Ben Model’s blog
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On this episode, Ben Model talks about creating and performing a live score on theatre organ for the 1931 “Dracula” with Bela Lugosi, shares some insights about programming the “Silent Comedy International” series at MoMA, and discusses why playing at a suburban library is just as important as playing a…
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Home Movie Day Goes Sledding
I’d almost forgotten about the home movie gem I posted a few years ago. Southwest Silents on Twitter @SWSilents has been tweeting a Silent Film Xmas Advent, finding holiday-related silents online and sharing them. They’ve already posted two discoveries that I’d scored and posted to my YouTube channel. One was…
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Is Copyright All Right?
Imagine my surprise walking home from the C train tonight, listening to the newest episode of Seth Godin’s podcast “Akimbo“, and hearing my own voice. Last week, Seth Godin discussed the current status, validity, importance and relevance of copyright on his podcast “Akimbo”. It’s a topic I grapple with myself,…
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Red Noses in Black & White: Clowns in Silent Movies
For a clown, a real honest-to-goodness Clown, the core of what they are doing is rooted in the honest, raw, vulnerable connection they create and have with the audience members. This is the source of where the laughs come from. The costuming and make-up are an extension or exaggeration of…
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Arbuckle-Spotting, or: What Emma Clifton and I Saw Last Night
The things you see during a silent film show when you’re the one who’s closest to the screen! As a film accompanist, I’m constantly scanning the frame for information while I’m playing. Impending story developments can be introduced in different areas of a shot while other action is happening in…
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The Lighthouse and the Sidecar Get it Right
“The Lighthouse and the Sidecar” is a nickname that is probably more catchy in its original language, Danish. Evoking two things that are pretty much extinct doesn’t help either. But this was how many people in Scandinavia and maybe Europe referred to Fy & By (pron. FEE eh BEE), who…
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“Jimmy Aubrey Comedy” is Not Always an Oxymoron
Worries and Wobbles (1917) has what might appear to be three strikes against it on the surface: “Jimmy Aubrey comedy”, “directed by Larry Semon” and that it’s a rather blatant knock-off of Chaplin’s One A.M.. The first of these is also usually an oxymoron. I can tell you that, like…
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Charles Puffy’s Film Career Sandwich
You may know that face. No, it’s not Roscoe “Fatty” Arbuckle. Nor is it Oliver Hardy, sans mustache, nor is it Otto Fries, or any of the other lesser-known plus-size comedians of the silent era. This performer was in over 130 films from 1913 to 1939 — Destiny, Dr. Mabuse:…
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Leo McCarey, Charley Chase and René Clair Walk Into a Bar…
Rene Clair’s Last Silent Completes the Boomerang Arc of French Comedies To America and Back (image above sourced from SFSFF press/downloads page, whose image credit reads “Poster courtesy of the Cinémathèque Française”) There are a few occasions I can recall from many years ago when, after playing for a film…
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Looking for Squibs
Two main elements in film programming, I’ve found, are knowing the films and knowing where prints of them are. The rest, to a certain degree, is setting the table or parking cars in a lot. Sometimes the prints turn up in unlikely places, and one film we scheduled for Silent…