Ben Model’s blog
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I’ve floated a couple trial balloons as projects to test the waters on another one I wanted to do. My first DVD release was not Accidentally Preserved, actually. You may not know about it because I didn’t send out a press release or screeners. I just wanted to get the…
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Finding a Chestnut in a Haystack
The Mack Sennett films released through Paramount in the late ‘teens give you the impression that an effort was underway to take the Keystone format up a level. That is, if you can see one of the Paramounts. Despite who produced them and who released them, they don’t survive well…
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Silent Comedy Laughs
Every once in a while I question something I’ve been saying about the way people react to silent films. It’s usually when one of these responses hasn’t happened for a couple or few years. And then it happens again, and I am re-invigorated with this reaction. This very thing happened…
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16mm Film Collecting on DVDs
Over the last couple years, I’ve had conversations with people who’ve told me how much they like the Accidentally Preserved DVDs I’ve released. Which is really gratifying. What started out as a one-off turned into a short series that wound up as the springboard for Undercrank Productions. Film collectors, in…
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Cliff Bowes Made Lots of Cameos
Every once in a while, a Cliff Bowes comedy turns up. Their rarity and scarcity explains why you probably don’t know who Cliff Bowes is. His one-reel comedies are undeservedly forgotten, but luckily some were accidentally preserved. Cliff Bowes starred in a series of comedies for Educational Pictures, part of…
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Charlie Chaplin, “The Eel”
In going through Chaplin’s The Adventurer for a project I’m working on, I wound up staring at a shot that usually goes by in a couple of seconds. It appears onscreen three times, and only one element is really supposed to register with our eyes and brains. What caught my…
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Live Music at Silent Film Courses
When I started accompanying films it was still common practice to show silent films, well…silent. They were only available in 16mm prints that had no music tracks. That’s changed thanks to DVDs and Blu-rays and video projection, but having live accompaniment in a film class is still important. I play…
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Reeducating Myself About Thomas Ince
I knew of Thomas Ince as part of the triumvirate that was the short-lived Triangle Film Company. I’d played for an Ince series at MoMA about ten years ago. Until my current Douglas MacLean project brought his name and work to the fore in my consciousness, that had been pretty…
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Silents for Seniors
I don’t remember how or when I came up with the idea of doing silent film shows at senior living facilities. On the surface, this may not sound all that exciting in terms of the sheen of Show Business or resume-building, but something a senior said to me at one…
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Ben Model’s Podcast
Every once in a while, after one of my shows, someone will come up to me and ask me if I’m writing a book about silent film accompaniment. My answer is that I’m not, although this blog is pretty close to doing just that. But it wasn’t always…and that’s why…