ve mentioned it now so it’s okay)

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Film Information

Title: £6,000 Paid For A Centre Forward
Year: 1923
Duration: 1 minute
Watch: BFI Player

Title: They Call It Football
Year: 1923
Duration: 1 minute
Watch: BFI Player

Title: Million Spectators Welcome Return of Football
Year: 1923
Duration: 2 minuts
Watch: BFI Player

Title: 4th Round Of The Cup 1923
Year: 1923
Duration: 2 minutes
Watch: BFI Player

Categories
This Film Is More Than 100 Years Old

Dogs Of High Degree (1922)

This is a piece of newsreel footage of some dogs at some dog show or other in 1922. One whole minute of dogs follows (also includes some owners). They’re nice dogs, I reckon. And at least 100 years old.

That last dog there is billed as the smallest dog in the world, but I’m pretty sure it’s not and never was. The little liar.

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Notes

1. I watched this on the BFI Player

2. I have little extra information to add.

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Film Information

Title: Dogs Of High Degree
Year: 1922
Duration: 1 minute
Watch: BFI Player

Categories
This Film Is 100 Years Old

Merry-Go-Round (1923)

Merry-Go-Round is a 1923 film directed by Erich von Stroheim and Rupert Julian, starring Norman Kerry as the marvellously named Count Hohenegg, who falls in love with Mary Philbin’s beautiful organ grinder at the local fair.

This was intended to be Erich von Stroheim’s follow up to the magnificent Foolish Wives, and indeed shares a lot in terms of themes and plot, but after a troubled start to production, von Stroheim was fired, as described in this pretty amazing sentence from the article on wikipedia:

“After a number of delays in filming, including the derailment of a prop streetcar, the overloading of the studio electrical system due to excessive night shooting, an inebriated lead man, the general disaffection of the extras, and delays caused by a search for an appropriate orangutan, the upper echelon at Universal mobilized against von Strohiem, and Thalberg was authorized to terminate von Stroheim as director.”

After that he was replaced with Rupert Julian (who later directed the Lon Chaney version of The Phantom of The Opera in 1925), and whether that’s the cause or not, Merry-Go-Round’s kind of limp and lifeless, and fairly disappointing, especially in comparison to Foolish Wives.

Although as much of the strength of that is in Erich von Stroheim’s performance, maybe it wasn’t his sacking as director which was the problem but their refusal to hire him as an actor. His replacement here, Norman Kerry, is hilariously inert as a leading man, which kind of undermines the romance angle entirely here.

Anyway, having said that, it’s not all bad. Mary Philbin has a wonderfully expressive face (which is just as well, as about tow thirds of the film seems to be close ups of her as she suffers through just aboute every emotion possible), there’s some nice scenes at the funfair, and they did indeed find a suitable orangutan.

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Notes

1. I watched this on Mubi. I took the screenshots from this identical (but lower quality) copy on youtube.

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Film Information

Title: Merry-Go-Round
Directors: Erich von Stroheim, Rupert Julian
Year: 1923
Duration: 1 hour 53 minutes
Watch: youtube

Categories
This Film Is 100 Years Old

Nanook Of The North (1922)

Nanook of The North is a documentary film, directed by Robert J. Flaherty in 1922, about the Inuit hunter Nanook and his family living in the Arctic north of Canada.

Considered a groundbreaking feat of film making at the time, Nanook Of The North follows “Nanook” and his family through what is presented as a few typical days/weeks in the life of a small family group of Inuit hunters. Bookended with starkly beautiful shots of the Arctic wilderness, in between we get to see them trade and hunt, eat and play, build igloos and pet dogs.

A lot of this isn’t “real” as such, (according to this wikipedia article, several scenes were staged, and anything considered too modern was left out of the film), but it’s certainly effective, creating an evocative image of enduring family solidarity in the face of the unforgiving bleakness of Arctic desolation.

(These duplicitous techniques are still used now, obviously, in everything from nature documentaries to news footage. I remember going to the Olympics in 2012, and while sat in front of one of the screens in the Olympic park, TV crews went up and down the line handing out Rebecca Adlington and Andy Murray masks to small groups of bystanders, filmed these supers fans spontaneously and vociferously supporting their heroes, then went back down the line and took their masks back. The bastards.)

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Notes

1. I watched this on Mubi, but grabbed the screenshots from youtube.

2. The Mubi version was a 1998 restoration with a soundtrack by Timothy Brock.

3. But apart from that I think it’s basically the same as that youtube version.

4. This film contains a lot of animal death (seals, walruses, fish, a fox), by the way.

5. So maybe give it a miss if you’re of a sensitive disposition.

6. Like me.

7. Prone to imagining you’re some poor old walrus bellowing in confusion and fear as you get harpooned to death in the waves.

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Film Information

Title: Nanook Of The North
Director: Robert J. Flaherty
Year: 1922
Duration: 78 minutes
Watch: youtube

Categories
This Film Is 100 Years Old

‘If Winter Comes’ – It Has! (1923)

A full minute of winter from 1923, including horse drawn snow ploughs and some people sledging down a hill in Buxton, Derbyshire.

That’s a lot of snow. And a lot of horses. (Yet not many sledgers).

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Notes

1. I watched this on the BFI Player

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Film Information

Title: ‘If Winter Comes’ – It Has!
Year: 1923
Duration: 1 minute
Watch: BFI Player

Categories
This Film Is 100 Years Old

Haxan (1922)

Haxan is a 1922 documentary directed by Benjamin Christensen that explores and depicts the history of witchcraft and witch hunts in the middle ages.

Using various devices such as stills of medieval woodcuts and manuscripts, dramatisations of actual events, recreations of recollections, stop motion animations, and some pretty lurid sex and nudity (by 1920s standards, at least), Haxan isn’t so much a documentary as a near two hour nightmare, surprisingly unsettling in many ways, not least the wholly demented behaviour of the witch-hunting clerics and monks.

This was banned on release across a lot of Europe, and in America too, just as much for it having the temerity to portray the church as absurdly evil as for its nudity and naughtiness (there’s a wonderful scene of the witches all giving Satan a surprisingly chaste kiss on the arse).

Even a hundred years later there’s still a strange, mesmerising power to its imagery, the ferocity of the performances and the sheer strange delight in some of the black mass scenes that’s kind of unsettling, a weird energy that’s impossible to ignore.

The final section, where it contrasts witch hunt mania to 20th century psychiatric diagnoses of female hysteria, feels startlingly modern, too, after all that’s gone before, and ends the film on a fittingly upsetting note.

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Notes

1. I watched this on an old Tartan Video DVD.

2. Which contained two versions – the original 1922 version, with Danish intertitles (basically this youtube version that I took the screenshots from), and various different soundtracks (included what supposedly was the original score from its premiere), and a 1968 American re-edited version called Witchcraft Through The Ages, with a William Burroughs narration and a wonderfully demented 60s jazz soundtrack.

3. I hadn’t seen that version before and it was wonderful, especially the nice stark black and white look, which I like a lot more than the red tinting on the majority of the 1922 version.

4. And William Burroughs has the best voice. He really does.

5. Anyway I’d seen this a couple of times before.

6. Once was the original version on Film Four a few years back.

7. And the other time was about ten years ago in a pub in Chelmsford, where a textless edit of the film was being projected onto a sheet while a very loud band played a live soundtrack to it very loudly.

8. Which was wonderful obviously

9. I have no idea who the band were I’m afraid.

10. They sounded quite a lot like Earth

11. But they were not Earth.

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Film Information

Title: Haxan
Director: Benjamin Christensen
Year: 1922
Duration: 1 hour 46 minutes
Watch: youtube; Mark Kermode BFI Intro

Categories
This Film Is More Than 100 Years Old

Scrooge, or Marley’s Ghost (1901) / The Death of Poor Joe (1900)

Scrooge, Or Marley’s Ghost is the oldest Christmas Carol adaptation on film, ade in 1901 by WR Booth (who directed a few other films I’ve already reviewed here, if you’re interested in).

This is a very quick run through of A Christmas Carol, assuming the audience already knows the story, and instead simply condensing the whole thing down into five scenes (although unfortunately the last one seems to have been lost at some point in the century since).

But still, we get the three visions of past, present and future, with some nice early double exposure trick shots to help portray the ghosts, and some good overacting from Scrooge (I especially like his “Look! It’s me!” turn to the camera when he sees the scene from his past).

Because it’s so short, this is fairly slight all round, but it’s pretty charming nonetheless, and I like how utterly delighted the children in Bob Cratchit’s scene seem to be. I was also kind of surprised to see the word ‘Xmas’ here, but apparently that’s hundreds of years old and not some relatively modern invention like I’d obviously previously assumed. Maybe X isn’t quite the futuristically cool letter I’d always thought it to be.

Now, while Scrooge was the oldest Christmas Carol adaptation, the oldest Dickens film is the (very short) Death Of Poor Joe, which was made a year or so earlier, in 1900. A whole minute of ultra misery, this recreates a single scene from Bleak House, and there’s not much to say about it really (I have never read Bleak House, so the full sadness of the situation is lost on me, I’m afraid).

But for completeness’s sake I have included it here.

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Notes

1. I watched Scrooge, Or Marley’s Ghost on the BFI Player

2. But it’s also on youtube if you can’t see the BFI Player version.

3. Although that version seems to be played at double the speed of the one on the BFI site.

4. I don’t know why.

5. Also I watched this while listening to this version of Merry Christmas Mr Lawrence by Ryuichi Sakamoto, which seemed to fit rather nicely.

6. Although it’s such a lovely bit of music it probably fits nicely with everything.

7. Also, I watched The Death Of Poor Joe on the BFI Player too.

8. And that’s available on youtube too.

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Film Information

Title: Scrooge, or Marley’s Ghost
Director: WR Booth
Year: 1901
Duration: 6 minutes
Watch: BFI Player; youtube

Title: The Death Of Poor Joe
Director: GA Smith
Year: 1900
Duration: 1 minutes
Watch: BFI Player; youtube

Categories
This Film Is 100 Years Old

Felix In The Swim (1922) / Felix Comes Back (1922)

Here we have two different 100year old Felix The Cat cartoons, both of which are directed by Margaret J. Winkler, who took over producing duties from Pat Sullivan and Paramount Pictures in 1922 and made over 60 Felix The Cat cartoons between then and 1925.

I’ve never quite worked out why Felix The Cat was so wildly popular for so long (it’s not that he’s necessarily bad, it’s just that he’s not that good), and Felix In The Swim (one of 17 Felix The Cat cartoons released in 1922 alone) doesn’t really do much to illuminate things, with some pretty charmless visuals, inert jokes and consistently bad comic timing (although the mice playing the piano are lovely).

Felix Comes Back, though, from later in the year, is much better, with better animation, funnier jokes, some inventive mild surrealism, and a penguin in the Arctic (where all the best cartoon penguins live).

So, if you’re going to watch one hundred year old Felix The Cat cartoon today, make it that one. Or maybe one of the other fifteen, who knows.

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Notes

1. I watched both of these on youtube. Felix In The Swim has added sound effects and music, which don’t actually add that much, while Felix Comex Back is nice and silent, just as nature intended.

2. I previously reviewed a couple of earlier Felix The Cat cartoons on here: Feline Follies (1919) and Frolics At The Circus (1920).

3. Oddly, the title of Felix Comes Back spoils the final joke (when Felix does indeed come back).

4. But maybe they were worried you’d think he was trapped in the Arctic forever otherwise.

5. And didn’t want anyone to become upset.

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Film Information

Title: Felix In The Swim
Director: Otto Messmer
Year: 1922
Duration: 7 minutes
Watch: youtube

Title: Felix Comes Back
Director: Otto Messmer
Year: 1922
Duration: 7 minutes
Watch: youtube

Categories
This Film Is More Than 100 Years Old

The Cameraman’s Revenge (1912)

The Cameraman’s Revenge is a Russian animation from 1912, directed by Ladislas Starevich, in which he uses stop motion animated dead insects to tell a slightly baffling tale of infidelity, voyeurism and revenge, for some reason.

Two beetles in a loveless marriage run off whenever they can to have affairs, one with an artist (another beetle), the other with a showgirl (a dragonfly), while the projectionist at the local cinema (he’s a grasshopper, I think) uses his camera to film the showgirl’s affair through the keyhole in the hotel door.

Then there’s just about enough time for some fist fights and confrontations and other odd convolutions of plot before we reach the end.

Anyway, and unsurprisingly, I liked this a lot. The animation’s great (although the picture quality is terrible, so obscures a lot of it), there’s some wonderful touches (especially when everyone goes to the cinema and their watching the scenes we’ve already seen projected onto their little cinema screen), and it’s surprisingly prescient in it’s prediction of mobile phone and hidden camera voyeurism, although the idea that the local cinema would be where you showed all this rather than on the grottier corners of the internet is quite wide of the mark.

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Notes

1. I watched this on youtube.

2. There’s probably other versions available.

3. And hopefully better quality ones somewhere (although I didn’t find any).

4. This is one of the problems of watching old films on the internet, all the general degradations of film over time combined with video conversion fuzziness and youtube compression artefacts until everything’s a complete visual mess.

5. Which is a shame, because I expect this looked incredible at the time.

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Film Information

Title: The Cameraman’s Revenge
Director: Ladislas Starevich
Year: 1912
Duration: 13 minutes
Watch: youtube