An Important Figure in Talkies Leaves Us an Intriguing Clue About Projection Speeds in the Silent Film Era As much as one may look at silent film the 1920s and feel like they are being run too fast, it’s important… Read More »Faster Than the Speed of Sound
I knew it. I just knew it. I’ve been looking for years for written evidence that silent film actors had to adjust the way they moved to compensate for the speed-up of silent film. It has always appeared to have… Read More »Undercranking’s “smoking gun” courtesy of Milton Sills
I sit about ten feet from the screen when I play for Chaplin’s “The Immigrant” at the Museum of the Moving Image at their education programs. Watching this film in a sharp 35mm print several times every year, I’d started… Read More »new Chaplin clip deconstructed – “The Immigrant”
Mar 6: played for Lloyd’s The Freshman at MoMA. Had a pretty full house and the film went over really well. This is the 3rd time I’ve gotten to play for it in the last several months. While it’s one… Read More »Mar 6: The Freshman at MoMA
Here’s a clip I just (finally) uploaded to YouTube. It’s one of the studies I did for my talk at the Clown Theater Festival last fall, Undercranking: The Magic Behind the Slapstick. There are a few others I need to… Read More »Chaplin undercranking study – boxing
Don’t know if I’ve mentioned this here before, but I’ve been making a study of silent comedy filmmaking and how undercranking was utilized. I’ve discovered the comedians not only knew the film they shot would be shown faster, but they… Read More »undercranking clip: Keaton