sport – This Film Is 100 Years Old

Tennis And How To Play It is a 15-minute quasi-instructional film about how to play tennis starring 1920s tennis superstar Suzanne Lenglen.

Roughly divided into two parts, the first half is mostly Suzanne Lenglen playing actual tennis outside, with the second half largely her in the film studio, recreating her shots in front of some slow motion cameras.

There’s also considerable interest in her celebrity (unsurprisingly), so the actual tennis stuff is interspersed with footage of her arriving at the club in a very large car, signing autographs in an amazingly huge fur coat, doing her make-up (next to her very bronzed looking father), and just staring happily at the camera for a bit, stroking her racquet like it’s some sort of pet.

The slow motion sections reminded me (especially in it’s use of slow motion) of Taris, 1930s film about the swimmer Jean Taris (directed by Jean Vigo), although not as beautiful (as elegant as Suzanne Lenglen is, her service action, even slowed down to a tenth of it’s speed, is never going to be as mesmerising to watch as slow motion water, it’s bubbles and splashes, ripples and waves).

Meanwhile, Little Lenglens is a single minute of news footage from the same year, featuring some girls playing tennis over the park.

There’s not that much to say about this, really, although I do like seeing how even kids weren’t allowed to escape the cumbersome trappings of 1920s tennis gear (including the boys seemingly having to play – or at least watch – in their blazers).

And that’s all the tennis.

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Notes

1. I watched both of these for free on the BFI Player (Tennis and How To Play It; Little Lenglens)

2. I couldn’t find either of them on youtube, unfortunately, if for some reason you can’t watch these on the BFI player.

3. Although there’s lots of other videos of Suzanne Lenglen on there which you might like.

4. Some of them, shockingly, not even 100 years old.

5. I made sure to shield my eyes from such glimpses of the future, of course.

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Film Information

Title: Tennis And How To Play It
Year: 1922
Duration: 15 minutes
Watch: BFI Player

Title: Little Lenglens
Year: 1922
Duration: 1 minute
Watch: BFI Player

Here’s two minutes of a Christmas Day hockey match, from exactly 100 years ago, in Wales.

I like the hats, and the general easy cheerfulness of everyone involved, and the air guitar using hockey sticks, and everyone smoking, even while playing sports, which has always been one of my favourite things

And the idea that human contact was once allowed is surprisingly moving these days after all.

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Notes

1. I watched this on the BFI Player

2. (Note how there’s NO SNOW)

3. Or even seemingly any winter coats.

4. Also this is the second 100 year old film from Rhyl I’ve watched this year (see also the terrifying Mr. And Mrs. Jones Visit To Bracing Sunny Rhyl, North Wales, somewhere down that page.)

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Film Information

Title: Christmas Day Sports at Rhyl, 1920
Year: 1920
Runtime: 2 minutes
Watch: BFI Player